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Friday, March 17, 2006

Colored Memories....



The festival of color was here once again - bringing along with it and coloring us all - with those myriad shades of joy, fun and happiness!!

And I just realized how time just flew by; It was exactly on the day of this colorful festival 'Holi' last year, that we (a team of about 15~20) had to involuntarily move to Hyderabad from Chennai (my Motherly-home town) for carrying out the implementation of our ongoing project, which had started in Chennai and was going on smoothly till the news came as a bolt from the blue for some of us at least.

And so here I was on the day of color, @ Hyderabad last year. And as I have my maternal aunt's family residing out here in the city, headed straight to her home after checking-in to the hotel. And as it was already late afternoon, did not expect my cousins to be adorning the Laal-Hara-Nila (Red-Green-Blue) stYiSH looks, but that was not to be, as I found myself drenched in a similarly wEt ouTFit in no time once I entered my aunt's residence!! :) And the rest is bright N colorful history!!

Well, thinking about this day, it brings back some nostalgic colored memories of the different phases of my life -

Those kiddish days :), I mean when I was a kid with those chubby cheeks and a gol-matol body, juz nebulously remember how my elder cousins and our family friends would paint me red-blue-green (yellow-pink-black also sometimes) with the 'Gulaal' as we call it in hindi. Those days when we would run around merrily on the terrace of our home, flinging those rainbowish-colors and splashing n spraying water of similar shades on each other. Oh and how can I forget those special entities which have their own gr8 significance on this day...yeah, I am talking about the bAlLooNS. We would fill them up with the colored waters and hurl them on one another and of course on the people going down the street :)

Those teenish days....I mean when I was a bright, energetic boy of about 15~18 years, remember how my school-friends-gang would come, call out, and then shout my name standing outside the house on the road. And my Mommy would say, "Yeh tel laga ke jaa, issey rang jaldi utar jaayega" (Apply this oil on your body, it would ease the color-removal process :)) And as soon as I'd open the main gate, those 'Rang-Birangey bhoots'
(Colored demons) would make me identify as one amongst them in no time. And then we would be out on the streets with look-alike-masses, our caravan going around the different addas (hubs) of our locality and spattering the shades of fun n joy around!! It was like, only if one was dressed very formally and seemed to be going to office, or if one was a student, one could barely think of being spared from the colorful extravaganza. But then remember that one day towards the end of my schooling life, when we had our board exams of +2, when unfortunately one exam was scheduled on the day of Holi, and my my....wasn't that a Rangeen (colorful) exam, many of my friends had to sport the colorful fury on their anatomy, while I somehow luckily managed to escape unscathed with only some minimal damage done...but the 'Mission-Reach-ExamHall-Uncolored' accomplished :)

These youthfully employed days....Of Oh U guys never understand :) Ok in relatively simple terms, I mean these days when I am a smart and handsome guy, and an even smarter professional, life seems to have become a bit monotonous with the Color TV which had all those beautiful shades, turning in to a black and white one nowadays :( Ok its not that bad I guess, but still miss those kiddish and teenish days of enjoying this day of color in its true and vibrant spirit!!

Wish you all a very happy and colorful holi; and a bright and glorious journey of life ahead!! :)

Saturday, March 04, 2006

fUN @ wOrK

Yeah U read it right! Itz real fun to take some time off your work N involve yourself in some extra-curricular acts, like the ones most of us used to take part in during our academic life :). And yes so on a fine friday (The cASuALs day) last week there was this event at the office, and we'd been informed about it and the activities involved had been communicated through the mailers from our HR department during the course of the week.

So the fUN activities arranged for us to have gr8 fun while working were....Ok let me instead share the invitation in its entirety itself with you guys, and it looked something like this.....

"Let’s make this Friday a FluOrEsCenT FridAY
Let’s see how we plan do it????????
Show YouR WACKIEST/WILDEST/COLORFUL SIDE:

1st Funway
Get spotted in FluOrEsCenT dresses (BUNTY & BUBLi ISSHTYLE) on Friday

And

2nd Funway
Get into a team…. (Project-wise/Random group- Max 5 people)
>Design a colorful poster……….. (Cartoons/Portraits/Collage)
> Display it around your funstation (read workstation)…..
> Poster Theme: “What’s your idea of FUN@@@@@@@work?”

Deadline: Posters should be displayed in/around your funstations
Please send your nominations to:
ABC Location – Manish Soni(MS)
DEF Center – Ms.XYZ

Wait for the judges……
BAGS FULL of GIFTS are READY for
· The Best Poster entry
· The Best Dressed Associate (Male & Female)

Have a fun filled week………… see you on Friday"

And yep as our dear HR sits at some other location, I was made the volunteer from our work location, to make this event a real fun-filled one for everyone of us.

