Marriages are made in heaven...

Yesterday(Sunday) was well spent, as I had the chance to meet a few good friends( batch mates) from my almamater on the occasion of the wedding reception of Sameer azeez, one of our friends. The travel to and fro Ponnanni( Kerala), where the function was held , witnessed some of the most hilarious moments in recent times in my life. It seemed like Rajeesh, PK, java, shibu , shanavas and others were synergised with one another’s presence, and everyone competed impulsively in creating lighter moments, though there were no prizes to be won other than creating magical moments to cherish for long.
Ever since I posted the wedding snaps of my friends, who had the ‘honour’ of having me attend their weddings, I have been getting lots of scraps in my orkut account. The crux of these scraps boiled down basically to two matters:
1. ‘When am i going to add my wedding photo in orkut album?’
Now , this one question has been volleyed to me from all corners ever since I celebrated my 25th year of presence in this planet.(not that it was not asked prior to 14-02-06, but i feel it was asked in a serious note and repetitive fashion, post this date).Whenever I visit my relatives, meet old schoolmates, have informal pleasantries with my clients after the official business , or attend social functions, it has become a routine for me to reply to this boring and dry question. I believe, the feeling a person gets when he is asked the same question time and again, is nothing different from dryness and irritation. So, is the case with me. This q has lost all its charm in my life, to the extent that I have become allergic to this q. I wonder what the big pleasure is derived by the questioner when he asks this hollow question?
2. ‘I am lucky to have attended these many weddings’
This question, though repeated many a times, is something which I would love to address and answer today. Coz it was never, sheer luck that enabled me to grace these many weddings. It was the result of a conscious attempt. An attempt to stay in my homecountry, so that i can be an integral part of such social and family occasions. It is the fruit of the strict practice of my desire to attend all(to the best of my capacity) functions to which i have been invited wholeheartedly. I always believe that when a person invites us to an event in his/her life, he sincerely wants us to grace the function with our presence and add glitter to his D-day by participating fullhearteldy. In my experience, seldom does a man behave hypocritically by making the invitation on one side and praying for the invitee’s absence on the other. At least, i believe it has not happened to me.
I remember being told that Indian marriages are the forefathers to the modern day orientation n induction programs held for the freshers in the corporate world. Just like a fresher is oriented about the companies’ policies/priniciples and his roles and responsibilities in the organisation, the Indian bride too is inducted into the groom’s house through an orientation held part of the marriage function. It is said, this is why we have week long celebrations in connection with weddings contrary to the present trend of displaying opulence in the nuptial extravaganzas, as in the weddings of Arun Nayar-Liz Hurley or LN Mitals’ daughter. The week long celebrations facilitate in augmenting the bonding between the two families of the bride and groom.
In the present day life of fast pace, there is no wonder that the week long celebrations of yesterdecades have been cut short to crisp twoday(as in Brahmin weddings in the south) or one day functions. But, marriages still serve the primary purpose of bridging the gaps between two families and uniting them to form a single cohesive mega family.
I have a feeling that our generation has less regard to these theories as we are so deeply engrossed in our own nitty-gritties in life that we forget the other person’s life. I think I shouldn’ blame people who even neglect to show courtesy of sending RSVPs or wishes , if he is not able to attend the function, for i believe they have their own rationales(although such rationale are hard nuts for me to crack).
But since I am a positive thinker , i believe things will change and every one of us will have more time to attend social get-togethers and marriage functions.
They say marriages are made in heaven!!!
I wish Sameer-Maleeha the best of heaven on earth!!!

Thank you friends...

I have always been humbled by the support extended to me by my friends at all times..
Many times, i had wondered.. if i am worth their love and affection.. If i deserve their support and favours... if they are overdoing their responsibilities...
I find it very crazy and strange that people born at different corners/culture/creed or class, happen to meet each other by chance or choice and are ready to go the extra mile for his/her 'friend' once they develop the so called relationship called 'friendship'. Perhaps, frienship is one of the wonderful feelings existing amongst living beings( am sure, the flora and fauna folks will frown at me, if i brutally assign friendship as a trait characteristic, only of the homosapiens ).
When god made man, perhaps, He was very sure that the latter will not be able to sustain or attain heights on his own.
Whatever be the reasons for the origin and existence of 'friendship'(i am reminded of the many funny and thought provoking sms(s) i rcvd in the early years of this decade, which emphasized the value of friendship, always had rhyming lines that ended in 'ship'), I am happy that friends exist in this world.. perhaps i would go a step further in declaring that I am what I am today coz of my friends.. I always had a tough time to digest the statement of some stalwarts, when they claim themselves to be 'self made men'. How can men succeed without any other individual's assistance.. Either I am too unintelligent to comprehend the logic or they may be some incarnations of the superbody. Or it might be that, these 'succesful' people are referring to the fact that they were not supported by their immediate near and dear ones on their path to success.
Anyways, I consider myself lucky and fortunate to have a good network of nice individuals all through out my life.. I am always indebted to the good lord for making me earn the trust of my friends. My friends were my biggest assets and support, when i was literally brought to ground zero and whenever fate chose to play wrestling with me. I am content that i had some good people to reckon during my testing times.. Now don' get the wrong notion that i had only bad days in my life.. There were cheerful and funfilled moments in abundance, in my life also . Needless to say, such moments were distinctly marvelous, in most of the cases, coz of the good deeds of my friends.
Upon introspection(one of my favorite passtimes), i believe the only way i can repay ( i am sorry if that word sounds too formal,,, i know i shouldn' be using it as frienship is not something that you gain/give to repay later) for the support extended to me is to extend my inconditional backing to my fellowmen at all times.. I have started prcaticing this for some time.. and I find it enjoying too. The happiness you get when you help someone find a house, arrange a tour, get a discount from shops/establishments/service providers known to you etc etc is simply out of boundaries...
I pray to almighty to continue to give me this sort of happiness in abundance.

