Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Letters over Emails

Long gone are the days when people used to wait for the postman to come and drop off letters at our nearby Postbox. Long gone are the days when we used to buy yellow postcards and blue colour inland letters. Long gone are the days when we used to collect foreign stamps and show them to everybody proudly.

Long gone are the days when I used to buy nice flowery envelopes and sheets in “Archies Gallery” to write a message to somebody.

Sadly , now our world remains with electronic mails :-(.

Personally, I feel that there is no “Human Touch” to an Email.I prefer writing letters rather than emails. I love the handwriting in those letters and would prefer people to send me letters over emails , atleast once in a while. I have treasured my childhood letters that I got from various people. The joy that I get when I see a past letter is very very different from the feeling I have when I read a previous email.

My first letter to my husband was also a handwritten letter. And now it remains one of his priced possessions :-) !!

Believe me............. Its really different !!

Monday, December 6, 2010

Diwali – The Festival of Lights – Always my Favourite !!



There is something in a “Deepam” or “Diya” or a “Oil Lamp” which attracts me :-)

I have been a fan of it since my childhood and my mood automatically radiates when I see bright diyas anywhere. I go to the temple , mainly to light these deepams and stand there staring at them. I must say that the TamilNadu temples look much more good than Andhra temples. And they give lots of importance to Deepams. Only in Tamil Nadu , I have seen people selling these oil lamps which the devotees can light in the temple. Simple , you need not be prepared and take it from home. They are readily available :-).

Before Marriage , for Diwali , I made it a point to put up some kind of Rangoli at home and then decorate them with as many deepams as possible. And then , I spent the rest of the festival just staring away to glory at them. I fall in love with them and I capture those perfect moments in my mind forever.

After marriage , in JoBurg , I hardly thought that I could make my Diwali so colourful as I was not sure if people would allow us and all that. But my two years of Diwali till now have been equally colourful and bright :-).

My mom keeps telling me that she also lights a lamp on behalf of me whenever and to whichever place she goes and remembers me fondly. Such is my love for lights :-) !!

No matter what , I will continue to light lamps for any occasion the whole of my life. I find God in them and I find peace and Divinity in them !!

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Sunrise at North Cliff



A week back , we had gone to view the sunrise at a place called North Cliff in JoBurg, which is quite near to our place. We had been planning this from a long long time. Finally could make it. I was very happy. But the challenging part was........ getting up and reaching the place by 5 AM.Thankfully we made it before the sunrise and the sun came up at around 5:15. What a sight!! Life is so beautiful and God is so wonderful !! :-)

My heart is beating fast.........my heart is beating fast....

I am always nervous even if I know that I am right and I am fighting for my right. It has not been easy....... not at all easy.......because I am not comfortable talking to new people and in a way I am tired of re-iterating the same issue again and again. All in Vain! Nobody seems to see sense in my argument at all. Even after the case is so clean , nobody seems to see any sense in what I say....... and nobody seems to acknowledge anything.

I guess I am the stupid idiot fighting for this. If it was anybody else , may be they would not have fought for so long............ but I chose not to keep quiet. And I chose to shout out loud.......... no matter what !

But then its a struggle you know.......... its not that easy.......... unfortunately ! :-(

My appraisal. My manager has been quite a good guy though I don’t approve many of his mannerisms and all that. He has always appreciated my passion towards work. My mind knew that he has a good impression on me or atleast thinks that I am out of the crowd. But the way he behaved when it came to my appraisal......... I didn’t expect it at all. I had a discussion with him and he quickly told me that he gave me a ECC but my Level2 manager has changed it without even asking him. And he told me to send him a mail with all the appreciations etc and said that he would fight on my behalf. And I like a little ignorant fool did whatever he wanted and kept reminding him of the issue. He insisted that he wanted a reply from J and will wait for it. Though I knew it was a futile effort , I kept quiet.......... just because he was trying to fight on my behalf. But then , he gave me the greatest jolt of my life. Suddenly one day , he just replied saying that ECC is given to extremely and exceptionally good people and may be I need to do a little more in terms of blah blah blah which he already commented in my appraisal that he is impressed about the same blah blah blah.

Thats it. He just sent this mail and kept quiet. He knew he was contradicting himself , but still chose to do it and left my side in such a horrible way. He didn’t even speak to me about it. Though he knew that somebody else has overrided his decision , he still chose to keep silent. I know why........... because he didn’t want to take it to the next level and spoil his relationship with people. He chose to compromise on his morals and ethics but he didn’t chose to compromise on his relationship with J. Knowing what kind of a guy he is, I just want to ask one question............ doesn’t his conscious prick him for doing this ?

If I were in his place , irrespective of what would happen to me , I would have fought for the right of my subordinate who deserved it. And more than anything , I would have been eager to know what was the reason for changing it when I myself feel that she is an ECC candidate.

I am still fighting for my right and have escalated this to various levels. Nobody seems to even acknowledge that something is definitely wrong except for one person. But ofcourse things were not in his hands either.

Even after having so many appreciation mails and even after working so hard for one year and even after getting ECC from my direct supervisor , why do I have to go through all this ?