And here I was as a result of it, going about addressing all the various project teams around, a day before the event, encouraging and reminding them off the events the next day, and man that itself was real fun for me. ha ha ha.... U ask how was it? Well, Its always known that the gurlz are all enthu N charged up when asked to dress up elegantly in a la bollywood actress isstyle, but imagine yourself convincing guys around to dress up in a bright yellow/orange or any of that flourescent colored tees/shirts to office - a la Mithun-The Disco Dancer- Isstyle :). That was as difficult as convincing a Salman Khan to wear a tee/shirt for the full length of the movie :D

So on the D day, it was complete fun, as people came in bright Jhink-Chack chamkeeley kinda clothes to the office, and also as we put our 'Think-Fun' cap on during the process of the designing a poster, in whatever short time we could take off from the project schedule.

It was an enjoyable xperience as we grouped into a team, for a change nothing to do related to the project, and with the thought process on, the fun ideas pouring in, we came up with a couple of posters in a short time and they looked something like these..... (Click on them to c the pics in their full enlarged view)



A poor chap developer learning all the soFTwAre funDas, the hard way, from his project lead and then going about implementing them in his own sTyLe @ his work desk :) with Great Control!!






The hard but true fact of a software professional's life depicted - funnily & comically :-)

And guess what, the writings you see on these posters have been inscribed by none other than yours truly. Woila.....I'd almost forgotten the so called art of 'Hand-Writing' - as Osama Bin Laden would have forgotten what Peace means!! - after joining this software industry a couple of years back, with all my writings..err..typings mostly only on the keyboard!!

And for the icing on the cake, our above entries to the contest won the best Poster award :D and so got a cool gift for our HARD but fUN work :)

And as the mood of fUn was on in the week, I thought Y not share some moments of fuN with the "fuN-Orginator" herself. Ok I mean our HR executive. She's one chirpy n bubbly lady, N our dear friend if you are reading this by any chance, the probability of which is less than Taiwan winning the Cricket World Cup, consider this as my humble request to put this conversation of ours, out here...... :)

Me to her:

Hi VBJi,

Please find the pics of the posters taken by us with a DigiCam, attached herewith.

Aur haan, ek reminder ki – “Sardaar hamey hamaare aur 2 gifts milney baaki hai.” :) Ab D bhi aa gaya hai N he is also asking for his gift; Khair usey toh hum sambhaal lengey, So this is a humble request to you that you please please do bring along our 2 gifts next time U grace this place.

Till then, Have a nice day n a gr8 week ahead!! :D

Her reply:

Hello there..

Ye kya kar diya mere naam ko..
Tum engineers ki yehi problem hai har cheeez ko short form technical sounding bana dete ho... my name is not VB (Visual Basic).. ok...

I was't well.. yeah was down with fever again so bunked office yest...
Be assured, will be getting more prizes for 2 of you (whoever are left) but not for D... he was't even there.. how dare he ask for one..
but will need some time for it.. I dont think I would be able to come this week to ABC location.. lets see...

My response to that:

Hi VBJi!! (Hum toh bhai jasie hain waise rahenge :), ab humein aapko aise hi bulana acchha lagta hai, kya karen!!)

Waise kasam Preity zinta ke dimples ki, aapka yeh naam humein bahut acchaa lagta hai, please humein aise hi address karne dijiye aapko, please…
Arey appraisal aur bonus ko chodkar, pehli baar kuch toh alag maang rahein hain apni HR se; kam se kam itna toh afford kar hi saktey hain aap (Yeh toh budget mein aata hai na!!...lolz…)

Oh that was bad 2 hear that U were down with fever yesterday; hope you are doing well now. Wish U a healthy recovery as speedy as a Brett Lee’s fastest delivery :)

Waise hum toh soch rahey they ki yeh HR log bade hi dIfFeRent hotey hain yaar……kabhi desk peh hotey hi nahin hain……And as if that was not enough, they also put up an out of office reminder to evade hum jaisi bechaari Junta :D

And thanks for assuring our prizes - aapko ek 25 paise waali toffee zarur doonga mein, aapke is nek dil gesture ke liye :D

Awaiting your arrival eagerly. (Woila, kaafi lamba chauda mail ho gaya, ab humein kaam karney dijiye)

Till then, take care N Bbye 4 now.

So then, that was quite a fun filled week for me and I truly enjoyed every moment of it. And as I wrote out there it was all "Juz 4 fUN, Nothing Official about it :)".

And talking about fun, well there are these 2 guyz Arz000n & Abhinav whom I've come across on the blogosphere, and whom I'll crown the stand-up Fun N Laughter Kings when it comes to making people laugh, have fun and Njoy their writings. Hats off to these guyz!!

So herez MS signing off once again, wishing U have fun filled weeks, week-ends and more importantly a fun filled Life to live in the years to come. Cheers!!