My Chweet Childhood

14th November, the children’s day made me feel nostalgic.  I have been wanting to post this blog since that day, but some how office work kept me busy enough to not even let me press the publish button.  So finally, here it is.. after 10 days of delay.

Those were the best days of my life .. My Childhood

I was born and brought up in a small-town named Dharwad. This town, its environment, people and the culture are as sweet as the famous Dharwad Pedhas This place has a major impact on what i am today.

me

As a child, i was pampered to the max extent by my family (i sometimes wonder how i didnt end up being a spoilt brat.. oh no, dont tell me now that i am one!! ). One of the things that i really cherish is being in a joint family.. my granny, grandpa, uncles, aunts, cousins.. so many people. I just loved having all of them around. My uncles still complain about how i troubled them to act out all the bed time stories till 1 am!! The present generation is missing out on these things, i guess. Being in a huge family gives u a different perspective towards people, you can trust people a lot more easily, you tend to adopt to people more readily and most importantly, you know the importance of bonding. Continuing to narrate my hero(ine)ism as a child.. according to my parents, i used to narrate Ramayana/Mahabharata at the age of 2 years!! The most unusual thing was that i used to force my parents to buy me nailpolish ( yeee.. ) at midnight at the age of 3. They say they have even woken up the local shopkeeper at midnight a couple of times to fulfill my desire . I agree i was annoying sometimes

me @ the age of 5 years

Academically,my parents never pressurized me to study. I used to manage to top every exam held in school. My parents made sure that i was involved in music, dance, quizzes and dramatics too. Those innumerable Bharatnatyam performances at school, those evening quiz practice sessions, AIR recordings taught me to manage time much before i knew what “time management” was.

How can i talk of my childhood and not talk about my best pal? Snehi, my childhood friend, is a boon to my life. This girl was and is my BESSSSST friend. I cherish the memories of going to school riding a bicycle, chatting with her, our silly fights and the post-fight-sorry sessions, our long study sessions together and so many other simple small things. She is the one who accepted me with all my strengths and weaknesses. You see, very few people in your life can do that… She never hesitated to tell me on my face about my mistakes. At the same time, she never missed an opportunity to praise me when i did the right thing. Thanks Snehi for being such a good friend.

Some of my other fantasies:

• As a child, i wanted to be – a doctor, a scientist, an astronaut, a singer, an IAS officer!! But i love and am happy about what i am today – a software engineer
• I just loved Sonu Nigam like anyyyyything in my teens… he he Him getting married was my biggest heartbreak in those days
• I studied in a convent school and i loved going to Sunday prayers, singing Christmas Carols and reading Bible at the school assembly. This has given me the chance to realize that every religion has its own beauty, its own principles and teachings that are applicable universally and are not limited to that religion alone.

I feel, the most special thing about being a child is the “hope” you have about life, about the world, about your future and about your dreams.

Find some more pics from my childhood here

Signing off,

Netra

All that matters

I bought an extremely handy, very well presented Bhagavad Geeta yesterday. As the introduction explains, “The uniqueness about this religious work starts with the very setting in which its described — the warfield. This is in contrast to other works, which are discussed in the more peaceful ambience of a penance, grove or amidst the glitter of the royal court or in the exalted forum of scholars and experts “. True, in fact, divine guidance becomes all the more important when u amidst turmoil.

I would like to share a few points here because, Bhagavad geeta’s teachings transcend beyond religion, time and culture.

Here are some excerpts :

• “Whether one attains elevation or degradation through one’s mind depends on oneself only, for the mind can be one’s friend or one’s foe”
• “One who is content in the self and derives happiness from self alone is said to be freed of duties. He attaches nothing to the results of his action. Thus gain and loss resulting from his actions mean the same to him. He doesnt need a purpose therefore to motivate him into action”
• “One who treats friends and enemies equally, balanced in honour and disgrace, heat and cold, happiness and anguish, free from attachment, unconcerned about blame and praise, controlled in speech, content, without any fixed residence, even-minded and engaged in devotional service, such a person is dear to me”
• “There are three gates that lead to hell- lust, anger and greed. These should be abandoned as they corrupt the soul”
• “That which changes with time cannot be considered eternal and is not the ultimate reality because the ultimate reality is neither temporary not does it change with time, it is indestructible”

The best thing about these teachings is that they can be interpreted differently depending upon ur situation, time and they are always valid. They seem to have more and relevance to you as time passes.

