One more year has gone by and time to celebrate(what an Irony??) Not much special as no one special was here with me down here in Sweden.. But got myself a damn good gift..guess what A Canon SLR Camera model E0S 450D rebel XSi.

Update: See the pic here

Celebrated Silver Jubilee this year and going by the genes of my family..I have completed half of my life ;)

When you realise that you have completed half of your life and have so many incomplete things on your list, a sense of urgency sets in and you want to complete the to-do things as soon as possible.

At the same time, when you realise that you don’t live for ever, a sense of boldness surfaces in you and the risk taking appetite increases as you realise that you have nothing to loose after all!!

Ya ya , I know I shouldn’t be talking all this on my birthday, but kya kare yaar, when you realise that you are not doing what you really want to do with your life, you tend to think in these lines.

Not planning to do much today!! Got couple of DVDs and pizzas along with some popcorn and munching my birthday away!!

It’s my first time to go on a shopping spree ALONE. In Hyderabad, I had my friends or family with me all the time. Here my roomie accompanied me sometimes. I alone did not go anytime. But i did most of my Birthday shopping today. It’s a different experience. You don’t have anyone breathing over your shoulder to hurry up, you can try any type of clothes and any number of times and spend time wherever you want and how much ever time you want :) .Also, I have to get my wardrobe changed which was due from a long time on my to-do list.

Got myself couple of T’s and Denim Jeans. I also got a Peacoat for me. Though I know that it won’t be of any use once I go back to India, I wanted to have one from sometime now. So, shelled out some bugs and got myself some pairs. Though, my wardrobe makeover is long way to complete. Also, Christmas is round the corner, So shopping is kinda fun as there are overwhelming number of people out for their Christmas’ shopping.

I will continue my shopping if I get any time in next couple of days. The main problem for shopping in weekdays is that I come from office at aronnd 6:30 PM and the shops close at around the same time. So, I don’t get enough time to complete.

Lets see how much I get my things done this week. I have a Camera and an iPod on my list. Also, my birthday gift is pending. This month is one helluva spendthifty one for sure.

I listen to different genre of songs everyday. Sometimes, somehow, I get stuck on a particular song and keep listening  to that until my roommate or a colleague make me realise how much I am in fact listening to that.

So, this week my stuck up song is: Guzarish from Gazini. A.R.Rehman did the magic again. A melodious and soothing song.

Listen to the song:

It’s 1:48 in the morning(or late night) and here I am thinking of a very important decision to make which will decide my life for coming time…gr8 decisions of a company are made in board rooms and in my case..they are made in my bed room :-)

Hope what ever decision I take today will be a rational one…

We always ask God to give what is important to us, not what is best for us. I have learnt very recently that whatever he gives u, is the best for you.Though you may not like that initially, you will realise that it was the best thing to happen to you. Well, there’s always an other side of the coin. If you don’t know if what you got is the best for you, how can you acknowledge that? OR is it that we make ourselves force to think that it was the best to happen to us coz we already got that and there’s no way turning back, so saying something something like this that might comfort you.

Is it the time or my state of mind making rattle all this stuff…I don’t know, but come to think of it, I think I am really on the hot seat ;-)

Last year, this time I just preparing to apply for Carnegie Mellon’s Masters in Information Systems Management(MISM) course for which I had to take my GRE, TOEFL again. I gave them for the second time, the first time it was in my under graduation.

I say that once every hour on every Friday!!

I was not a Friday lover before, I used to get many such forward mails when I was in India, but didn’t care much coz I was having fun all the week along. Be it office or at home or hanging around with friends…

But after coming to Sweden, life has changed. Work takes a toll and the pressure of work at office and at HOME are too boring and monotonous to carry on. I don’t know how moms just do the same stuff all their life for us…I wonder…

But, Friday’s different..it marks the starting of a wonderful weekend and culmination of a stressful work week…

Here whats I do on a friday evening:

• Read Naruto and Bleach Manga
• Go out for dinner..
• Go out to a pub or watch a good flick at home
• watch Naruto and Bleach Anime

I will do couple of other things which I can’t write but the above ones are the a definite subset of them.

