Confront Your Weaknesses

It has been long since I posted in this blog. I would like to come back with a good story..!

Yeah, everyone of us have weaknesses. But how do we face it and how do we overcome it makes the difference. I would like to share one incident which happened in my life some years back.

I was shown a picture of a baby, laughing happily. I was given 5 minutes to prepare a 3 minute speech relevant to that picture. After 5 minutes, I was asked to come on to the stage to deliver a speech in front of nearly 40 strangers.

I stepped on to the stage. An awkward feeling rushed over me and it was a heart thumping moment when everyone was watching me. If you have ever experienced this feeling, then probably I am one among you. Somehow I cooked up a small story for the speech.

Here it goes.
"Good morning everyone. Seeing that picture, some of you may have thought, 'why couldn't I be so happy as that baby? Why life is not happier as it used to be when I was a child?'. For those of you, I'd like to tell a small story.

Three boys, Ram, Shyam and Kumar, were sleeping in a room. Unexpectedly, the power went off. Since power cuts have become a common scenario now, 'unexpectedly' doesn't seem to be correct here. OK, lets leave that and get to the point. As the fans were off, they felt opening the windows could get them some fresh air. But no one wants to get up from their bed to open the windows. Laziness - one of the characteristics of some contemporary boys. Ram asked Shyam to open the windows. Shyam asked Kumar to do the same. Kumar said that he has opened the windows. After that all the three slept well.

Next morning, Ram woke up to find that the windows were never opened. That was when he realized, what he felt made the difference. He felt that the windows were opened and he got some fresh air. That made him to sleep well. Same goes with life. If you feel that 'All is well', everything will be fine. After all, life is to live, to love, to share and not to suffer. Happy living..!"

Does this story has any relevance to the post title - Confront Your Weaknesses. Of course, yes. To confront your weaknesses, believe that you are not weak. If you believe that you are not weak, then you won't have such heart thumping moments or any anxiety in the pit of your stomach when facing people.

"What you habitually think largely determines what you will ultimately become." - Bruce Lee

P.S. I Love You - Cecelia Ahern

P.S.I Love You - I never knew that this is Cecelia Ahern's first novel. But later when I came to know, I felt that this is a wonderful debut from her.

Gerry and Holly are childhood friends. They both share a very deep love - like love birds - one wouldn't live without the other. They marry each other. They couldn't even imagine their life without the other. She could tell what he thinks and he could tell what she thinks.

One day, Gerry dies of brain tumor. Holly couldn't bear the loss of Gerry. Holly is inconsolable. She struggles with what to do in her life without Gerry. She couldn't sleep. She couldn't eat. She doesn't leave the house or talk to friends. Sitting alone in the house, she is thinking of Gerry and the beautiful life they had before he died. Every time she thinks of him, she cries.

The only person in the world who could give her strength, who could move her to a normal life is her husband Gerry. But he is no more. Nobody knows Holly better than Gerry. He knew that Holly would be devastated if he dies. So, he planned to write letters that could guide her and help her to overcome his loss. He wrote a series of letters each signed with "P.S. I Love You" for 10 months.

The man who knows her better than anyone else sets out to guide her into a new life. Holly cheers up every month while opening each letter to see what surprise Gerry has left for her. Every time Holly reads a letter, she feels Gerry is somewhere near her, still looking at her, still embracing her. All the while she realizes that even though he is gone he is still with her in spirit. He guides her into a new life, teaching her how to laugh, how to dress, how to sing and even how to love again, but now without him. He guides her in overcoming her fears and rediscovering herself. He made her believe that his death is not the end, but the beginning of her new life.
----

There are so many characters in this book and some characters have a very little contribution. The story moves very slowly in the beginning and at many points there is a sense of repetition. But I should say the characterization of Gerry is beautiful. I couldn't even imagine how he would have felt when he wrote the last letter to Holly, especially the last sentence of the last letter. You will definitely have a lump in your throat when reading it.

P.S. I Love You -  Simple, bitter love story but sweet.

                                          

Dear John - Nicholas Sparks

Dear John - one other best romantic book from Nicholas Sparks. This is a love story in its purest form.

John Tyree is back home to Wilmington, North Carolina from a military tour in Germany. While home on leave, John enjoys surfing along the beach at Wilmington. This is where he meets Savannah. John rescues Savannah's purse that has dropped into the deep waters - a simple incident that changes his life forever! After that incident, they two get talking, he teaches her to surf and very soon they fell in love.

Apart from describing the intense love that John and Savannah shares, Nicholas Sparks beautifully describes the relationship between John and his father. John's father is quiet. He likes to do his routine things and never talks much. The only thing he talks about is his extensive coin collection. He has a great passion for numismatics which John could never really understand. One day, John took Savannah to meet his father. After spending some time with his father, Savannah points out to John that his father may have Asperger's syndrome. After that John comes to look at his father differently, finally accepting him for who and what he is. Savannah presents John a book on autism to better understand his father.

Unfortunately, John's leave ends and he has to return back to Germany. He has one more year of service before he can be relieved. They both promised to wait for each other and write to each other during this 12 months separation.

"Dear John, Should I start by telling you that I love you...If you come back, I'll marry you...Love, Savannah."
While reading this, John could think of nothing but going back to Savannah. Thus they both shared their love through letters during their days of separation. Both of them longing to see and embrace each other soon. Both of them longing to start their life soon.

But then happens the tragic 9/11. John faces a difficult choice to make - Whether to re-enlist himself as a patriotic soldier or get back to Savannah..? Really difficult choice to make. But he decides to be a good soldier leaving Savannah with a difficult choice as well - Should she wait for him or just move on..?

