The flights, from the train!

Travelling by train in the night can be proven as an absolute bliss given certain coincidences as following. 

You manage to get the lower berth, most important than that is you manage to seat yourself next to the window. Getting seated in your allocated seat needs to be hardly fought for at times, especially if you are travelling from northern India to southern part. The train crosses so many states, you get to travel along with people from all those states, that makes you all of a sudden realize the diversity in the Indian culture and people about which you must have studied in the early schooling days. That must be a moon light night, moon shall at least be shining more than half. The train crosses the river or a canal which is wider enough to see the waves. From the window, you be able to capture the scenery of the night. The water waves in the silver shade shine from a distance. You be dumbstruck! Well, this is one of the blissful moments. Likewise, everyone of us must have had something or the other of equivalent experiences. 

In the recent train journey, I've experienced another scene. This is not that typical one as above that I can ask you to recall one such that you had. Of course I managed to seat myself next to the window. I was travelling from Pune to Trivandrum; hence fortunately I needed not to fight much to grab my very own seat. Our train was crossing Pune, it was about to leave the last stop of Pune. From the window I spotted a flight in the blinking lights. After looking at the angle with which the flight was travelling, I took at least a minute to understand that the flight was actually landing in the Pune airport and was not just took off. Following my habit of eyeing the plane until its disappearance from the sight, I kept looking at it. It reached the run way, the height of it was so low that I could no more spot it from the train anymore. I thought the pilot must have landed yet another flight to add up to his experience. 

I was not yet out of the thoughts about that flight, and suddenly I saw another flight moving ahead in the same direction to land. This one was, may be, a minute away from the earlier flight. I then followed it again to keep eyeing it until it reached the runway! Immediately after that I jumped into the thoughts about my memories from my previous visit to Delhi. Our cab did not even move more than half a kilometer, there were two flights already crossed our cab to be successfully landed in the International terminal. Along the rest of our cab journey, I kept watching the sky only to spot the flights, one after the other, getting ready for landing. India is still 'the developing country', what must be the time difference between the landing of two flights in a developed country! I wonder if that's a worthy comparison!

After I saw the two flights from the train, and after I was done with the recollection of my 'Delhi' memories, my wish to spot yet another flight climbed up. I kept looking for one. Only after almost fifteen minutes of not being able make at least one flight, I discovered that I actually had to look further up in the sky, and in angle, to be able to spot a flight, as our train was moving away from Pune and hence from the airport. At that particular location, flight might still be up in the air as it would be minutes before it dripping down for its landing. 

I could go back to listening to music and sleep only after I spotted another flight up in the sky. I wondered how physics, the subject that must have almost killed many of us in plus two days, could be forgotten when it was supposed to be applied. And I'm going to remember this for the rest of my life, in all train journeys. May be that's why they say, experience is the best teacher!

Book: half girlfriend

Author: Chetan Bhagat

The title of the book did not impress me when I heard of it for the first time. 'Half Girlfriend' appeared to be the story of a girl who was halfhearted in her relationship. I also thought that this story had been probably narrated by a boy about his so called half girlfriend. One more reason why I delayed reading this book was the news I had read from the internet saying that a Bollywood movie was being planned based on the story of this book. I thought watching the movie will save at least three hours of my time. But the recent big billion day sale in 'flipkart' had assured I ordered this book for 99 bucks. We ladies buy mostly everything if there is a discount offer to it or at least something comes free along with.  

Initial two pages of the story proved that the decision I had taken on the big billion day made some sense, if not entirely correct. Mention of the 'journals of a dead woman' do create the all needed over-enthusiasm to make you delay your food routine. The story telling skill of the author definitely deserves a pat on the back. Because I had heard about the movie-plan off the novel, every line that I read and every situation made me imagine the typical Bollywood movie scenes. At few instances I actually searched for the actress who suits best for the 'heroine' role of the story narrated in the book, I could not be successful although. 

