The "Digital India" initiative... Take Home #464

The number of people that get influenced and advantaged decide the greatness of an initiative taken by a leader. Doesn't matter however fair and clear the initiative is, as long as it does not reach out to the masses and touch the lives of people, it cannot qualify to be called as a great one!

PS: Best to wishes to Mr. Narendra Modi and all of us to digitalise India. It's an initiative as of now. Hope it turns as a great one, one day soon. Also hope that the privacy and security of people and data will be maintained well. 

Praises and applauds...!

Be aware of the fact that not every praise or applaud can be genuine. There is foreign interest in everyone and that's quite human, I think. Because, what each person faces is unique to him and always appear important for his own survival.

It's your own responsibility to understand and estimate people, especially those who praise or applaud you. Nevertheless, as long as you are not getting carried away with all that praise, it does not matter. But being so is very difficult practically, not impossible though! 

Sense of responsibility... Take Home #463

One must have and show the sense of responsibility in everything he or she attempts. Be it in personal life or professional life, your sense of responsibility is one of the qualities of yours that gets various opportunities to you. Have it and remember to show it too. And never fake it as its one of the easily understandable human behavior and can create a never changeable bad impression.

Never imitate... Take Home #462

Taking inspiration from someone and working towards our own goal in our own way is always better productive and qualitative than following someone and imitating them while trying to reach our goal. Along with reaching the goals, we must also make sure of putting forward our own identity. That's for the basic fact that everyone of us is unique! Sticking to basics is not a bad idea under any circumstances. 

Be proud... Take Home #461

Be proud and give your best when someone intends to utilize your energy to get an idealistic thing into reality. Not everyone contains the energy needed to transform the way the world happens around them. Be proud of the fact that you are able to contribute back. 

Coconut scraper... Pic of the day #22

Scraping the coconut was one of the toughest things done by my mom and grand mom in out kitchen as far as my observation goes from my childhood days. They used to cut it into small pieces and would peel it into tiny pieces. Sometime later, I remember my grand mom holding the coconut scraper with her feet and scraping the coconut into a plate underneath the scraper. Touch-wood, she must had a lot of patience and skill. 

When I had been to Kerala, I came across a different type of coconut scraper. The abundant availability of the coconuts in Kerala needs no confirmation and the usage of coconut in their food items is understandable. They use coconut in almost every item, I think. Over there, in a house I saw the coconut scraper which was fixed permanently to the kitchen's rock base. They would use it and cover it with a small plastic cap in free time. There was nothing to rotate the scraping blade, rather the person who would want to scrap the coconut would have to rotate the coconut on top of the blade. Since the scraper was fixed to the kitchen base, it could not move! I tried my hand at it and then soon realised that it required a lot of skill and practice.

In Pune, once I had been to a shopping mall. While I was casually roaming in the steel utensils section, I saw a box with the image of a coconut scraper kind of thing. I opened the box and saw a dismantled one. I quickly asked the sales person there to show me how to use it. She assembled the parts and put it on the floor and told me that the handle will have to be rotated to scrap the coconut. I remembered a similar one which my grand ma used to hold with her feet. I asked the sales girl, how to hold it as it would move otherwise while rotating the handle. She struggled for a moment to figure out and finally we discovered the way to use it. There was a small black knob we saw  on the right side of the based of the scraper. Once that's completely moved to the other side, as could also be seen in the picture here, the air underneath the scraper base would get evacuated and the rubber base would get stick to the floor and it will continue to hold the base to the floor unless and until the small black knob was moved back. How simple it felt! I immediately put it into my shopping trolley.

I've been using it since quite sometime now and it's very useful and mainly, its simple to use and clean. A very important product that every kitchen must have, except the kitchens in Kerala. For the whopping usage that they have, only the permanently fixed scrapers will be able to do the job for them. There have been many innovations which have made our lives easy going. This coconut scraper definitely one of them! 

Herbal/Green Tea... Pic of the day #21

I do not take tea or coffee. Even the chilling weather of Delhi, where I stayed for two years during my post graduation, could not succeed in making me drink tea or coffee. Not even the seven years of my work life, spent among the friends who would take tea or coffee number of times a day, could do that either. Somehow, I'm not the one for those drinks. And I do not think I will ever have to drink them, at least I hope for that. 

Recently, I've started taking the Herbal drink. It has all the types of healthy herbs as ingredients. It tastes too good with a mix of a couple of tea spoons of honey into it. I also have tasted green tea recently. And that did not impress me with its taste but as I understand, there are many anti oxidants available in the green tea. Hence its good for body's immunity system. I've Ginger and Cinnamon flavors at home. I've started taking the green tea and I hope I will continue drinking it in future as well. I recommend green tea for everyone. Instead of taking the coffee or tea, take green tea and let your cup of tea take care of your health. Anyone suffering with breathing problems can drink the Ginger flavor. It really works! A green tea in rainy season can keep you protected from a number of viruses. Also, the hot tea makes you feel better in your throat, if you are having a soar one. 

