Great Insight!

DISCLAIMER: These are my thoughts; one has all the rights to disagree with me.

“I can see so many things going wrong here, but why can’t people sitting on top see the same!!!”

I think most of us go through this thought sometime or the other in our life, and waste too much time discussing the same. Let me put my recent cerebration on this:

• Lately, I realized that majority is the biggest lie on earth. What I mean to say is, whenever we get the thought mentioned above, we get numerous people around us supporting the same, but the fact is that it is not true (I feel so). Keeping the simple thing in mind, all who are above us have gone through the stage where we are today, and believe me, they know the reality on their own. Just that they live with it, and they have their own reasons to do so. But they know the reality.

• Before you say that system is not working, you need to ask the following to yourself:

1. Are you sure that you know what is wrong in the system? Can you “write” them down on paper/presentation?
2. If you write them down on paper, do you have solution for all those problems on your own, with you?
3. Do you think, you can solve those problems if given a chance? Are you convinced, confidant and sure?
   

• Before you go to someone to ask these questions, you need to put yourself in other person’s chain and see - what will be your answers to same questions?

• There is no point saying that you can also be a champion! Win the race at least three times, and say that “I am a champion!” You need to demonstrate again and again before people accept your capabilities. That is the fact!

• It’s better to accept that wherever people are there, politics will be there. You can only choose to be part of it, or not to be part of it. You cannot remove it. No one can involve you in that if you don’t want to be.

• If you really want to be successful, be the buyable and not sellable. What I mean to say is that one has to make one’s place in the world. Now a day’s, most of us want to know something about everything, but at the same time you need to know “everything about something!” You need to have your own USP (Unique selling point).

• Life is long, and you have a long career to go. You cannot even imagine where life can take you. If you start running today, you will reach somewhere for sure, and if you standstill you will not reach anywhere for sure.

• There is no shortcut to success! If you follow the path what every successful person has followed, and you will succeed.

• Your life is the sum-total of all the choices you make; whether it’s the choice to sleep, choice to spend life with your near-n-dear ones, choice to enjoy life, or choice to work hard every moment to be successful in your career. You cannot ask for everything at the same time.

• You need to put tremendous amount of effort “everyday” in your life to reach where other successful people are (if you think, you want to be). The sooner you accept, better it is.

• Last but not least, it is better to accept that some people are lucky in this world; some people are GOD gifted, and there is not point thinking about them, and being sad. It’s not that you cannot beat them, but you need to be ready to put 150% effort to get 90% results in that situation. Are you really ready to do so?

In summary, I would say that most of the time solution to our entire problem lies inside us only. We are the one who needs to solve those problems, and come up with solution. I realized that sometimes we are frustrated because of ourselves and not because of the system/others. If we cannot change ourselves, we should not expect system to change for us any ways – “Be the change, you want the world to me”.

The 13th :-)

Today, one of my very close friend (Blue) made me realize that there are too many 13s in my life :-)

- Born on 13th
- Name (Manish Dwivedi) has just 13 letters.
- First letter in name i.e. 'M', is the 13th character in the alphabetic list.
- I have my very very close friend who is also born on 13th.
- Four other friends are born on 26th (I can't believe it!!) which seems to be another multiple of 13.

I am not sure what other people think about number "13", but I find it too good for me :-)

Seoul Pics :-)

http://picasaweb.google.com/mdwivedi/ManishSokchoTrip

http://picasaweb.google.com/mdwivedi/SeoulPic

Boredom...

The word with which most of us will be aware of :-). I know the three characters which came just before the period "." get disappear once you are in this state. I mean the state of euphoria and boredom are just enemy of each other. As two swords can not live in one "holster", they can not live in same person. And all of us know which sword we want anyways :-).

By the way, If I am inditing about this right now, it implicitly means that I am not in that state, as that state is like a monster. It just eats away all your thoughts, and put you in a world where you really don't know what to do.

As I mentioned, I feel that it is just a state of mind, and nothing else!! So, to come out of it, you just have to fool your brain. Just give it some nice food to eat, and it will forget that it was in that state sometime back. If you can believe me, just go and watch a comedy movie,and all your ennui would have gone for a toss.