Yet another fiction work from Chetan Bhagat! A typical, of his type, fiction. As the story was about a half girlfriend, the author could not bring in the hard core romantic scenes in between. However, he could manage to hold the readers, at least me, to the story line. Narration was not so great, to be honest, so as the middle portion of the story. It bored me to the core when all of a sudden the heroine was out of the story for a while in between. Basketball was a good choice to build the story around in a college environment. No other game could probably have been a better choice for the theme of the story. 

The last part of the story was the best. Frankly, that's like a second-life for this novel. Since the story was to be built around almost ten years, there were certain sudden jumps the author had to take. To an extent they were wisely chosen. Bill Gates episode was too much to the plot. Well, I'm more interested in knowing who will play this role or how the director is going to change this particular episode of the story while making the movie. Anyone can be imagined while you read through, picturization is somewhat different I guess. 

Whatever, it was a good read. An interesting one to be specific. Although not the entire story but some twists of the story made me unable to keep the book aside and do something else! For me, 'Five point someone' and '2 states' still remain the best of Chetan Bhagat's novels so far. Awaiting another cracker of a fiction from him! 

Team delivers... Take Hone #356

A job can be started by a person, but to accomplish it in a fulfilling way, a team is definitely required. It's not just about setting goals, but it is also about planning it out in terms of resources that matters in winning businesses. After all, what a team can deliver is, most of the times, more than what an individual can contribute, or should I say 'always'!

Post-1100: A special dedication

Time changes.

Life moves on.

People come and go. 

Memories remain.

Love remains.

You gave your everything to us.

You gave up many things for us. 

You were always there with us,

You kept us united, as a family.

I could not do to you anything in return.

Except loving you back so much. 

My dear loving Grand-ma,

Love you so much!

Thank you for everything. 

Owe you a lot!

I miss you so much. 

PS: This is in loving memory of my grand-ma. I dedicate to her this 1100th post at my blog, written on her 12th death anniversary, tears being the witness! 

Relaxation... Take Home #355

A deep wish for relaxation is the strongest hurdle between success and yet another start, which shall be crossed in style by planning it perfectly and also by realizing the fact that relaxation does not help in defending one's own success feat. 

It's not that you should not relax anytime. It must be done in a highly controlled manner.

Congratulations to the Asian games medalists!

Firstly, congratulations to the Asian games metallists from India and all other countries. Podium finish is never easy. It takes lot many hard practice sessions and too many sacrifices in personal life. Yet, there have been players and their coaches who have done their best to come out well in the recently held 17th Asian games. Congratulations to them once again! 

Out of all the medals India have won, the one which has inspired is the good medal won be M C Mary Kom. By saying that I have no intentions of conveying that the rest of the medals are not valuable. It's just that I'm most touched emotionally by this medal superbly won by this woman. That's a real come back to the boxing ring. It will become one of the best come backs of sporting world, if she manages to wi an Olympic gold at the Rio Olympics 2016. All the best to her. 

Hockey team played their best sport in the past few weeks. Absolutely unexpected yet the most cherishing and satisfying. When they were on the podium and when the national anthem was played, it was one of the best experiences I ever had. May be it's too much to say it now, but I'm hopeful of a medal at the Olympics. Also, I hope this team will not take this win to head. Kabaddi is the sport I have a special affection for. Those moments of witnessing our school team practicing it hard for the zonal games from a closer distance and encouraging them to win it at the zonals just come to my mind every time I think of kabaddi. Those were some of the beautiful moments from my school days. Kabaddi teams won the gold medals as expected although not in the expected manner. Iranian teams played really well to put forward a tough fight. They will definitely, I think, take these losses seriously and will try to put forward their best in the upcoming games at Jakarta. Indian teams must prepare themselves very well by being extremely careful and aware of the opponents. 