Have green tea along with your loved one and enjoy the added taste of love! 

Gardening... Pic of the day #20

Gardening is probably the most loved hobby although not the most common one! I've grown up seeing my parents and family members taking care of plants in our garden. Once in a while, I used to extend my hand too. It used to feel very refreshing after every gardening session. Sometimes I used to water the plants with a pipe and I never liked watering the plants with bucket and mug, somehow! We had a lot of plants in our garden including a white colored rose plant. This particular plant gave us a number of rose flowers. My mom used to wear them. I had short hair at that time and never liked to wear a big rose flower although my mom insisted at times and succeeded few times, especially on Fridays. 

Recently, in our flat at Pune we made some plantations. Mom was here that time for summer vacation. We had been to a nursery and chose the pots and plants that we wanted to take home! A small garden was eventually made in the terrace. Mom insisted me to plant at least one rose flower plant. But I was not for it as I always had bad experiences with rose flower plants except the while rose plant that I mentioned above. I thought and still think that rose plants do not grow easily! You need to take a lot of care! I was not somehow ready for that on that day. But lately, we bought a rose flower plant, this time a pink one. We planted it in one of the pots and so far it's doing good. Also, we bought a Tulasi plant. We chose a differently designed pot for it. Although we don't worship it, we felt that it needed a different kind of attention and place in our garden. 

So, that's how we added few more plants to our garden. Now, I water them with bucket and mug, even though I still do not like it fully! The problem is, there is tap connection to terrace and also the garden is not so big that we can invest a lot of time to connect a pipe! But anyway, watering the plants has become my hobby now and I'm happy about it. The monsoon rains here take care of a certain portion of my work. Yet, spending time with plants is an absolute stress buster for me. I feel like they communicate to me at times!  

Things that matter and You!

Certain things appear a lot valuable than what they actually deserve. The first impression makes us believe that they are valuable. And over a period of time, we grow closer to such things and eventually start identifying ourselves with those. It becomes difficult thereafter to stay without them or even to rethink about them if they deserve so much attention of ours. Every time we try to rethink, an inner voice pitches up and makes sure that we postpone the thought process. Still, its never late to have realized about  what's important and what's not for us. Not every time the inner voice can come over us. There will be moments that make us feel free from any other distractions. Identify such moments and utilize the freedom to get to know what's really important. Hence get rid of the long closed opinion of yours about the things that you value really. Also, be attentive while getting closure to any thing. It can take ages at times to realize the hard facts behind your present moment's feeling like liking! 

Debating... Take Home #460

Debate is an important platform to get to know of various perspectives and hence improve our way of looking at any topic, incident or a person. The more open minded you are the more people enjoy debating with you. The more open minded you are the more you you can learn from a debate. 

Be open for debates, unless that's not possible at a given point of time due to time or process constraints. Be as much open minded as you can and hence enhance your understanding to the next level.

Dreams... Take Home #459

With time, we must feel more deserving to get to see our dreams becoming true. That's the indication that we are actually working towards fulfilling them and not just remaining dreaming! 

Martina Hingis and the comeback!

It feels wonderful to watch your once favorite player making a comeback into the game and winning the grand slams all over again.  The player, whom you once greatly admired, will stay in your favorites list forever unless there's really something disturbingly bad that he or she does. Martina Hingis is one of such players whom I admired a lot in my teenage, My mom used to talk about Stephie Graph but for me it was always Martina Hingis who would come first in the favorites list. Later when I kept occupied in my studies, a lot happened with Hingis in her sporting career. Once in a while I heard or read about her in news. At one point, I read about her being suspected in a doping case and that she would either have to prove her innocence by submitting the required samples or quit the game by retiring so that she would not have to face any allegation. She eventually announced her retirement. In women's singles category, she is the first and last player I ever admired. There have been many a players later on but frankly none has been my favorite somehow.

Before the London Olympics, when I read a news that Martina Hingis would do a comeback into the game and might be partnering Federer in the mixed doubles event in Olympics, I was very happy about it. But it did not happen the way I read though. Later on when Martina partnered Sania Mirza and Leander Paes in women's doubles and mixed doubles events, I started once again keeping an eye on her and on her Indian counterparts. We all know how Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis have raced flawlessly to the top of the rankings table. Leander Peas and Hingis won three grand slam titles of the year 2015. Sania and Hingis won the grand slams too! Currently, they are in the finals of the US Open 2015 and are going to play the finals tonight. I wish them all the best for yet another fantastic show to end the season. Congratulations to Leander and Hingis for winning the mixed doubles event yesterday. 