We often blame others for mis-happenings in our life, find an excuse for every unfinished task and every unreached goal.  What we often fail to notice and acknowledge is that its “us” who are genuinely responsible. If somebody put you through misery its because you allowed them to. The principles explained in Bhagavad geeta are fundamental, practical and the “ones that count”. They are much harder to practice than materialistic accomplishments. We all want to lead a life that we can be proud of. We dig into what caused an outage at workplace. But how many of us have dug deeper into inner-self to find out why we shout when smallest of things go wrong, why we impose our decisions on others, why we are not content with whatever we have..

Its time to concentrate upon things that matter.

What to feel and what not to

I feel completely let down, depressed, helpless.. My dreams lying shattered, nothing to look forward in life, no one to share my pain with.. Feel like my world is gonna end soon, feel like i am falling through an endless tunnel of agony.. I guess it was supposed to end this way

Then suddenly, out of no where, a thought strikes my mind. A quote read during my childhood – “We all long for a person who understands us, fulfills our desires, who pats us on the back when we excel, who gives us a reassuring hug when things go wrong, who loves us very much, who guides us through life.. what we often forget is that ‘that person’ is none other than ourselves”

Very true indeed! How could i have considered myself so weak? How could i have felt helpless when i have such amazing people around me? How could i have forgotten that the Almighty has been very kind to me all this while? What if one dream has gone down the drain? I ll have hundred more dreams to accomplish. After all, life is not about winning every battle, its about winning the ultimate war.

I peek outside the window towards the moonlit sky and wonder “What to feel and what not to!!”

Its Vacation time! Yay! Yay!

Having finished the 8th semester exams, I feel very free and relaxed to the core. Its a feeling i have been longing for, a feeling that refreshes one’s perspective towards life and prepares one for the next big step in life. Well, you must feel euphoric about such a vacation after going through 152 internal exams, 59 VTU semester exams and 2500+ class hours

I still remember my first day in RVCE as though it was just yesterday. The anxiety of being in a new place, the apprehension of tough competition in the best engineering college of Bangalore, hundreds of dreams and ambitions.. ufff!!! These four years of engineering have been as adventurous as they can get. I cherish the memories of the first program i compiled ( printing “hello world!” in C), the first time bargain for books on avenue road, the first time i was ragged, the first programming contest won by me…

Now, that i have all the time in the world for myself, I ought to plan and become more disciplined, focussed individual. I am interested in learning hindustani classical music. Please inform me if you know any good hindustani music classes in bangalore. It would be nice if classes happen during weekends. For the fun element, here is a song sung by me. Please give me your feedback so that i can improve and sing better.

Netra IMproved!!!

This is a blog after a looong pause…

Life has been a sinusoidal wave since last 9 months. Some times i ll be so happy that i ll thank GOD for giving me this life, but sometimes things are so disappointing that i keep scribbling “Ultimately, everything boils down to nothing ” in my diary.

Here are some updates

• I am interning at Yahoo!. Its been a great journey till now.  and ya,  I love Bugs/Tickets!!!!!

• @College, i have been busy with my final sem project. Its quite interesting.

• Juggling between college and office is very hectic.. But thats ok, one more month to go!

• My last few days in college — i ll miss all these friends, studies, internals, attempts of mass bunks ( i always used to resist mass bunks!! stupid me!!?? ), friendly teachers and most importantly “i am still a student” feeling

• I am earning now.. yay!! Bought lot of things for family from “my money”, feels really good.

Apart from those, my routine has become realllllly boring, { home  -> college -> office} being in an infinite loop.

Thats all for now..  See u soon

-Netra

P.S. : You might wonder why i am blogging in terms of  “bullets and numbers”.. Well, this the result of  ‘n’  number of presentations and documents prepared for VTU project

“Open Dream” come true

Remember my post about Yahoo! ? Its title was “Life at its best”.. Today it was a dream come true for me since I got a job offer from Yahoo! Research and Development. Well, I have been dreaming about this company ever since I wanted to work, concentrating on the skills that Y! looks for, took a lot of risk waiting for Y! to arrive on campus and now.. its worth all those efforts. With God’s grace and good guidance, i got through.

The selection process consisted of a written test, 2 technical interviews, a programming round and a HR interview. The best thing about the overall process is the emphasis on thinking BIG. Y! seldom asks memory based questions. All they need is the right approach to the right problem at the right time. It was a great learning experience. Looking forward to working at Yahoo!

This is how i feel now – “YAAAAAAAAHOOOOOOO”!!!!!