4*400 m relay gold win run by the girls was fantastic. It's not that easy to win it for the fourth time consecutively. That too after all the misery the team had to go through after the ban they had to face in 2011. Well done girls, keep it up. Again, this is one of the events to look forward at the Rio Olympics. Seems Poonia got a life stabilising medal. She must have already been geared up for the practice sessions for Olympics. She must be consistent in her throws.

Every medal is important and hard fought in the games. Although the Indian squad could not manage to get more medals than last year, they have got some important ones this time. Saket Myneni and Sania Mirza did well. Appreciate the decision of Mirza. Badminton squad disappointed. So as the weight lifting, boxing, shooting etc. Abhinav Bindra's retirement decision surprised me. Good that he is still thinking of the next Olympics.

All in all, that's a good show by the team. But the fact is that it's incomparable to that is the Chana's, our neighbours. Wonderful show they did perform. All appreciation to the facilities created by the authorities. Indian authorities must benchmark this. Hope they do. 

MOM... A history, designed and created by Indian Scientists!

There have been many emotional moments round the country since the news was aired that India's Mars Orbiter Machine had been steered successfully into the orbit of the red planet. It's definitely a history created, a pure indigenous to be specific. Along with every other Indian, I'm too proud of this spectacular achievement of the Indian Space Research Organization. This project now has become a benchmark for many projects of  many other domains and not just space research. A well versed and truth filled book about the MOM will surely help the next as well as current generations. Hope to read one soon.

Congratulations to the team worked for this mission. I've read about the design accuracy needed for this mission to get accomplished especially when the MOM enters the orbit of Mars. Hats off to the team work and to the leadership.

There have been enough articles about the technical details of this mission. As always, I keep my post only to the point of my experience with MOM's success.

It felt great to see the Indian Prime Minister coming down all the way to watch the historic moment live. His speech later made every Indian recognize the importance of this mission. 'MOM never disappoints' was awesome too! It felt as if the country was in safe hands and most importantly under the rule of an inspiring leader, after a long time. A leader, who not just speaks but does it commendably. Thank you Mr. Modi, for that short yet memorable one.

When the mission was first launched, frankly, I thought, let's see if this MOM really survives for so many months in space. I had no idea what was the main aim of it. Over a period of time, especially since past few weeks, I started following its news. It's like this. Watching a movie not on its first day but after it is tagged as one of the biggest hits. Or may be like, following the news about a sports personality who is in news for a tremendous performance and who was no one before that. In India, Bollywood and Sports occupy half portion of the news. And why not? After all they interest to an extent that whichever is the topic, these two items do come in between, like the way I mentioned them as an example above while writing about world's first of its kind mission, produced by the Indian Scientists, Managers and work-force. 

As I said above, MOM's success story now has become a benchmark. In many of the recent discussions and debates, MOM was shown as an example, saying that if MOM happened, anything can happen! That's pretty much correct, but only if the intent and the hard work do match to that of the staff worked for MOM. Hope, MOM becomes the benchmark world wide by performing its intended job roaming around the red planet. ISRO must become an organization, by working for which people feel it prestigious. I will wait for that day. All the best team ISRO for many more endeavors to come your way. This nation is proud of ISRO and that itself is the proudest ever achievement for ISRO and its employees.

Jai ho!

Handling success... Take Home #354

Handling success is not any task to accomplish. Rather, it's an attitude to be developed and maintained to keep succeeding. 

Jumping to conclusion... Take Home #353

Jumping to conclusion is neither a fairer nor a wiser thing to do, especially then, when you are analysing something in which you have not involved yourself in the sequence of the events happened earlier. Take time, give everyone the chance they deserve. 

Live and let live!

Disbelief may occupy some space in any relationship, over a period of time, based on a given sequence of events between the partners. Most of the times  the partners end up fighting out the misunderstanding than the truth. Whereas the matter needs full attention and work out, it also helps if the partners open up and have a healthy confrontation. Silence between the partners might kill the show beyond anyone's imagination; it only adds up the distance if not anything else. 

With whatever the understanding I have on this topic, I would like to suggest the below. 