Hoping to see Sania and Hingis winning the coveted title tonight. Also, hoping to see Martina Hingis having yet another satisfying outing in the court  as part of her second innings in the game. It she and Federer will represent Switzerland in the Rio Olympics 2016, and Leander and Sania will represent India, it will be great to watch the final between these two teams. Wishing all of them all the best. 

Spring Onion... Pic of the day #19

Onion prices are racing high day by day these days. I think its 80 rupees per kilo now. Although some of us can afford it, if we buy the onions at such a high price, its going to become further difficult for those who cannot afford it. As the demand goes down, the prices goes down too. Now that's from the basics of economics I was taught in class tenth. 

Spring onion is very good for health and that's what google says by the way. I first had a look at it in Pune when one of my flat mates cooked its curry. Earlier to that I was not aware that there was such a vegetable existed. For sometime I was surprised and was resistant to eat the curry but once I tasted it, I was then comfortable continuing to eat it further. Since then, I've been cooking it once in a while. Recently I've bought one spring onion bunch from the market. Knowing the onion prices I thought the spring onion bunch would also cost more. But I was told by the shopkeeper that its cost was only ten rupees. After a brief surprise, I quickly paid the amount and got the spring onion bunch. 

That gives me an idea to give a tip to you all. We can cut the spring onion leaves and keep it in fridge. The pieces can be used in place of onion pieces in all curries and breakfast items. I tried this earlier as well when the onion rates were high once. Egg fry tastes too good with the spring onion. The 'Sambar' made with the small onions at the root of the spring onion leaves tastes just awesome! And more over, the whole bunch costs just ten rupees. Using the leaves instead of the onions in recipes is definitely going to reduce the price of the onions because the demand goes low! Hope this helps some of you! 

Dictatorship and Love - A choice can still be made!

Where nothing else works, dictatorship and love still work. Dictatorship works relatively faster than love. Dictatorship brings the angle of helplessness and hence the response is relatively quick. Love works upon a person's comfort zone and hence the realization time is more and can be huge at times. Nevertheless, they both work. The way you have to adopt can be anything out of these two. But the way you prefer to adopt, usually, depends upon you patience level. The more patience you have the more you lean towards love. The less patience you have the more you tend to go the dictatorship way. Nothing out of the two can be concluded as right and wrong. Both work. Both did work. Both will work. History has many examples for both ways. The difference between , as I understand, is that the dictatorship works on the present generation or may be couple of the following ones. And love works on the present and also a few of the future generations. One more difference is that dictatorship works quick and love works slow, too slow at times. Coping up with the change of pace is crucial in dictatorship whereas in love, coping up with the huge time slot and still be able to be connected with each other is crucial. 

At the end of the day, it hugely dependent upon the way you are, the way you have been brought up, the way you understand the things, the way you connect with people and the way you wish to add value to your life and to million other lives. Choice is yours, as like in many other cases. 

Showcasing of work and the two perspectives!

Unless its a favor and that too if you are a believer of doing favors being anonymous, showcasing the work that you do is debatable. 

Its a perspective that showcasing of what you do is not required and only self satisfaction is sufficient. There is another perspective to it that showcasing is necessary and important in today's competitive world to grab the opportunities that you deserve. Whatever is the perspective you follow, be aware of the positive and negative sides of it and prepare yourself to handle them. 

If you do not showcase and just work, you are full in energies from within and you can do a lot of things as your level of self satisfaction and self sufficiency from within is untouchable. It remains as your strength. At the same time it can become your weakness if you do not take care! You are not showcasing what you are doing so you might not get a chance to get it reviewed. Hence, you might not get the feedback time to time. If there is any need to improve, you might realize very late. Not showcasing the work that you do gives you sufficient freedom to be what you are, to follow what you think is right, as you need not think about anything or anyone else while you work. This enables you to be yourself and provides an opportunity to give your best. And the negative side of it is, you will not be able to think over various perspectives while you work and hence your work can reflect monopoly and eventually it might not be useful for a wide range of audience! 

If you showcase your work, the quality of your work gets an added advantage as you prefer to be perfect even though what you do is not fully of your type. Your work might reflect various perspectives and the diversity levels will be higher. The more perspectives you think over, you consider, you respect, the better the work can be useful to a greater level of audience. But the negative side of it is, you always are under pressure to represent and consider all the possible perspectives and hence it might lead to delay in the delivery. In business, time to market is very important and similar is the case for any delivery that you do. If you cannot deliver things on time, that's half failure already. Of course, time  management and adjustment is possible even after considering all the perspectives but that might not always be possible. Showcasing your work always keeps you on your tows to be right, even though not true! This works and does not, depending upon the situations. 