4th November 2008, it’s been exactly six months for my stay in Göteborg, Sweden and the journey till now is almost amazing. I have learnt so many new things – both professionally and personally. The leaning curve is very steep..so steep that I was afraid of tumbling down.. :)

Among the many things that I have discovered about myself, the thing which amazed even me is that I am very good at cooking. I hardly went to kitchen back in India and here I am cooking all sorts of dishes..which even my sister can’t  ;-)

Professionally, I got to learn bounds of new things: I met wonderful people who are way different than us,Indians, both at personal and professional level. I got an opportunity to work on the latest technology that my field has to offer, which in turn helped me a lot and the scope of learning was vast. I interact with people who came from different psychological, cultural and geographical backgrounds. The amalgam of experiences which I experience interacting with them is great.

Travelling out of the country for the first time, I experienced almost everything a usual first timer would experience. That includes Culture shock, Home Sickness, Jet Lag, weather change etc,. I came here in May and it was truly unbelievable to see sun shining bright even at night 10 as I come from a place where there are night and day times are constant round the year.

Personally, I can say that I have learnt the most. I had the total control over my life – what I do, when, where, how – everything. I also realized how difficult is to run a house consistently day in and day out. I understood how mothers struggle to complete their daily chores and at the same time keep family members happy. You are great MOM!!!

The only thing I repent when I look back the six months is that I did not utilize the time effectively to see new places. In India, you can go around at almost anytime of the year. But in a country like Sweden where the temperatures are so low, we can hardly do anything in winter. I just lazed off the entire Summer and it was too late for me by the time I realized my mistake. The only places I went were the Archipelago and Botaniska. But better late than never I have started seeing around the places and hopefully cover as many as possible. My next big tour is for Christmas where if everything goes well, I may get a stretch of 9 holidays. I am planning a lot for that vacation. touch wood!

One thing I really miss and being with my nephew Cherry, who was born on July 1st, 2008, a couple of months after I came here. He is already 4 months and I miss being with him dearly.. :-( But I think I will make up to it when I go back.

Happy Raksha bandhan to all the siblings out there.

This is one of the couple of times when I am away from my sis on this occasion and first time being out of the country.

But my sis catches me wherever I am…hehe :-)

I got my rakhee by DHL two days prior to the festival..and man it was a beautiful one indeed.

The rakhee was best for sending. It had placeholder for some kumkum and one for some ricegrains. And ofcource the rakhee.

Here are the pics

Thanks Shilpa for this lovely Rakhee and the heart touching wishes in the card.

You are the best Sis in this world.

My sis is the only person who understands me to the core. She can tell at anytime which mood I am in and how I behave.

Thank You God for such a lovely Sister.

“NO OBLIGATIONS”

This is my mantra from past 3 5 weeks.

Life is a beautiful time, which I think, one should spend happily and to the fullest. After some years, when we turn back and see ourselves and our lives, we should not regret, of what we have done and what we are doing then. Also, there should not be any feeling that we have missed something in life which we still think that we should have done.

Enjoy your life, LIVE it, don’t just spend it just as you spend your detention classes in school.

It just happened one fine day to me that I got up from bed feeling great about myself and too happy and content. I wondered what made me so happy. When I ruminated what I dreamt the last night, it was about my friends and some little things which me and my friends did together in our college days. This made me wonder about the whole thing of mindless rush that we go through each day in this corporate jungle and how we allow those things to sap out our happiness.

Now, all my friends are in different parts of the world, couple of them in the US of A, I am in Sweden, couple of them in India(though in different cities).

So, what I was wondering what makes me happy, you happy, all the people happy…well if its earning money, then I am earning enough to tell whether money makes you happy. If its success in life, then I know people who are successful but not happy.

One of the many things that my mom says, is that all the hard work we do is to have out stomach full. You eat at the Taj’s or at the chat bandaar around the street corner what ultimately you need to have stomach full.