Disbelief is not a mistake of your partner. Feel the responsibility yourself for any disbelief shown by your partner. Try and understand where it would have probably gone wrong rather than pinching him or her for expressing the disbelief. Feel good about the openness in your relationship than pointing finger at the other person for being doubtful. Try your best in making your relationship come out of the expressed disbelief. Remember that it can happen to you too! May be at some or the other point of time, you may end up in disbelief too. Do not blame. Blame game does not work in any relationship, it turns out to be miserable if it happens between the partners for life long! As much as possible, don't feel bad about the other person for being so mean and all. Don't let that thought come to you. Understand that it's quite human and move forward in right spirit. Contribute your maximum in building back the trust. I don't believe in saying that if the trust is broken once it's broken forever. It can be worked out still. As long as the partners wish to be in the relationship, every thing is possible, every miracle must be hopped for. 

If you are the one expressing disbelief, first of all don't feel bad to have been doubtful about your partner. Being doubtful is not a sin. Of course, it might not be entirely correct to be so, but it's not entirely avoidable either given the circumstances and different brought up patterns the partners hail from. Try to be calm from inside as much as possible when you talk to your partner about it. Be specific, avoid being generic as maximum as possible. Have an open and to-the-point talk. Don't take your partner for granted if he or she gois listening to you. Don't say anything and everything and then don't expect him or her to listen to you fully. It's not fair enough. You yourself might not be able to do it too, if you are in the receiving end. Try as maximum as possible to express your feelings than doubts. Tell him how do you feel along with why you do feel so. Make the discussion thoughtful rather than argumentative. Do not expect answers on the fly; allow your partner to have time that he or she might very well deserve. Believe that thinks will work out. Be patient and determined enough to get the solution for this problem. 

Certain relationships in life are the beauty of human evolution. Be proud to be part of one such. Do your best to be true and dedicated to your partner. Set examples, positive ones. Live and let live! 

Don't underestimate... Take Home #352

When you underestimate someone you give him an opportunity to prove himself. Doing this with an opponent or a rival may get proved to be your first contribution towards your defeat. 

Don't underestimate anyone. Give yourself the benifit of doubt that you very well deserve. 

Understand people to their maximum!

Being social animals, over a period of time, we must learn to ignore certain statements made against us, we must not ignore any person although. Its not that people stand against each other. Its just that they stand against each other's perspectives of life. Everyone of us have our own thoughts based on our experiences, understanding capabilities, circumstances and so on. When a person says something about you, it might or might not be entirely correct. Most of the times, its definitely not entirely true. But every time it might be correct, from the point of view of that person. True and false matters at individual level to all of us. But right and wrong must be seen in totality. Yes, they matter too, but not beyond an extent that we cut off relationships, be it in personal life or professional life. 

Being able to see and understand life from different perspectives is a bliss. Its very much practical as well. Nothing in life is ideal. At the same time not everything is practical in nature either. Its up to us how we look at life. Its up to us how we perceive things and happenings. 

Do not think much about what's being said about you. Yes, it interests. It motivates. It pinches too at times. But that cannot lead you anywhere. What all that matters in life is how you understand the other person. When he or she says something, how do you take it what matters and along with that how do you maintain your relationship irrespective of what's said. People don't change much. If they are elders to you, expecting a change in them is nothing less than a unending wait. Get their perspective. Understand that everyone is unique. Try and introspect. After all that, if you think you are correct, be what you are. You are the ultimate judge for everything that you do, until and unless you harm someone. Doing things knowingly and in full self control is a dream to come true in every person's life. It is of course difficult to achieve. But not impossible. Build up the list of your perspectives of life. Understand people to their maximum. Enjoy life to the fullest. 

Put forward the problem... Take Home #351

How does your problem get addressed depends largely upon how do you put it forward than what the problem actually is. Be precise, be alert, avoid any short cuts and be aware of why you are bypassing people if you need to do so.

