Something Deep

So I read this poem that really got me thinking. Its not touching but it is contemplative. What are our identities? The poetess is a migrant to UK(incidentally she is Ayesha Tharkers mother).And she asks the questions. I will quote only 3 paragraphs. Love the last para. In an oblique way. Search for the complete poem if u are interested. I love the last para.

THEY’LL SAY: ‘SHE MUST BE FROM ANOTHER COUNTRY’

When I can’t comprehend
why they’re burning books
or slashing paintings,
when they can’t bear to look
at god’s own nakedness,
when they ban the film
and gut the seats to stop the play
and I ask why
they just smile and say,
‘She must be
from another country.’

When I speak on the phone
and the vowel sounds are off
when the consonants are hard
and they should be soft,
they’ll catch on at once
they’ll pin it down
they’ll explain it right away
to their own satisfaction,
they’ll cluck their tongues
and say,
‘She must be
from another country.’

When my mouth goes up
instead of down,
when I wear a tablecloth
to go to town,
when they suspect I’m black
or hear I’m gay
they won’t be surprised,
they’ll purse their lips
and say,
‘She must be
from another country.’

But from where we are
it doesn’t look like a country,
it’s more like the cracks
that grow between borders
behind their backs.
That’s where I live.
And I’ll be happy to say,
‘I never learned your customs.
I don’t remember your language
or know your ways.
I must be
from another country.’

Imtiaz Dharker

I would simply never have walked

It’s a phase of solitude,

A season of setting suns,

Drenching rains ,

Cold mornings,

Sweaty afternoons,

Reminding me each moment of the futility,

Of things, people, actions and rewards



The emptiness around me that haunts me,

While I miss you in ways small and big,

And as my loneliness caresses me in a crowd,

I feel a void inside that seems to be endless.



It’s funny how long I have survived,

In this desert without water,

Like a swimmer who lost sight of land,

With water the nourisher being the final,

Destroyer.



Now,

In this season of forced smiles and artificial grace,

That I look back and wonder,

How long I have survived.



When I started on the long trudge,

Had I known the then unwritten play,

My journey would be so lonely,

And I would hope of love,

Yet never close to drowning the emptiness,

Or filling up the yawning hole,

I would simply never have walked.

Articles

These are two articles which I wrote for a magazine that the toastmaster club in my company is going to publish. Read them if u have time. Enjoy maadi. :)

My journey with MyInfy

I remember the first time I heard about toastmasters. It was during my induction session when I joined Infosys. They talked about toastmasters as a venue for people with weak communication skills. Toastmasters seemed to be the last thing I would join. I immediately forgot everything about the MyInfy toastmasters. It appeared there was just too little time.

But there was a curiosity about toastmasters that I could not hide for long. Those tempting posts on the bulletin-board created a desire to attend a meeting but something or the another kept cropping up at exactly the wrong times.

So finally I went to a toastmasters meet and I simply had no doubts that toastmasters offered something special. To those who struggle with speaking skills toastmasters offered a chance to improve. To those who were already conversant toastmaster offered the chance to be better.

So putting my money where my mouth was, I joined toastmasters. And it’s been a great journey. The toastmaster projects allow me through their goals to each time focus on one aspect of public speaking. From words, structure of speech body language to voice modulation it appears toastmasters encapsulates everything. I have slowly seen my speeches and my communication skills get better. I was never a weak speaker as such but toastmasters has helped me polish my skills.

Also a big advantage of toastmaster is its visibility in b-schools and other companies. We all want to say that we have great communication skills. In that b-school interview toastmasters credentials as a CC or even an aspiring CC can vouch that you are a skilled orator.

The tablet topics section in the Toastmasters meeting helps sharpen on the feet thinking skills. So often do we feel after an interaction that we could have done it better. The table-topics ensure that such regrets come less regularly as the speaking on the feet skills rub off everything.

Toastmasters till now has been a wonderful journey.

It’s been a journey of self discovery and continuous improvement.

I hope you also get to walk the same trail and have as much fun as I have if you decide to take the Toastmasters journey.

My Area B1 Contest Experience

“We improve ourselves by victories over ourselves. There must be a contest, and we must win.Or at least aspire to win because we all think the best man has won.”

Toastmasters International endeavours to improve the speaking and leadership skills of its members. While projects help people sharpen individual facets of their skills, only a contest can test the mettle of people. Toastmasters International organizes fours contests over a year which are organized in groups of two every six months. So while during the first six months of the year we have the “International Speech” and the “Table-topics” contest, “Humorous speech” and “Evaluation” contest follow in the next six months.

As a toastmaster I have been involved in representing my club in the various contests for the last one year. I have been a participant in all the four different contest at different times. Unfortunately I haven’t won any of the contests even one time. Infact I can proudly say, I haven’t been even close. No special mention or even third or fourth runners up for consolation.

