Words from me...

I heard many people saying "How naughty and troublesome I would have been to my parents but still they were so good to me"
These words come from their mouth after their experience with their kids!! :-)

Yes, "You will love your parents more once you start take care of your child".. You will then start savoring reminiscences of your childhood. These words of mine from my experience now, may re-emphasize others words, but still its worthy a million to say it "How good and affectionate are my parents to me..."

In search of a good time!!!

Some thoughts have been rolling on my mind for many months which I wanted to pen down. Often, I used to say myself, that I can pen down those thoughts when I find good time. I used to think that only during some "good time" I can articulate my thoughts well.You may ask what is a "good time" for me. When I retrospect about my definition of "good time", I could say that it is a calm afternoon or a serene atmosphere, conducive to pen down my thoughts. If I say I have not gotten a "good time" all these months, then it would be a white lie.

But its true that I have been postponing not only blogging, but also some activities that I wanted to do, saying myself its not a good time and let me wait for "some good time"! Sometimes, though I postponed an activity and did it later (yes after I found a good time ;-)), I realised that it either turned futile or din't have the effect of doing it without postponing.
It took me these many months, to realise that I have to equip myself such that I can articulate well and do things at my best in any given time. Perhaps, I realised by magic of Barathraam. Though initially I may not be at my best in articulating and doing my activities better at any given time, I believe I will slowly imbibe the skill of doing my best any time. Also my habit of postponing activities will slowly get rid off.

Through this post I would say to all who are like me that, we won't find a "good time" unless we seek it.
And, if we could see all time as "good time", then we could see ourselves transformed.

I should also accept here, that I have not taken any oath of "seeing all time as good time". But I will try my best and once in a while check out this post and your comments to remind myself of it :-)

Keep Echoing

Its been more than 10 years now, that I lived with my parents continuously for 3 months. If I am right, lastly when I was studying 12th standard I was at home. After that I could be at home only during my college holidays which is not more than 2 months. Later once i started working it was even ,ore less, like some weeks.
It was now possible to stay with them for 3 months continuously because of our sweet little Barathraam. I could still vividly remember the initial days when they arrived. We showed them the washing and other places in our colony, my college, my office etc. How Appa got accustomed to this cold winter climate still surprises me.
I dint have the slightest thought that he could go for supermarkets alone even during snow and on temperatures like -20 degree Celsius.  Though he was hesitant initially, he did it for he wanted to shoulder Sriram's shopping activities. As Amma kept praying, she dint face any major health problems during these 3 months, though she had few minor ones now & then. I was sure that she would like this cold climate and she also liked it. As always, she gave me advices softly and took great care of us. I would say both of them are instrumental in bringing Barathraam to set into a rhythm, like timely activities. We are a bit disappointed that we could not take them to any place, but we can't help it as we had our little Barathraam. Good at least we could take them to the frozen lake.

Now though they are back to India, their voices are keep echoing for me in each & every activity like Appa's dialogue when he keep him விபுதி (sacred powder)"தாயுமான சுவாமி குழந்தை காப்பாத்து. குழந்தை சமத்தா பால் குடிக்கணும்" (Lord Thayumana Swamy take care of baby, he has to drink milk well) and Amma's "ஜோ ஜோ ஜா ஜா ஜி ஜி" (rhyming tunes) mimicking all songs, like Bagyada Lakshmi Baramma and "ஏழை சொல் அம்பலம் ஏறாது" (Poor man's words are not heeded in an assembly). I have to say her that, "ஏழை சொல் அம்பலம் ஏறாது ஆனால் அம்பலம் ஏறும்போது ஏழை நினைகப்படுவான்".

We do miss them and by recollecting their voices and dialogues, I feel they are still with us. I sincerely wish to stay with them longer. I believe they enjoyed their stay in Finland.

Our sweet little Barathraam

On an auspicious day, we are blessed with our cute little baby Barathraam. I was wondering earlier before delivery  how I would take care of a small little baby for I din't even have courage to hold a small baby. However as everyone says, things change when it comes to own individuals. Yes, I could now say that one will acquire all needed skills to take care of a baby naturally and will become motherly.

One of the most important things about babies are that they are very good in observation and acquires inferential knowledge. So it is very important for the parents to watch out their activities. I have learned many good habits from my parents and grandma, and imbibed many good activities from them. To name a few, I imbibed श्रद्धा (shraddha - performing work with trust and faith), hardwork, dedication from my father, being tolerant, inquisitive, creative from my mother, and being perfect (including keeping things from where its taken), systematic from my grandma. When anyone says that Vidhya is good at this, I  attribute all those praises to my parents and grandma, for its because of the way they brought us.

Similarly, I believe Barathraam will find some good habits from us. So it is very important for us to follow some of our good habits consistently and at the same time acquire new good habits.

