Raphael... Cognizant play

This is the play I was in when I was at Cognizant... Theme - Raphael and our colour was red. I was the co-writer and narrator of the play. We (obviously) won the first prize. Reading it now, I am amazed at the depth of the play. Hope you enjoy it.

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Good Afternoon everyone… What a pleasure it is to present Raphael Story to you – and that is quite literally too as you would be seeing in few moments.

Here is Raphael, an aggressive warrior. He experiences waves of emotions and is easy to be provoked and to win. His winning streak has given him an unnatural confidence. His brutal winning streak showed him just a single facet of Red… Of Blood that is on ground… Not worth as are his challengers according to him! Little did he realize the pain of losing or of dying?

But, there was one incident that made him change… A battle that drew his blood… A battle that left him so near to death that he almost lost his hope. The same color that previously meant victory to him is now speeding his own death…

His eyes closed, he could visualize all who were delivered to Death by him… No, he cannot lose hope now… as

ERIK H. ERIKSON:
Hope is both the earliest and the most indispensable virtue inherent in the state of being alive. If life is to be sustained hope must remain, even where confidence is wounded, trust impaired.

He regrets his arrogance and aggression… he realizes All violence is injustice.
Responding to violence with violence is injustice, not only to the other person but also to oneself. Responding to violence with violence resolves nothing; it only escalates violence, anger and hatred. It is only with compassion that we can embrace and disintegrate violence. This is true in relationships between individuals as well as in relationships between nations.

Understanding why this violence has been created, we will then know what to do and what not to do in order to decrease the level of violence in ourselves and in the world, to create and foster understanding, reconciliation and forgiveness.

After regaining his senses, he observed his opponent in a worse state… With his renewed mind set, he cannot let his opponent die, not if he can help it! He passed on his blood to save his opponent… He is just learning about the importance of peace

ANTON CHEKOV:
We shall find peace. We shall hear angels. We shall see the sky sparkling with diamonds.

And indeed – This is what the Angel said…

I bring to mankind, from God,
the Gift of Mirth.
I counsel you to
take pleasure in small things
and to laugh easily.
For laughter is
wine for the soul and a barrier
between man and madness.
Life is worth living.
Enjoy life!

And now, both are fit to live! Truly understanding the victory…

RALPH WALDO EMERSON:
The real and lasting victories are those of peace, and not of war.

A new mind set, a new perspective of life. He still sees the world in Red – but now, it is of Love, of Passion, of Care and of Life…

I now ask each one of you to close your eyes and visualize Red color. What is your Story? Does it represent the Drop of Life? Does it represent the Cross of serving? Does it represent the Depth of Love? Does it represent Beauty of Rose? Or is it symbol of Danger? Or is it the woe of warriors?

Let the hate abate giving rise to love for all beings – Coz’ love alone can conquer the world – Not wars, not hate!

Here’s Raphael’s tribute to the power of Red!

Robin Hood - Review

A movie after ages! And while I would not call it great... a fine movie it was!

We all have read Robin Hood stories and his escapades, archery and so on since childhood... This Robin Hood breaks the monotony and gives us a refreshingly fresh perspective and a slight scottish accent Russell Crowe!

This Robin Hood story is how he became the way he did... His adventures and conquests of Europe and Asia, Royal problems and of course the grand bit of driving away the French!

If you like Russell Crowe, medieval movies, some action, some story - then worth a watch!

Rating - 3.5/5

Starting fresh...

Time is a funny thing… As it passes, you lose interest in some things and gain interest in others… I regret that I lost my interest in blogging over the time. There was a period where I was an avid blogger in Cognizant community… guess I also had lot to say those days… even though it was just on love ;)

My good friend Himanshu gave me a reason to come back to blogging by giving me Happy Award! Thanks Himanshu… :)

Rules to accept the award:-

1. Link to the person who gave it to you,

2. List 7 things that make you happy,

3. Pass it on to 7 happy bloggers.

4. Notify the nominees about this Happy Award.

I award following bloggers “Happy Award” – Drumroll please!! (Lol… I miss the excessive amount of drama of ch1blogs ;) )

Ravali

Tejaswini

Vaibhav

Abhishek

Shweta

Gandharva

Chocoblog

7 things that make me happy!

1) Ujwal… what else do you expect from a newlywed bride? (yes… even after a year, I still call myself newlywed ;) )

2) Talking to family – I love talking… and as both of us are so far away from family, we relish the times when we talk – especially video chat :)

3) Having toffee ice cream – I never realised I loved toffee ice cream till I came to UK.. I had it in Swiss before but did not actually think twice then… but now… I love it!

4) Fresh (not so cold) breeze – Staying in Aberdeen, its very common to feel the breeze (sometimes too much of it!) all the time… But, it is very refreshing to get out as the winter is coming to end.

5) Aroma of food (not cooked by me ;) ) – I enjoy food… before marriage, my brother and I used to go around restaurants… and now it’s me and Ujwal. There are very few restaurants left that we didn’t go to!

6) Surprising Ujwal with some new dish – some are good and some are bad, but my dear husband always says “Wow, its good”… till I ask him if it can be made again…

7) Seeing a long lost friend on online friend list – It is really nice to catch up! “Hey… did you know that X got married?” or “Hey… did you know that….”

So, here I leave… hoping that I will blog more often :)

Rakhi

Rakhi was never a big deal for me... I was always with my little bro and we always used to go around for movies, restaurants, hang outs and so on... We used to try out new dishes at remote places... give them ratings... decide to try later or not... We were particularly attached to Curry on the Roof - Veg Saiwoo... both of us adore it and go there once in a while just for this delicious starter... The point being, I never needed a single day to spend quality time with my bro. We had fun... always, whether we were joking around or fighting...