Play to win

I was attending a two day workshop on Team leading by a leading corporate trainer in India. Three days prior to attending the training , i was fortunate to have read a book titlled "Business the Bill Gates way". The book was a collection of ten principles that helped the IT whizman to make it big time(really big!!!!) from moderate beginings. Among the principles listed, was one thing which appealed to me the most.. That Bill Gates always played to win. This one philosophy took him to greater heights, helped him circumvent every challenges and gave him a better edge in all competitions and is the one and only criteria which erges him to push his limits.. He always plays to win and he says that if a person does not play to win in business, the guy has already lost.
For some unknown reason, this tip(million dollar tip , i wud say) kept pricking my grey cells coz when i started counting the number of times i had played to win, I could hardly reach a two digit figure. So I thought its time for me to test the trick. I employed this strategy in this workshop right from the beginning. I made every efforts to win every moment in the workshop.
Upon hindsight, i find that the results were astounding:
1. My energy levels were far higher than my usual...
2. All my senses were in full concentration throught the two days.
3. I was very enthusiastic, positive and receptive to new information and knowledge.
4. End of the day, I emerged as the "Outstanding partcipant" of the workshop amongst a team of 35 comprising of navy commannders, army col.s, doctors, engineers and marketing professionals.

If you believe this is a chapter to boast on my recent achievement , well then its ur problem and botheration.. God help you..
But , i sincerely had two intentons.
1. Appeal to everyone reading this blog to start "Playing to win" . It surely will make great positive results in your life. You can extend this theory in a lot of arenas : Be it at your family, workplace, friendship circle or any situation in daily life. You can win your spouse's heart , get the trust of your customers, incresase productity at job, increase your business or start doing the so called impossibe( i recently read that impossible has got a new meaning.. no, am not reffering to the "i'm possible" stuff. But that any thing is impossible in this universe only as long as it is not done first time. e.g. going to moon was impossible in the 18th century. Getting transported from one place to another by air was impossible in 15th century.. so on.. So next time a person says to you , 'owning an acre of land in Mars is impossible', I hope you have the answer). So start playing to win.
2. Once you find that the results obtained by practicing this theory is amazing, spread it like wildfire. Let everyone start playing to win(in the ethical way, of course) , so that we have a better group of individuals in our society and country such that our productivity goes up phenomenally. I believe this will remarkably change the attitude of the people in this country and this is a must for India to achieve the develped nation status by 2020 as envisioned by our former president Dr Kalam.
Guys and gals,, wish u the very best...
Lets all be winners in life...
Keep winning..!!!!
stapati

Restarting blogging...

Well , i used to blog .. Its not a 'once upon a time' thing.. But till one year back..
Unlike Big B, who religiously posts some interesting note everyday, i was never a regular bloggie.. But whenever, i was overjoyed or over-sorrow , i used to scribble something.. So thats it , i had to be in my extremes of emotion to blog.. Blogging helped me vent out my feelings.. In a way it was good.. Since i had a lonely life ( inspite of having these many friends and relatives, i still feel lonely at times. Jayan is the only solace in such times, taking me to lighter moments whenever he is with me.. I have always wondered, how he had developed his unparralled skill of cracking thought provoking statements/jokes over mundane matters.. Anyways, god must have definitely had something in his mind, when he opted not to bless me with that gene which makes Jayan a man with humour sense.)
Writing of loneliness, i am in a state of loneliness now.. Why do i slip to this feeling??? One obvious reason is the absence of Jayan in town. He has gone to celebrate mom's birthday.. I too could have enjoyed the luxury of tasting the 'paalpaayasam' (poridge), but deep down my mind, my proffesional commitments , pestered me to stay away from the celebration.. I hope that i will be able to share some good moments with my family soon.
Its raining outside, though monsoon is still shying away from showing its full vigour. On a working day , amidst pending jobs and minutes before lunch time , I still feel lonely..
I can't single out the reason for being lonely..
But i am thankful to it.. for it has tempted me to scribble a few lines and i hope i will stick to blogging regularly once again..
happy birthday to you amma...!!!