As the saying goes சொல்லி கொடுத்த வார்த்தையும், கட்டி கொடுத்த சோறும் எத்தனை நாளைக்கு ? - as, "How many days will the preached words and prepared lunch will stand?" meaning those advices which are kept told will have effect only few days. Only when an individual realise it by himself, he will do it lifelong. Children will not heed to our mere words or instructions. So for our words to be effective, we have to live those words by ourself.

I pass on this message to all those ought to be mothers - You will acquire motherly skills naturally, but you have to watch out your habits for your baby learns from you and not from your words.

Its been a year!!!

I couldn't believe that its been a year since I joined Nokia.
When I look back and have a retrospective thinking, I have to admit that my learning curve is not huge in the past year. I have just got to know some of the open source stuff, but technically I have not learned anything new and have been passing the time solving bugs with already gained knowledge.

I have to clear a point here, that its ME who did not learn much or took steps to learn. Nokia as a company provides a good platform to learn, provided one has the thirst towards learning. One good thing about Nokia is, you can get to know many useful information on various fields - Intranet is swarmed with information!
But, that seems to be a bad thing for me.. For, I am overwhelmed with so much information that I easily lose track of what I am interested in.

I am kinda person, who can easily get lost in a maze with many open ways.
But once started with a particular way, its easy for me to concentrate on it and reach the destination. I hope I will utilize the wide Nokia platform in the coming years with a destination to reach.. Ah, this might not be possible in the coming year as I will be away on Maternity leave :)

Let's see whats in store for me after the coming year.

Teachers same everywhere!

Before I start writing about this post, I would like to say that this is based only on my personal experience. Like many things in life that cannot be generalized..

I have hardly seen any teacher who does what he preaches. Almost all of the teachers I met from my school days are good in commanding and getting things done from us. But least is their interest in keeping up their words.
Finland teachers are not an exception!

I had many rounds of discussion with my Professor for my assignment and he gave me a strict deadline to submit those changes we discussed. Sadly, I could not spend more time for the assignment before the deadline (as always), and rushed up in the last two days. Spent two days of round the clock thinking, sleepless nights and finally managed to send it on time.

Its been more than a week now since I sent him the assignment. He is supposed to give me comments about my assignment in a day or two after my submission.
But I have not got anything from him yet!

For a second, I felt if the efforts I spent on it is worth? When I try to keep up my word so badly amidst work and other assignments, why is not he?
Is it because he is a busy Professor and need not keep up his word to a Student?
So am I going to be the same way as he in my future assignments?

Wait. This is not a Student's attribute.. As a Student, I have to learn only the good things from the Teacher , and should discard all such bad things.

I think we should be only a Student all through our life and seek only good things. Never become a Teacher unless you do what you preach.

As the Tamil saying goes,
கற்றது கை மண் அளவு கல்லாதது உலகளவு.

So let us be a Student and Seek good always.

Juggling, responsibility, commitment and more...

As you grow so is your responsibilities..
At some point of time we could suddenly recognize that all our time is completely occupied. This point of realization can happen out of our frustration or lacking time for hobbies(includes sleep!), perhaps on our introspection when we did something ugly in our activities etc.
But, in the first point its good to recognize that we are completely occupied, may be entangled in our activities! Only then, we can understand the importance of planning.

I still cherish the childhood days spent roaming around claiming it as studying, playing and fighting with brother.. but then I cannot afford it now.
I have to say it was quite difficult to me when I started studying at Tampere University though it is flexible.. may be because of the heaps of assignments..
and have to manage cooking and stuff.
Then when I started working at Nokia, I know its going to be a nightmare to manage all: work, study, home..
During initial weeks of my joining I had many meetings.. not only at office, but in college.. As most of our assignments are group assignments, groupmates have to meet and discuss about it. Oh!

But now when I looked back on how I handled them, I am satisfied though there are some scope for improvements. I havenot missed any meetings, been prepared with my assignments and discussions and also attended the induction meetings. Though it wasnt so many meetings, it really demanded planning and preparation. One important aspect to ponder is the quality of activities I pursued. I would say neither it was best nor it was worst.

I am happy it dint turn worst and I know it wont be best. But the reason I am feeling satisfied is the courage I mustered to not abandon my activities and shrug off my responsibilities. Juggling can be easy by tapping the tactics but juggling with responsibility & commitment comes from proper planning and preparation.

This experience and satisfaction has brought in me being committed to all our activities, for we dont know which one brings us favour.
Needless to say, I am motivated, for I dint do those activities for recognition, reputation nor remuneration but for my satisfaction.

Another view that struck me is, do we need to have a limit on our activities??! Ofcourse yes, will pour in my view in a separate post.