Actually just now I realized that although above thing may not work at all times, as boredom is also of different kinds :-(.But it does work most of the times:

Ephemeral Boredom: This type of boredom comes just like that, without any reasons. Sometimes you are bored just like that.I have gone through this state several times, e.g. if I sit at home for more than 24 hours, suddenly, I start feeling that something has terribly gone wrong,I mean, without any reasons at all! But I know this kind of boredom is short-living ,and if I follow what I said above; Bingo!!!! It works :-)

Persistent Boredom: This is of some specific type, where you get into tedium state because of something tedious, or because of something too simplistic and monotonous .... Booooooooo :-(.... you are gone man!! So believe me, it's better that you catch it before it actually starts, and take some preemptive actions to avoid it. Because, if you get into this state, it is gonna eat-up hell lot of your time and energy. And only way to come out of this is: "A Big Change!!".

I know that it is impossible to save yourself from this virtual-behemoth, but I believe that if one consciously keep this (not to get into this state) in mind, and take necessary actions; the frequency of this can be reduced for sure.

Okay, Okay, Let me not bore you anymore. Oh Man! I don't think that I have covered this type above, but I am sure that you already know what to do here :-)

Cherry Blossom

Winters in Seoul are almost over, and that becomes the most amazing season of the year. The days are warm, sunshine is yellowish, and the breeze is soothing; trees are getting leaves back, and the place is becoming lush green and colorful with days. Seeing the sun rising behind the hills from our balcony while sipping that hot-tea in the morning is becoming a visual delight to me.

The cherry trees are in bloom, and everybody seems to be getting rid of their heavy jackets and winter-clothings. After the cruel winter, weather is again becoming pleasant, and It becoming fun to wander around in the Sun. The beauty of the season touches some vein in my heart, and I recall all the experiences that I have had at this place. Some of them were really bad, but many people helped me unexpectedly. Some of them were really good, and I was really fortunate to have nice people around me to share my joys.

One month back when I came to this place, on an official trip, with few colleagues; I did not know that the bond of fraternity will become so strong in so less days, and it will look so true to me. The kind of affection and care, I got from them is immense, and can never be forgotten. All of them are so nice that it feels bad even to think about even one of them going back leaving all of us here.

The place has surely changed couple of my beliefs in life. The place seems to offering me a new confidence in the fields which were always gray to me. The amazing public transport system is giving a feel of being independent even if I am out of my own country which used to be the biggest problem ,for me, in united states.

Communicating with people without knowing their native-language as well as lack of common-language ( sometimes) gives me a reason to learn a new language itself.

Playing Squash gives me an insight that it is not as difficult as it was always being projected to me in college days. Guys! the ball does not come as-fast as you used to tell me always :-(. I wish! I could have tried it there itself at least once.

I always feel that new place always gives you a new energy. May be, it is because you find so many new things, in so less time, that you keep forgetting about all your old stuff, and just get busy in things coming in-front of you. Anyways, that fits into my philosophy of life, i.e. "Life is a time-pass". So, the lesser you realize where time is going, the better it is for you :-).

Right now I seem to find this place very interesting; people are nice, facilities are awesome, culture seems different, and learning seems to be very fast. So, let me enjoy the Cherry Blossom for sometime, and we will see how does it go forward :-)

Reporting from Seoul

Last three-weeks, I have been in Seoul (it's pronounced as Soul),so here are the few interesting reflections of the place on my mind:

• People eat dinner at 6 p.m. itself. Man!. First-day when my new friend Dong Jin (He likes to be addressed as "Tobetter") asked me to join him for dinner, I was almost shocked! What?. Dinner! At this-time ?.But I guess one get use to the system in few days, as now a days we go for dinner at 6 p.m.:-). So,now I am having four meals in a day :P .Morning, Afternoon, Evening, and Night:-)
• Here everybody has an electronic device in hand. I mean whether you see a kid, teen-aged, young, middle-aged or even a old-aged person. Each of them will be carrying a electronic device, or a book while local travel. They just keep playing games, watch video, or listen to music. I really wonder if they even see who is sitting next to them in the train (or bus).I wouldn't be surprised if if I come to know that they dint even notice presence of their close friend(s) in same train. I don't know;may be they are too occupied with themselves.
• They stay too long at work. I came to know that sometimes they do not even go home for several days, and just stay in office itself. My goodness! what do you do in office for so long dudes!!!
• As observerd by one friend (we call him "Chote/Shyam" - real name Sanny though),no one in Korea seems to have mustaches or beard. We don't know why though :-)
• I don't know how many times they brush their teeth in day ;-(. You will see n number of people doing-this just before/after lunch/dinner (actually anytime in the day).It's like in-India we keep comb in our pocket, and here they seem keep tooth-brush :D
• Public transport is just amazing. You just buy a T-money card (like a prepaid-pass), and you can use it seamlessly in any train, bus or taxi. In fact we have tried fooling the system as well. That also works :-).May be, I will update you in some other blog in details :P.
• We are required to change 1 bus, 3 trains, walk for almost 2 km. and climb 300+ stairs to reach office :-(. Now I realized why everyone looks so fit here! Yes, I have not seen more than 10 people who are even plump!!
• Do not put any 10,000 wons ( Yeah! Here, you have only 1000, 5000, 10000 won currency-notes in Korea) in the bus. As driver doesn't have rights to open the money box, and you will loose rest of the 9.000 won (the expected change in return) :-(. Surprised!! Yes, you are suppose to carry T-money card, or loose-money (change).
• During peak hours, traffic in Seoul is pathetic.
• People are very disciplined on the roads when traffic is not there, but once traffic is there; They are just like us :). No difference!
• Whole metro-infrastructure seems to be constructed underground. I think the gap between line-2 and line-6 will be more than 5 floors! "Lagta hai ye sehar andar se bilkul khokhla hai :-)".Jokes apart, Amazing infrastructure for public transport.
• Unlike India, where all of us at-least try to communicate in English (at work), these guys seems to love their native-language, and hence most of the meetings (even in office) are always in Hangul only :-(.It seems that they just don't care; even if you are sitting there, and aware that you wouldn't understand. They will just keep talking in Korean.
• Also, a meeting can go for hours-and-hours!! Meeting just rambles on and jogs.
• I don't know how do they manage to eat "even rice" with those chop-sticks. I tried, but no success yet!! They tell that you need to have really strong fingers for that :-(. Really!! My take is;it's just about habits.
• People are helping, and they will try to help you as much as they can. Although most of the people can not speak English,they can read it and write pretty well. So if we need to ask something to these people, better you write it down and show it to them rather than asking them in words.
• These guys are always in Hurry! And that is the part of their culture. So if you listen too many "Belly! Belly!" (hurry-hurry),don't get offended;it's part of their culture.
• To me, Hangul (Korean language) seems to be pretty easy and nice to learn :-). Already learnt quite a lot sentences,but mostly problem happens when I speak in Hangul, but the person on the other side is not expecting me to speak Hangul; and he/she thinks that I am speaking something in English only :-((nd can not decode it correctly :-(. But they really appreciate if you put any effort to learn their language.
• Somehow, I felt that female/male ratio is relatively height here. Not sure!.
• Hairs!! Man, people have really-good hairs here. I have hardly seen anyone having less hairs (other than My Manager :P, looks like he worked outside Korea for long time :D). Almost 90% people have same coiffure -irrespective of guys or girls - The style with hairs falling on the forehead. Man! You can never read the lines on their forehead :-)
• Seoul is awake through-out the night.
• It has lot of street-shops which really give you a feel of India.
• You should not miss a chance to bargain. Believe me, you can bargain more than you think! You can start from 50% as well.
• People have awesome dressing sense.Everyone seems to be a natty dresser.
• Most of the girls seem to wear skirts.And I wonder how do they manage to survive with them in the winter as chilling as -10 *C. Seoul might be a good place in summers ;-)
• Water seems to be costlier than beer :-S.
• To all the volley-ball players, these guys play it with legs man! But believe me, it's nice to see the control they have over the ball.

To King of Punjab

Before any thing else, I would like to congratulate you on your wonderful results. I know that this was not the first success you have got in last few months, but I think that this-one made you truly happy. And I was really delighted to feel that.I know you have put numerous amount of effort to achieve this. It's really great!!

When I think back, I actualize that it's not been long that we know each other. But it has been a pleasure to spend time with you. I would have learn a lot from you in all these days.I always reckoned that you are really a diligent person, but what you have accomplished in all these days required right aptitude too! I would suggest that you must celebrate this time also as we have always done it :-)

As we often talked, I hope that you are also taking care of all your other fields too.I would recommend you to read some stuff on the finance et cetera in your free cycles. Just don't keep spending time in one area only. I know that you might be doing it already, but in case you are not then it is just a reminder for you.
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I would also advise you to spend some good time with your family as well. Try to make a balance between your professional-and-personal life as they are most precious gift for you in life.

Lastly, I would just say that you already have a real nice attitude about life so just try to be the way you are. I presume that you know how to ignore your success; not to gloat over what you have done, or berate what others have. As I can assure you that you can get what you want even without doing them. All the best to you!