This year, not being around, I wanted him to feel I was around... And itasveer was the answer for that. They started with these Photo Rakhis... I thought wow! That looks very neat and innovative... This was when I was having my exams... Once my exams got over and I finally booked the Rakhi, it was 2nd. I was quite worried if it would reach by 5th. But, itasveer team assured me it had pretty good chances of reaching. If they would have said it will reach, then, I probably would not have believed it ;) But. it did reach Satwik by 5th (i.e. today) and I am so glad he liked it!!



My dear Satwik... this post is for you and to say I miss you!

1 year since I left Cognizant

Last 1 year had been a thrill ride... first 3 months, slowly going up and then a fast forward roller coaster! First 3 months, I was still in a daze of not having to go to work. It was hard not to do something. My Cognizant times had been full of activity... not a responsible sort of activities, but, nevertheless... there was something or other to do everyday! And whatever I did in Cognizant - multiple roles and mltiple jobs... did not help me in managing just 2 roles - a wife and a student... It was not that it was difficult... because, it was not. But, it was new. I was always (and am still) confused which cap to don when!

As a wife, I do hope, I am not drastic... ;) ... Ujwal does say he loves me... and we've already passed the 6 month milestone, so, I am quite satisfied :) As a student, well, I have passed my exams and managed to learn something on the way... See, there you go... But, there were times, when I mixed up these two... I wonder if things would be different after studies and when we go to job...

All this ranting to remember my blogging days of Cognizant... they were quite fun, actually... especially since I had a Love blog ;) And here I am gaining further experience... may be I should restart that!!

Penny for your thoughts... :)

Angels & Demons (2009)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASVeN-58HKk

Ever since I’ve seen the trailer, I’ve been looking forward to this movie… And we decided to make this our first movie in theatre too. But, what a disaster this movie turned out to be.

PLOT
For those who have read the book, you can appreciate what a fine read that was… A page turner with a fabulous ending. Movie delivers nothing – it is slow and the characters changed, characters removed! I was very much looking forward to the flight journey at the speed of Mach 25. What I get is a Helicopter Ride! Well, this summarizes the entire movie speed!

For those who have not read the book, the plot: ancient Brotherhood named Illuminati resurfacing for its revenge on Church at the time of Conclave and Professor Langdon solving the mystery with his usual aptitude for Symbology. Then again, if you have not read the book, lesser chances of liking the movie ;)

Dan Brown being on the producers and yet let this so called adaptation of his novel, release is indeed surprising!

CHARACTERS
Though there is handful of characters, one standing out is Evan McGregor. He is the most similar to the soft spoken Camerlengo and shows passion when talking about Science and Religion. But, he too was disappointing at the end. But then, the end itself is so terrible and emotionless – who is to blame?!

POSITIVE
Path of Illumination and the subsequent free tour of Rome and Vatican (Some of them being a full scale replica)

NEGATIVE
Everything else

RATING:
4/10

Are you looking forward to the movie or have already seen? Let me know your thoughts :)

March!! Uff!

If I had to list out all the activities of March, it just sums up to three!!

--Blue Skies Competition
--Assignments
--Part Time jobs

But, this was one of the busiest months we’ve had and we both agree that we didn’t run around so much even for our marriage!!

This is the rough time line with major events:

Blue Skies is a competition for Business Ideas that are viable and profitable. This is run by University of Aberdeen and is open to all. Details of our experiences with this competition itself would be a Blog post. We’ve been lucky to get tremendous support from our Staff (Lyn, Russell and Colin) and our very own In house SIE advisor – Simon and organizer of Blue Skies – Ann. Lyn was as involved in our second round as we were and we do admit that we couldn’t have crossed the line without her expert suggestions and crossing out :) And we’ve enjoyed Blue Skies more so because of the passion we felt for our own idea as we progressed ahead. And of course, it does help that at the end of the competition, we did win £2000 prize money + £4000 support to actually start our business + a session with leading venture capitalist in shaping up the idea to a business!! (Woohooo! Yippie!! Yay!!!) In the course of building up a good presentation, we came across this wonderful program of BBC – Dragon’s Den. Also, we were introduced to Apprentice – a very addictive program. You can see previous series on YouTube.

Pictures: Preparing for presentation and after presentation!

But we had no time on 23rd to celebrate our victory… we were gearing up for our first MBA assignments… waking up the entire night to give that finishing touch. 25th by 8:30 AM, we reached our college to display the posters… Our Professor Lyn took pictures of these and posted them on Picasaweb. And once the Leadership assignment is completed, we had to rush to our Research Assignments! And of course lectures and tutorials (Marketing Game in case of Strategic Marketing – “informed” and “theory – based” decisions to be taken in a simulated exercise) were going on as always. For the Thursday tutorial of Leadership, there were just 6 out of 21 (including us) and Alison was so upset with that… but, hey, half the Indian Student population already flew to India!!

Picture: Leadership batch - relieved after poster presentation

27th and finally with Research Assignment submitted, we had no time to relax… YET! Our part time jobs are weekend based… and we had to be on our toes for that! On 30th we slept and slept!! Just one day at the shared accommodation…

Icing on the cake – 31st – the last day of March was entirely spent on our shifting to new home!! :)

Next post on new home… coming up soon!

Though it was busy, we’ve had loads of fun juggling through all of the above! And that is what we are here to learn anyway, right? Managing multiple tasks effectively :) And Profitably!!

Do share your thoughts or perhaps similar experiences :)