But Savannah understands his decision and continues to wait. They continue to write letters, sharing their love. But as days passed on, some lack of intimacy from Savannah. The frequency of letters from decreased. Finally the last Dear John letter arrives from Savannah.

Dear John,
  ..... So here I am, groping for words with tears on my cheeks and hoping that you'll somehow forgive me for what I'm about to write....I understood your reason for staying in the army, and I respected your decision. I still do, but we both know our relationship changed after that. We changed, and in your heart, I think you realized it, too. Maybe the time apart was too much, maybe it was just our different worlds...please believe me when I say I didn't mean to fall in love with someone else...
                                                          It goes on..
I'm so sorry-
Savannah


Through her last letter, Savannah notifies John that she has fallen for someone else. John does not respond to that letter. He decides to continue being a good soldier. John's father become deathly ill and John comes back home to see his father. In a heart touching manner John reveals his feelings to his father about how much he loves him.

In a few days John's father dies and John goes to see Savannah only to know that she got married to Tim, who is stricken with melanoma. Tim is in hospital taking his treatments. At home, John and Savannah have the last heat-to-heart talk. Finally John says "Goodbye Savannah".

He anonymously donates money for treatment that will save Tim’s life, and then checks back to see that that Savannah and Tim are happy. The way John concluded his thoughts about what real love is would make even the toughest hearts melt and toughest persons weep.

If that is not true love, I don't know what is..!

2 States - Chetan Bhagat

To be frank, I seldom read books. "2-States" is one among the few story books I have read so far and this is my first post about a story book.

How I started reading this book is an interesting story. It was during my initial days in an IT job. I was a trainee and I had to take the morning shift (7am to 2pm). Spending rest of the day was actually the tough job. This may be contrary to what most people in IT jobs would say - "stressful". But, I used to go to office at 7am, do some work, chat with friends, have lunch and back to home at 2 pm..! That is how easy my initial days were. But, after 2pm I was left alone at home, bored. That was when a friend of mine suggested this book. I borrowed the book from her and started reading it.

The story is much obvious from the title, but how Chetan Bhagat narrates the story kindles interest even among the reluctant readers like me.

When I read - "She stood two places ahead of me in the lunch line at IIMA mess...Her waist length hair rippled..." - these exact lines from the first page of the book, I thought "why the hell my college(CEG, Anna University) has separate mess for boys and girls". But lets don't think about whether I would have approached any girl like, how Krish, our male protagonist, 'corrects' his female counterpart, Ananya by sacrificing a rasagulla..ROFL..

After their first meeting in the mess and some days of combined studies, they fell in love. Life goes on well for them with 'combined studies', love, class room lectures, exams and so on... Soon, they realized they may not be able to convince their parents for their marriage. But, they want to marry with their parents’ consent rather than choosing to elope. How both of them convince their parents and marry each other concludes the story.

If you are a Tamilian as our heroine Ananya, then probably you would have watched the two block buster Kollywood films Jodi and Vasanth's Poovellam_Kettuppar. The book shares similar story line with these two films.

Through the story, Chetan describes the cultural differences in India, ranging from boisterous Punjabi music versus quiet, mellifluous Tamilian Carnatic music.

When you read this story, you will definitely burst out into laugher at many situations. Most of the boys cannot even propose the girl they love. But our hero, Krish gets 4 gold rings to propose the entire girl’s family..!

To end, "2-States" is a simple, breezy and a beautiful happy-ending love story.

Happy Reading..!

Could 0.03 make a big difference..?

Hi Guys,

Placement season started and almost every newspaper has this headline
                          "IIT student gets Rs.70 lakh job offer from Facebook".

Placements started in CEG too with some high paying companies like Amazon, e-Bay, Google, Microsoft, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley..fighting to recruit students from my college. Some of my friends are happily distributing sweets saying that they got placed.

Wait..wait.. I am also a student of CEG. Why haven't I got placed yet..? Because none of these companies even consider me for an interview. Trying to find out the reason for my rejection, I found that my CGPA is 7.93 out of 10, which is 0.07 short of their 8.0 CGPA expectation.

Can 0.07 make a big difference..?

I would like to share an interesting incident with you all. During the last year placements, one boy (let us name him Ram, does name really matter here..?) who got 6.97 as his CGPA, which is 0.03 short of the 7.0 CGPA expectation from Microsoft at that time, got placed in Microsoft. I was curious to find out how he got placed. Ram submitted his resume stating his CGPA to be 7.5 and he cleared all the technical rounds and the personal interviews to get selected in Microsoft. Later, his placement director found that he attended the interview with a fake CGPA. He suggested Microsoft to cancel the offer made to Ram. Going one step further, he prevented him from attending any of the campus interviews further.

Do you think 0.03 made a big difference in his life..? Absolutely NO....!
He did not attend any campus interviews after that. He went for an off-campus interview for the same company Microsoft and got placed again. Next year he came to my college for recruitment and the same placement director welcomed him. wah..Hats off Ram..!

Let us come to the point. Most of us continue to place a premium on external indices. Most of us think that knowledge is synonymous with the marks a student obtains, which in many cases need not be. To be frank, by giving importance to only marks, we fail to nurture our genuine passions. We give respect to anyone who has more number of digits in his salary. One sad point is, only when knowledge is tagged with some priz(c)e, we're giving attention to it. But, could salary bring you happiness if you don't have job satisfaction..? or could salary buy you some good friends..? I guess I need not answer these questions.

One last thing. Hereafter, I won't make life's choices based on money. I'll start following my own passions. After all, marks are just some random numbers scribbled on your exam papers which may eventually end up in dustbin. Would you consider something that will end up in dustbin so important than your own passions..?