2 Years
Posted by Guhan | Filed under Events
2 years ago on this day, sporting a wide smile and dressed up in a grand saree, a beautiful lady sat next to me tossing stuff the priest gave us into the holy fire. Our parents stood behind us, almost blessing us every second, and a huge audience in front of us, all set to literally shower us with their blessings. The celebration reached its crescendo at 9:30 am in the morning, every one eagerly waiting for the all important index finger flick by the high priest. And exactly at 9:40 am, the music had more base, it was raining rice and I was working my way up to a complex double knot of a turmeric coated thread!! We were no longer single, we were smiling, we were married !
I know its a cliche, but time sure does fly. 2 years has zipped past, and it stills feels like it was just the day before that we were rushing through the preparations for the wedding. Its been an amazing 2 years, lots of fun memories, the couple getaways, the gifts, the celebrations, decorating our home, the parties, the great food, the little fights, the big gestures, the love notes, caring, being cared for and most important of them all Happy times.
All through our lives, the wedding day is hyped up to be this momentous day in ones life when supposedly every thing begins to change and we are expected to have this great epiphany of all things grown up and mature. In retrospect, I personally dont have any horror stories to share about the wedding contrary to popular belief. It was a fun day, when 24 hours felt more like 10 minutes. Over the 2 years, we got to hear many stories about our wedding day, different perspectives and little incidents around the function. It almost seems that people who attended the wedding had more fun and remember it a lot more than the bride and groom. Which is why I always say, the wedding is for the people attending, the marriage is for the bride and groom.
So today, as we celebrate our 2nd wedding anniversary, I am happy to have some one who I can call my better half. I have enjoyed this phase of my life, its been different for sure, but in a good way. Its been full of interesting moments, moments that you remember, moments that you cherish, moments that you learn from, moments that you hate, scary moments etc. Having that special someone witness all those moments relevant to you with out judgment or prejudice is what my marriage has meant to me.
Wishing for many more happy moments.
Highs and Lows
Posted by Guhan | Filed under thoughts
The last 2 months have taken me on a joy ride with lot of highs and lows! It all started off when certain plans did not materialize and I was at a all time low, I even started writing up a very negative blog post, but decided not to. After all, I did not need more negativity. But all of that changed when I participated in the University hack day and got to meet up with a lot of students. Its always a rush when you can have a good discussion with students. And I think coming from a big company helps, they always tend to listen to you more eagerly :-)
Then there was another high, I won an award in office. But the bigger high was when loads of friends, colleagues and family wished me the best and told me I deserved it. The family making it to the award function was icing on the cake.
My profile made it to Yahoo! careers site and was also the photo for Yahoo! technology in the careers site, another high.
Me and my wife love traveling, and a holiday together is pending for a long time now. We have just been planning the last couple of months, but nothing finalized as yet. Another low.
Then in my cricket, I had a good start to the year, scoring a good 50 in a corporate tournament match. Then a series of low scores and again I started feeling low about my game. Recently, i seem to have found my form back, and it was a thrill winning the match against Wipro this weekend, and I am happy i contributed.
Its that time of the year when all salaried slaves expect their increments. The industry has not been doing good, and last year, there were no hikes. This year, the appraisal was again a low. Was really disappointed with whole thing. Another low.
I tweeted that may be the outcome of all this has to be “change”. Time will tell
Yahoo! Ratna !
Posted by Guhan | Filed under thoughts
I have been working in Yahoo! for almost 5 years now. Its been a really great time here. Yahoo! has a very open and informal culture, and are also the things I like about working here. You can really enjoy the work atmosphere.
Yahoo! has many cool awards they give out. The You Rock!, Yahoo! Ratna and Yahoo! Super Star, in the same order of importance.
This year, I was given the Yahoo! Ratna. It was a wonderful moment for me. Earlier I had won the You Rock! award as well. May be Super star is next. :-)
IISC University Hack Day
Posted by Guhan | Filed under Events
I was part of yet another Hack U. This was a first for me because it was at Indian Institute of science and all the students there are PhD students and doing heavy research work. It was a good experience talking with them because their view information and computer science is completely different. They are more focused on the science, algorithms, efficiency and more core problems. Me on the other hand am more about the applications and the end user experience side of things. So the discussions with the students was really interesting.
I blogged about this on YDN, so check out my YDN blog post
200
Posted by Guhan | Filed under Sport
Wednesday, 24th Feb 2010 was the day when the world witnessed 200 runs scored by the greatest batsman to play Cricket, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. Standing 5 feet 5 inches tall, Sachin is a class apart. Ask any bowler in world cricket, he would have surely had a night mare or 2 about bowling to Sachin.
Today, I had to miss office and a team outing because of a bad cold and an infected throat. But no regrets after watching this stunning innings. I was glued to the TV watching Sachin toy with the South African bowling. Not even a single chance, not a single slog shot nor a sign of nervousness during his innings. 36 years old and close to 20 years in professional cricket, Sachin was as hungry for runs as anybody. There was great article in Times of India by Rahul Dravid about today’s cricketers lacking the hunger to succeed and how they have way too many opportunities to fail. All of the new breed of cricket, the so called Young guns can sit down and watch this Sachin innings at least once a week. They will learn what it means to have passion for a game.
Even after batting for 50 overs, running hard for his runs, Sachin walks out on to the field encouraging his bowlers and settling down in first slip. Today’s cricketers are plagued by injuries and comforts that even if they were to score 50 runs, they choose to get a massage and allow for a replacement fielder to take their place.
There was a board in Australia held up by a fan that read “I have seen god, he opens the batting for India”, such is the respect Sachin commands. Never dogged by controversy, never got into an argument with a bowler, no fights, just goes about his business of scoring runs. I think Sachin is the only sportsman for whom an entire nation prays to do well. There was a phase in his career when people doubted his talent, and suggested that it was time he retire. People expect so much of him, I cant even begin to imagine the pressure he would need to handle every time he takes guard. And its just unbelievable that he most of the times lives up to the insane expectations of the cricket fans, and has done so for 2 decades with humility, passion and such style. He is undoubtedly a great role model. He is one batsman every bowler in the world wants to bowl to, just so that they might have a chance to get him out and go into the history books, but at the same time, have night mares the moment he takes guard.
Every time I bat in the cricket matches I play, I just wish I get to hit the ball as well as Sachin would. It would be hard for anyone to match Sachin’s talent, even harder to even come close to his achievements and all most impossible to be a better ambassador of cricket. All hail Sachin Tendulkar, the master blaster.