What I intend to tell is that, what ultimately matters is whether you are HAPPY or not. What I tried with myself is for 2-3 weeks, I did not allow anything which may cause any trouble, to come near me. NO OBLIGATIONS, I have to answer no one. All I want to be is happy, place all your constraints, stresses, deadlines etc which make you stress in some place and lock it up for some days. To tell you precisely, stop preparing for your exams, stop going to your gym, stop getting up early, eat all the junk food, booze like there’s no element called water on earth…in other words pamper your senses. Pamper to an extent of satiating them. BUT, word of caution, before you start this we have to decide when we will be back on track after this small escapade, because this is so addictive that you tend to forget to come back.

Well, I got many positive results from that. First, it rejuvenates us.Next, it gives us time to ponder on our deeds and our future actions and most importantly satisfy our body. :)

Moral of the post: Enjoy once in a while. Do not stretch anything beyond its limit. Its good some times to be a lazy moron ;)

pic courtesy: Pic of Ooty lake in India, copyrighted to me.

Inder Sen blogging live from Goteborg, Sweden...coming after one month after I landed here. For the record, I am here on an overseas assignment from my   company.

Man Proposes and Destiny(God) Disposes....

I have heard this somewhere and felt the same thing during my 8 hours flight from New Delhi to Gothenburg, Sweden...and for a very good reason... After I got an admit in CMU, I thought nothing can stop me from going to CMU...but destiny was smiling seeing my confidence and this is what happened...I had an interview for an urgent requirement in my company(i had to attend that coz I did not yet receive my admission status :( ) and the very next day, I got the admit letter from the Carnegie Mellon, ha!! and here comes the twist, the next day I got a call from the person interviewed me saying I was selected and have to go to Sweden for 6 months work. Destiny is the player who toys us...indeed.

I was confident that I will reject the offer and go for my further studies...how can I let go the amount of hard work I underwent to achieve that (spare a bit of self-boasting here ;) ) But the series of events occurred due to which I had to take a tough call...THE RESULT: I deferred my admission to fall 2009 and accepted the assignment and here I am blogging from Sweden while my friends got the visas to US of A. I am not repenting the decision that I have taken but it pricks sometimes...isn't it?

Gothenburg... in fact Goteborg (in Swedish) is my first place out of India...so,there are many things that I have experienced... from the jet lag(though it was just 3.5 hrs ;) ), to the culture shock(btw it was nice ;) )                                                                                              

I will start right from beginning of this journey...

My flight was from Hyderabad to Delhi and from Delhi to Amsterdam and Amsterdam to Gothenburg. Though Hyderabad's international airport has started, all the flights did not yet start their operations..so we had to experience the gruelling short journey. Rajiv Gandhi International Airport is a real visual treat... the could really appreciate that only after I saw the pathetic condition of New Delhi Airport... Though it is not yet complete, in the little time I got to explore it, I could find everything a traveller longs for...you name it, you have it.

Well, I was taking a domestic flight to Delhi, so couldn't see the international departure terminal...but seeing the domestic terminal, i can imagine how it will be. Our flight's gate changed and the Kingfisher flight we had to take was delayed by 45 min. It was in a way good as I got some time to see the airport. The flight took off to Delhi at around 7 PM snd landed in Delhi at around 9:00 PM. The most arduous task was to get to the International terminal from the domestic terminal. The KLM ppl whose flight we had to board, made us the arrangement to get to the international terminal..Next, came the nightmare...the check-in...

I thought I had a bit of more luggage than the prescribed weight.So, I was a bit apprehensive about checking in. We were a total of 11 ppl going together,so I thought it would be fine if there is an extra luggage as I can adjust that in one of my colleague's baggage. First one to go the check-in counter was my project manager and I was in a line beside him.The person at the counter checked the weight calmly and with same serenity said that my PM has to pay eleven thousand rupees for extra weight...that’s it there swept a layer of panic in our group(coz most of them including me had overweight baggage). Some how my PM got back(of course followed by us) and in the frenzy dumped off all his baggage. In the mean time one of my colleagues checked off his baggage in a counter with a kind lady at it. That's it we all hopped there and completed our check-ins...After this task we went to the immigration check and the time was 11:30PM and our flight was at 12:00 PM...add to this the loooong queue at the counters and again add to this a man having an argument with the officer just when it was my turn...gosh...it was such a cacophony that I thought I will surely miss the flight...and did I mention you that it was around 40 degrees Celsius at that time in Delhi and I was wearing a POLO NECK SWEAT SHIRT and a JACKET(see the pic below which was in the Gothenburg airport) over it :) Sweat was almost dripping from my shirt inside...after i crossed the immigration check there was a security check and the kind person standing there wanted us to remove the Laptop from the bag...heights of things were going in my mind...amidst all these the flight official came and was scowling at us,as we were the only ppl left to board the flight...