It cannot be concluded upon what to be showcased and what not to be, even if its about a favor. You are the best judge to decide what to be showcased and what not to be. It varies from case to case. You can of course discuss with your close mates in case you are confused. But one thing is very clear that not everything can be showcased and not everything can go concealed. It varies. It depends. Showcasing gives the opportunities that you deserve as people know that what you are capable of. Not showcasing your talent or work might not get to you opportunities in short term but in long term there can be something good happening. Its all upto a person and the given situation. Your decisions build your career, so decide your way! 

The panoramic view... Pic of the day #18

I'm a fan of panoramic photography. The below posted photo is one of the panoramic photos I've clicked lately. The panoramic view not just covers the major portion of the view but also enables us to capture the natural placement of all the things/people in their own positions instead of adjusting them to fit into the frame which we usually do while taking a normal photo. The panoramic photo option being provided in the smart phones is a very useful feature for all the photography lovers, especially the nature or landscape photography lovers. Certain landscapes cannot be captured together because of their length or the distance between two. The panorama photo option clicks away that problem and makes you enable to click as you wish. 

Thanks to the inventors of this feature! The phone that I use is giving a little trouble to click panoramic photos in a row. It works just normal for first few, and then it starts displaying a message to move the phone in any direction to start panorama view. Inspite me moving the phone in all possible directions, the panoramic view just does not start! The camera will have to be closed and reopened or at times the phone needs to be switched off and on to click the panoramic view. Hope this software or hardware bug, looks like, gets fixed soon! Looking forward for a flawless and countless clicking of panoramic views!

The fact... Take Home #458

Don't keep being wrong and expect people to understand that one thing, which may have happened wrongly but not because of you. You are judged by what you are in your day to day life. And this is the fact. 

Love and be loved... Take Home #457

Showing interest might or might not work all the time. But taking interest does work most of the times. Be genuine and take interest in situations and people. Love and be loved. 

Confidence and self-confidence!

What you think you can do is important for you to have self-confidence and what you actually do is important for others to have confidence in you.Your self-confidence cannot build the confidence in others and the confidence that people have in you cannot build your self-confidence. Each of these must be worked out fully and individually. In some cases, they might go parallel to each other for a long time or forever. 

The finishing line... Take Home #456

Change of approach, at times, can be of great help in keeping up the commitments and hence winning the race. Hard work can get you to a distance but to cross the finishing line, approach does matter.

Respect... Pic of the day #17

I'd been to HDFC bank few months ago to get an ECS form signed. It was the lunch time when I reached the bank, hence I was asked to be seated for sometime. I sat in one of the chairs in the visitors' lounge. I did not have my lunch but I thought once the bank officials come back, I would get the signature done and go for a brief lunch. While I was waiting in the lounge, a sign board caught my eye.  It was put on a chair in the visitors seating area. The below is the picture of it. 

It was for the first time that I saw such a thing written for the specially abled people. Later to that incident, I saw many a such boards though, the goodness I'd felt in the bank about the way it was written on the board was amazingly great. Its important that we all respect each other as fellow beings. Limitation of any person can never be his weakness until and unless he lets his become so. All of us have some or the other limitations. Helping each other by understanding each other's strengths is going to take all of forward together and longer. 

Happy teachers' day!

Life's lessons are one of the best lessons and the teachers who ignite their students' minds to accept various perspectives of life are few of the best teachers. 

The betterment... Take Home #455

What's said before doing a given task is usually an opinion and what's said while doing it or at the end of it is usually the feedback. Opinion can be overlooked at times but feedback can never be. Take opinions as well as feedback time to time. Choose carefully what to work upon. The ultimate goal must be the betterment. 

Support from within... Take Home #454

What you get to handle is what you can handle. Every problem must have a solution so as yours. Before going out and find the support, find the support from within first. That's the best support one can get and so is for you. Be positive and believe in time when you have no solutions at hand at the moment. Time heals a lot of wounds and resolves a lot of problems. Just stay focused. 

Justify your position... Take Home #453

Justify the position you are in by accepting the whole and sole responsibility. Make it tough for him who tries to occupy it when you are there. Make it exemplary for him whom you wish to see in your position when you decide to take another. 

Let's be on our tows... Take Home #452

Irrespective of how successful a person is, at no point of time in life it can be taken for granted that he or she is correct always, which is also practically and humanly not possible! Better be aware of this fact and be on our tows in deciding anything.