Training aboard a Houseboat

I have been deputed to undergo a three day training at Kumarakom Palace Conference Boat from September 24-26. The training program is on ' Leadership Skills for Effective Management' and is being conducted by Sterling Institute of Corporate Conferences & Events, Kerala (http://www.sterlingeventsindia.com/). More about the training event in my next post.

Timeless

The other day my daughter had her maths exam. In her syllabus,among other things, she had chapters on - How to read time on a watch ? Despite her best efforts, she would somehow mistake half hour to mean 50 minutes or read 3'O Clock as 3 hrs 60 mins and so on. I could somehow relate to her learning woes. Learning about time is perhaps among the first steps towards growing up.

When I was as small as her I had no sense of time. I don't remember if I had any chapters on time. At that stage the summer vacations meant fun, no time to quantify it in weeks,days or hours. We generally spent our vacations at our nanke ( Nanaji's house) at Jalandhar. In those days, TV had not intruded the indian household, going to movies was a once in a while affair and children generally played in various groups either with cousins or with the children from the neighbourhood.

Evening time after dinner was reserved for stories from Nanaji when all the kids will curl themselves on the big manja ( charpoy) for his story. His stories used to be long as they were told in enormous detail. The children were told to give hunkara ( Confirmation) so that he could know that we are awake and are listening to the story. The stories continued over several days; one could catch up the next day if one had missed some part due to sleep. His stories were also thought provoking, always giving out some message in them. I always had questions on the plot of those stories as I always wanted the stories to have pleasant endings as we have in our films.

In all the stories, the characters went through good as well as turbulant time. One such story had a moral which I could recall even today:

आस का बाप,

(a father will always have expectations from his child)

निराश की माँ,
( a mother loves her child irrespective)
चलते की बहन,
( a sister keeps in good stead only if the brother is doing fine)
संग की स्त्री
( a woman will only be a companion if staying together)

Nanaji passed away last year, but his timeless words will always remain with us.

ਧਰਮ ਹੇਤ ਸੀਸ ਦਿੱਤੇ , ਬੰਦ ਬੰਦ ਕਟਵਾਏ, ਖੋਪੜੀਆਂ ਲੁਹਾਈਆਂ, ਚਰਖਾਰਿਆਂ ਤੇ ਚਢਆਏ ਗਏ

Gurudwara Mehdiana Sahib: I visited Mehdiana Sahib in July 2005 when I was visiting the Gurudwaras of Panjab. The speciality of this Gurudwara are the sculptures depicting the various events from the Sikh history. The sculptures leave an indelible impression on one's mind. The various verses which are ingrained in our conciousness are effectively portrayed by means of these sculptures

The Gurudwara owes its development to the untiring efforts of Baba Zora Singh, a one time transporter who is said to have lost his only son in an accident at Canada.

بسملﻻح ( Bismillah)

Perhaphs the first person to take notice of my blog was Capt Balvinder, whose own blog' Frankly Speaking' is going great guns! (typical fauji lingo). Capt Balvinder is an ex 3 Dogra officer which also happens to be my parent unit in the army. He was commissioned 18 years before me in the same unit. His popularity can be gauged from the fact that he was still remembered in the unit among others by Colonel P S Bhagi and

Colonel S K Sharma, who served with him while the unit was stationed at Trivandrum in late 70's and early 80's. I now work in the same Bank as Capt Balvinder. The above picture is of October 2000, when he had visited the unit at Jalandhar (Panjab) during the Centenary Celebrations of the battalion.

RBI - For Common Man

The other day I was invited for an official dinner at a hotel. As I was waiting in the gallery for others to join in, I involved myself in small talk with the people around. On getting to know that I am from a bank, one of the gentleman wanted to have a specific information regarding foreign exchange. As I was about to get back to him, when during the course of the discussion, he informed me that he has asked for this information from many bankers but none has given a precise reply. I asked for the mail Id of the gentleman with a assurance to provide the information.

The next day, I was lucky enough to get the information online within a few minutes. I immediately mailed the link and almost forgot about the incident till a couple of days later when I received a mail back from him.

His mail somehow touched me, gave me a satisfaction of a job well done. Quite often, we become indifferent towards our job to realise the magnitude of the expectations the other person has from us. It happens all the time, in all situations, to almost everybody. Sometimes this indifference spills to the personal side, towards children, family and friends and so on. The answers we are looking in our life are sometime within reach, only we need to remain organised, balanced and in a state of harmony with ourselves.

I've posted the said link in my links under 'RBI for Common Man' for use by everyone.

Independence day at Thiruvananthapuram

August 15,2008: Thiruvananthapuram- One of the residential colony of the Bank is located inside the compound of the Belhaven Palace at Kowdiar. The Palace has now been converted into the VOF (visiting officers flats) . In the late 80's ,the Belhaven Palace housed the administrative office of the Indian Airforce during Operation PAWAN in Srilanka.
The Independence day is celebrated by the residents of the colony by Flag hoisting in the morning and a cultural program by the children of the residents in the evening. My kids Mannat and Aryaman also participated in one program which was based on 'Mile sur mera tumhara' which used to be aired on Doordarshan a few years back.

Mannat & Aryaman, all decked up before the cultural evening
The Kids giving the salute to the National Flag during the cultural program.

The day I received my transfer orders..

April 16,2008: The entire day was spent at Bhitargaon, a remote village about 50 kms from Kanpur city. My Bank had organised a Financial Literacy Camp for the residents of the village with assistance from the local administration. I had no idea where we were heading or what will be in store. But I guess, that's how life is. It was only after reaching there and interacting with people that I realised that rural india is in such a bad shape. Even till date, the village is without power, drinking water is scarce, agriculture is on the mercy of the almighty.The majority of the population in this village is living below poverty line. We were given a nice welcome by the locals, expecting some big announcement.

I felt awkward for the luxury vehicles in which we were travelling, not sure of what difference will our endeavours will make in their everyday life.
I was totally cut off from the rest of the world as there were no mobile signals. The entire proceedings were stereotype and I felt an unending uneasiness.