Checkmate!... Take Home #350

Checkmate happens so often in sport, whereas its rarely a checkmate in life. There will be a way out from every problem, its just the matter of keeping up the belief and enduring the trouble time.

Check with the right people... Take Home #349

Before ruling out the possibility of anything, make sure you check with the right people. Ideally, anything is possible. Not to forget, ideal things too happen in life! 

Movie: Mary Kom - Its about an inspiring sports person, by an energetic actress!

Sport has a lot spirit and emotions in it, which I'm in love with and probably addicted to. It feels not less than inspiring every time I follow and watch a match or a championship. Life histories of sports persons do attract me more than what a magnet can do to a piece of iron! Having said that, I need not mention how much I would have waited for the release of  'Mary Kom'. It took me no time to book the ticket eventually after its release couple of days back. 

First and foremost, for the first time ever I realized that I was watching the northern east side of India on the silver screen. Manipuri slang did not trouble me. The terminology of the boxing used in the movie of course did confuse me but not too much to an extent that I could not follow the flow of the movie. Movie definitely did not have a rich look, which was fair enough I guess as long as it resembled the true incidents and the life style of Manipur. Script was not really half cooked, considering the evident efforts the writers put in at some of the scenes. To give strength to the script, those scenes were the important ones. 

The emotions in the movie and in the story flow were so deep that I was moved after a long time while watching a movie in a theater. While I was so hesitant to move my hand to clear my tears, the person sat next to me was a little faster in clearing his own and hence cleared my hesitation too. Priyanka Chopra did an exceptionally good job. For an actress like her, in her success streak, leaving out the glamour and converting herself into the role that she was playing would not have been an easy juncture. Definitely not everyone can do it. She is already known for her energetic performances. This movie has once again proved that she can deliver that on a consistent basis. I have no doubts in saying that she will be one of the top contenders for this year's movie awards. My vote is for her already. 

Coaches play an important role and I think they own a potion of every successful sports person's career. MC Mary Kom's coach own's nothing less too. I'm not sure if the name was given by him in reality, but the way it was shown in the movie, he gave her the name and a lot along with it. Having your coach around in your tough times makes huge difference. You feel that the spirit is back to field, to keep you in action. settling down of the matters between Mrs Kom and her coach could not have been shown more impressively by anyone else than this director. 

By the way, never at one moment I felt like watching a film by Sanjay Leela Bhansali. No art work could be seen. All that was shown was the life of a Manipuri girl who loved boxing and dreamed to be world's best. As I write this, a scene from the post-interval part clicked to me. There was a scene in which Mary Kom's husband was shown arranging back her medals/shields in a room dedicated for them. That one probably would have been monitored by Mr. Bhansali. This is my wild guess. 

Life partner plays an important role in every person's life post marriage. In the case of a woman, a partner should be a lot more than a partner. He should be supportive more than what he could ever promise. With kids in place, its even demanding. While watching the movie, I was really happy for her and was thinking about her husband and his dedication towards their partnership. Family support is there most of the times but winning parents' hearts by achieving something is an ultimate thing to do. Opponents play an unforgettable role in any sports person's life. Team mates are never less a supporters. Frankly all this could have been depicted in a better way in the movie, but then, had it been that way it would have been a typical Indian movie rather than a depiction of the life of a middle class Indian woman player. 

I loved the movie. A must watch for all sport lovers. A must watch for all the fans of the former Miss World, Priyanka Chopra. Good one! Congratulations to the entire team of 'Mary Kom'. 

Happy teachers' day!

What impressed me the most about this year's teachers' day celebrations is the Indian Prime Minister's speech. Something different, motivating as always, Modi's address to the teachers and students is the first of its kind that I remember from the recent years. Hats off to him for that wonderful planning of doing all that. The must have been thought of very earlier, might not be an impromptu. A lot to learn. 