We board the flight scrambling our cabin luggage as they were getting overburdened thanx to our exhaustion...I was so tired off that i went to a deep sleep even before the flight took off...after a good nap of one hour,I was woken up by the air hostess to have dinner(I donno if I can call that a dinner as the time was already 3 in the morning). After that, i tried in vain to go to sleep, partly it was because i was a bit uncomfortable(what more can you get in an economy class) and partly because of the boisterous laugh of a kid beside me(not at me!) to the some cartoons she was watching over the set. So, I thought its good time cover up on my pending "must-see" movies and could successfully strike Golden Compass from that.

at around 7:00 AM local time we landed at the Amsterdam International airport...I was told that it is one of the largest airports and really experienced that when I walked almost for 20-25 min to reach my next gate to board the connecting flight. The little time I got to see the airport was enough to tell that it can be the one of the finest airports on the planet. Though many stores were yet to open as it was early morning, there were quite a few coffee bars open to have a sip. I couldn’t get time to really have a look at those coffee bars but really felt the aroma near them…

The connecting flight took off at 8 AM local time and was about 1 hour flight. The flight was a very small one,small seats to sit. They supplied us with the breakfast and I tasted the European cuisine for the first time…really did not know what I ate but the ingredients showed that it had Egg(didn’t taste like that in any bite) and a cheese in that…just surfed some magazines and there we were above Goteborg…the pilot asked to fasten the seat belts as we were landing but there was quite a cloud cover beneath us….I was waiting to get the cloud cover cleared off so that I can have a clear bird’s eye view of the city but alas! the moment the we crossed the cloud cover there was the runway beneath it….I couldn’t imagine how the pilot knew the altitude…phew…anyways…after the landing we expected that we may have to do the same routines of security checks again to enter, but good for us they were hardly any…

We collected our baggage and came out into the lobby where we met our agent who looks after the ppl like us….One thing I understood immediately after meeting her was that Swedes dont work on weekends and unlike Hyderabad where the entire city is in the malls on any given Sunday, Gothenburg almost hibernates on sundays…wonder why?

We exchanged the money from the Forex counter in the airport(we were give traveller checks in India in Euros and we had to convert them into Swedish Kronas(local curency) and almost spend the next two hours in the airport(I still wonder why?) but this was my first pic in Sweden in the airport

So finally we came out almost at 11:00 AM and took a cab from the airport to our destinations and shelled out some 360 Kronas(2000 Rupees…man its almost one month and I still convert the kronas into rupees) for that…gud thing is that our company reimburses that… :)

We took some nice pics of the city when coming to the apartment and have uploaded in the flickr…

After reaching the apartment(U can view the pics here) we just dumped our baggage and were again on the roads to see the city and to search for a gud Indian grocery store…

The second thing I found out was that all the shopkeepers(read 5) were very acquainted with India and knew quite a few places.. they were asking which place in India we belong to.. and the still more interesting thing was that they were all fond of the country…I used to think that not many westerners like India(thanx to the Out-sourcing)

we walked down the entire Aveny road up to Nordstan(a huge shopping mall stands there) and also to hjalmar…only next day we knew that we walked almost for 6 kms) You can have a look at the map below the directions from our apartment to the Nordstan…. We were already starving(ate modestly before boarding the flight in Hyderabad to keep myself safe from any kind of sick feeling) and were strolling on the roads with no idea of what to eat…then there was just in front of us…. McDonalds…we were so happy that we felt that we found some one we knew from a long time….We hurried ourselves in and satiated our hunger(though not our taste buds). We then asked the counter guy to call in for a cab as we don’t know the language(swedish) the drawback which we are still facing, but to learned to live…. Got back to the apartment and just dozed off as we had to go to the office the next day and I didn’t want to look exhausted the first day at my office….

