Monday, December 24, 2007

dissapointment and i

i was just going through some of my posts, and i noticed one thing, they are mostly negative, or may be critical is a better word to describe it. It bought up a lot of uncomfortable questions. Am i somewhere dissapointed with myself. Am i thinking too much and living too little? May be my regular sarchasm has something beneath it. May be i should see a shrink!!? I didnt think about the shrink part, but it made me think and it still does, as to why this general sense of dissapointment?

People reading this and people who know me, am i a negative guy? Add insecurity to dissapointment and u have me??? Jokes apart, another thread of thought that comes to mind is why the times we think the most are the times when we are not happy. Or let me put it this way, when do we generally think more, when we are happy or when we are sad. Somehow happiness does nt give me so much reason to think. as sadness does. Theres also the saying that u are happy when u dont have the time to think about it. Random thoughts all of these, is there a picture, most definetly i have not been able to paint it.

Think of all the great works of art and literature, they have somehow come in difficult trying times. Is the mind, humanities escape from reality? May be the great artist dissapointed with their lives try to create something greater than themselves. hmmm time to sleep! one thing for sure people i am not as dissapointed/ insecure/ convoluted as it might seem from this post. ... or may be iam being defensive!! :-)

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

America set me free

I had no high hopes from america, and at the risk of sounding arrogant i wasnt overtly excited by it either. It was to me a next step, another assignement, considering that my last one was in chennai, anything was welcome. yes, it was a step up, because it was direct client contact and things like that, but it did not look to me like a radical leap ahead, iam still not convinced if it is but my experience here in the last one and half month has been an eye opener.

As a kid i was told by one of my uncles that i just had to go to europe or the us, another friend who had widely travelled argued why coming to europe even on my money made sense. i understand why, just why they said so.

It is said that the only kind of learning that money can buy is the one that comes with travel. And if u have lived in america then you have already seen a lot.
Because this country is like a salad bowl. Walking on the streets, in the stores you will meet all kinds of people. At least in the major cities, its a great place for interaction .

For starters, Americans are smart, they are so bloody smart that if u think they are dumb then its you who is dumb. A nation who thrives on the intellectual capital of the world has to be smart. From NASA to the neighbiourhood walmart you ll find all kinds of people, with all kinds of nationalities, these people work and work hard sometimes on lesser money. These people are happy to work here, and they contribute immensely to innovation and efficiency.They give tax so its not for free. The nation who gets the best kind of people from where ever they are, who ever they may be, and profits from it increasing the living standard of every body in the society is smart, actually very smart.

When i sit with my client, i have to keep in my mind that she has been doing her job for the last twenty years. This is because she has never mentioned it and i doubt if she ever will. She is so open minded about everything, nothing is right because she said it or because she is doing it that day. Everything needs to be subjected to rigour, everything needs to be validated. And when i suggest a book in casual conversation, she rights it down. I sometimes feel extemely tiny in front of these people, there is so much of attitude that i need to incorporate. And this open minded attitude to change is displayed everwhere, from outsourcing to the imported chinese toy sitting on some supermarket shelf.

Iam not saying that this is heaven or its comfortable so its great. There are good reasons why it is what it is. And the typical american takes thing light, laughs quite a lot and says sorry at every possible instance. So much to learn.

Disclaimer: This is just the beginning, author reserves the right to change his opinion.