Happy teachers' day to my parents and all the other teachers. Teaching is a profession which has an uniqueness in the aspects like respect, remembrance and satisfaction. Watching my mom and dad closely, who are teachers by profession, I've got plenty of chances to observe the all three aspects mentioned above.

Parents of the students come to you, handover their kids to you, believe you for everything that you can turn their kids to, that's the respect you have! 

An old student comes to you, along with him he brings the long lost memories of his whole batch, of his friends, of his the then dreams. Years might pass by, your hair might turn gray, you are still addressed the same, that's the remembrance you have.

Some of your old students become successful professionals, you feel proud to introduce your old students to your students, an ever increasing count of students achieving great things, this is the satisfaction that's gained over a period of time. 

Its one of the noble professions to choose. Unfortunately, these days it's not so preferred, not in all parts of the country although. Sometime back I heard that there will be special colleges and universities for those who aspire to choose teaching as their profession. This idea is well received too. Hope this comes true soon and before this government asks for another chance to serve another term. 

Happy teachers' day to all teachers once again. I sincerely thank all the teachers who have inspired me all throughout.

Determination... Take Home #348

Determination chips in that extra ounce of effort required to keep the hopes of winning alive. Put every effort to find the reasons to be determined. It will make sure your play it in an adorable way. 

Loneliness!

Loneliness is nowhere else!

Its all in your thoughts. 

Engage yourself,

Try your best to escape it, 

And you will escape it.

Loneliness is nowhere else!

Its all in your thoughts.

Learning is equal to the amount of task done!

Learning is of two types. One, learning in the form of the deep down understanding of a given project. Two, learning to be taken forward to ensure that the similar mistakes or rather shortcomings do not repeat while we do another project. Be it mistakes or shortcomings might have resulted out of various steps that we would have followed while trying to accomplish the task at hand in the given time. The amount of mistakes depends upon the newness of the task or the newness of us towards the task. The amount of learning from a task depends upon the mistakes we would have done, the hurdles we would have crossed and most importantly the thoughtfulness of us to find out the learning hidden either in a debacle or in an error near-missed. 

The learning is directly proportional to the mistakes done. The mistakes are directly proportional to the tasks or things done or attempted. Hence, by following the mathematical rule learnt in school, the amount of learning is of course proportional to the tasks done. Do not get worried to know that your list of learning is too long, that your list of mistakes were too many! Be courageous and bold enough to believe the fact that you have done so much, attempted so much, accomplished so much in the given time. Take forward the learning and give your best to implement it at the next best needy occasion. That's how life moves on, that's how work goes on. So as work life. 

Always try to perform your best. Do your duty to your best potential. Do not be too much conscious of not making any mistakes. Let a few happen, don't bother as long as you are taking necessary decisions respecting the time line that you have to follow. Learn from them and move on.

Broaden your perspectives... Take Home #347

Those who do not question may not like to get questioned. It does not mean that the only way to deal with them is not to question. Keeping up the habit of assertiveness in questioning is important for your learning and hence to broaden your perspectives. 

To find yourself... Take Home #346

A job can be given to you because of someone's confidence in you or his/her helplessness in that given situation. If you understand it as confidence, try your best to live up to it. If you understand it as helplessness, perform it your best to gain his/her confidence.

Whichever is the case, ultimately its an opportunity that allows you to find yourself. 

Comeback... Take Home #345

Believe that you can win. At the same time, also be learnt of the fact that you can lose it too. Accept the defeat in all grace; plan and practice your comeback. 

Defeat or win... Take Home #344

Its not the win or defeat that alone makes us happy or sad. Its how we accept and respond to them that contributes a lot to how we celebrate the win or introspect the loss. Also, the importance of a win in the given moment is another factor. Where as, the impact of the defeat in the given situation either strikes us hard or leave us on a casual awe!

When defeat cannot touch you...Take Home @343

In spite of you being involved in the game with all dedication, the moment when defeat cannot touch you emotionally, that's one of those moments you experience the ultimate enjoyment of playing the game.