 Next Post I’ll write about the places we are visiting and hopefully I will complete the redesign of my blog till the next post…until then ciao

P.S do chip in your comments leaving your blog address so that I can read whts happening in your life….

I did not write what's going on in my life from many posts...part reason for that is my inherent laziness, but the main reason was that there were many changes in my personal life which i cannot blog about but which happened for good. The changes made me question myself and the direction in which i was going in and got a reality check on myself.

well alot on philosophy... October was the fulcrum about which my life has taken a sharp turn and thanks to that now iam in a different position all together. Destiny plays hide and seek with us and the thing which we curse may infact be a boon in disguise. It happened to me many a time and i always just laugh about my foolishness. It happened to me once again and here i am amused and laughing again...

November starting i had a big discussion with my GL, PL and couple of HRs who came to sort out a thing which i have escalated...and after a hour long discussion they finally agreed to solve my problem and the next day i was on bench wondering where i was going and what my future might be...

a lot has happened in november to march and the D-day was on March 6th...it was Maha Shivaraathri and i went to temple nearby my house at around 10:30 in the night...met my friend after a looong time and had a chat with him till mid night and then broke my fasting at around 11 pm in the night...it was first time in my life to fast for such a long time without even taking a sip of water.

From Jan 31 there was this one chore which was added to my itenery...checking my mail every morning first thing...so coming back...after i got ready to sleep i thought of checking my mail since it was already 1:00 AM in the morning. Then there was a mail which i was waiting for 1 month and for which i worked continously for  long months....

Sub:Carnegie Mellon University Application Status

My heart skipped a beat as he did not mention anything in that mail but just said...

Dear Inder Sen,

Your application for admission to Carnegie Mellon University has been reviewed.

Please login to the online application to view your application status.

Thank you once again for applying to Carnegie Mellon.

Sincerely,

The Office of Admissions
H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management
Graduate Programs in Information Systems Management

I just dont remember what was going through when i clicked and logged in my online application form and scrolled down...i could only find another link to the final result of my application...that moment was like for an eternity all the thoughts which were suppressed once came to my mind...Carnegie Mellon is ranked first in the US for Information Systems Management and many suggested that i should apply for more than one universities and CMU should only be my ambitious application. But I was determined to do my MIS in CMU..it not CMU i would wait for one more year or go for something much better than CMU (which was not the case as its the only one which i had applied to). What will happen if i dont get the admission and what will happen to my confidence which i showed to all the naysayers.

Amidst all these thoughts the page finally opened and i was just gazing through all the form but couldnot understand any....then i calmed down myself and read from beginning...

Dear Inder Sen,

On behalf of the Admission Selection Committee, it is my great pleasure to offer you admission to Carnegie Mellon University's Master of Information Systems Management program. You have been selected to enroll in the MISM 16-month track beginning in August 2008. As you may know, admission to Carnegie Mellon is very selective due to our high admissions standards, the significant number of talented students who apply, and limited class size. You have been chosen as a result of your notable accomplishments, both academic and non-academic, and we sincerely hope you will accept our offer of admission. Please respond to our offer of admission by....

thats it...i found myself punching the air and shouting in the middle of the night...

My  months of my hard work has bore the fruits and i was much happy not only coz i got the admit but i could prove myself what i can really do....circumstances sapped my energy and my confidence to do what i want... i totally forgot what its like to achieve something which others say impossible.

But i could not just enjoy the moment then and there as all this preparation and hard work....was done without any knowledge of my family....so it was an arduous task to first tell them about this....

I was totally confident that after all this come what may i will be doing my MISM @ CMU in this fall 2008...and nothing can stop me from that...but destiny was laughing at my confidence and it indeed had the last laugh....why?.... because i am now in Sweden for next 6-9 months and not going to CMU...not for this fall atleast... i would blog abt that in my next post...