However while people and even I see failure at times as an indication that it’s time to give up, I am still as enthusiastic about contests as the time I first tried my luck. Maybe the fact is that contests have given me so much new to learn that I am still pining my chance. Here are my major learnings-

Sh** Happens- I normally consider myself as pretty good at table-topics. However the first contest I went to had a topic like-“My parents are in the iron and steal business. My fathers steals and my mother irons it.” The announcer announced the topic and I started speaking. Unfortunately maybe I was too scared or something as its only when I sat down after the speech that I realized the hidden pun. There was no reason why it had not clicked to me earlier except the random factor called luck.

Competition Helps-At times I have realized that my ego tends to get the better of me. After a good speech when people congratulate , I start to feel happy about myself and think I am very very good. Competition tells me there are better people. It allows me to set higher goals.

Practice helps- This international speech contest I saw someone steal away the top prize as he just had prepared too well. The speech of nearly each contestant was very good but this guy comes as if in a movie and simply blows us away with his body language, gestures , voice modulation. Practice allows even an average speech to touch greatness.

Never Give Up- I have seen giants(in terms of their earlier track record) ousted by people who were just members for a few weeks or those who had no prior record. Basically in the David versus Goliath battle the underdog wins. And that tells me why I should keep at it.

There is no limit to perfection- It is important to set high goals. You may be good but there is no reason why you cant be better.

Very few win by a wide margin- The margin of win and defeat is mostly very slim. Maybe better practice could have made the difference or a better modeled speech. Or maybe it just was not your day. Defeat is perfectly natural. You went and tried and that itself speaks a lot. Never forget there is always another contest six months down the line.

Why I havent blogged?

So I havent in some time now.

I feel guilty for it and will be back.

Its just that I am going through a phase where its all so confusing. Despite getting a 99.45 percentile I dont have the IIM calls that I desire. So I will probably return to fight another day.

Beyond that there are a lot of issues I am musing about. However I still dont see the bigger picture and from that stems an inability to put it in words.

Will be back soon

Article SRIJNA 2010

So this is my article for this years college magazine. I have been out of college two years now but I am still contributing. Now its been six straight years of Srijna articles. Unfortunately maybe there is nothing left to write now. I had an idea of this article in my mind since the last two years. And even last years one. So goodbye Srijna

IT career for dummies

So this is an article which could very well be titled ,’procrastination’. Despite having promised the Magazine board members nearly 2 months back that I would write an article on my experiences in the IT sector, I never got down to writing it down. The first deadline, got changed to the actual deadline which then was replace by the actual printer’s final deadline and in the end I had to grapple with the final-final hard deadline set by the Magazine Board secretary.

So with tonight as the deadline I have finally sat down to write down the article. But before I move on to the topic and talk about careers in the IT sector, I must introduce myself. I am Syed Ashraf Husain, proud to have been a part of the AIT comp batch of 2008 and presently working for a major IT company out of Mysore. I was also the Mag Sec of my time. I would like to talk more about my time at AIT, but I sadly realize that my time at AIT is long over. The memoir would be out of place now because nearly half the college would not even know who I am.

Thus this is about the IT industry and the last two years of my life. In the first week when a FE joins college, he hears the dreaded ‘I’ word- ‘Industry’. Or its variant-‘company’. And the 'I' WORD keeps coming back. This is what happens in Industry. This is how stuff works in industry. And it goes on and on. The grass is always greener on the other side but the industry is at times more intimidating than alluring.

This article is meant for anyone who has ever thought of working in the IT sector for even a sliver of a moment. If you don’t fit the bill, then you just saved the next five minutes of your life that everyone else will spent in reading what follows-

What companies’ need- Opportunities always exist especially for people with experience. However as a fresher, you should have at least one or even better all of the following things- dazzling marks ,great communication skills or rock hard technical skills. The recruiter needs a reason to hire you. Give him many such reasons. And the importance of communication skills can never be sufficiently stressed upon. The majority of Indian IT workers have very poor to average communication skills. Your skills can make you stand out.

Big versus Small companies- While small companies may provide better technical experience a great name at the beginning can do wonders especially for an MBA aspirant. The big companies can however be a bit random. They don’t really care if you want coding or if you have a language choice. You will do what they need. I consider myself lucky to have worked in core coding projects in all the time I have worked in my company. Please note the word ‘lucky’. I consider myself skilled and an exceptional performer but I have seen many equally talented people from my batch get stuck for years in hopeless projects. In the end you will only know once the cards are dealt out. It is very well possible for the most best of decisions to go awry.So the lesson is if a company offers you a specific work profile that is a better bet than relying on fate. As a side note as a mechie or an entc graduate shifting to core IT sector, large companies (Infosys especially) are a better bet as they invest a lot in training. Comp and IT folks smile- training difficulty is the most overrated thing I have come across.

Java or .net- I personally am biased towards Java but frankly the whole war of the languages is a mockery. There is no difference between the technologies. In any case you may be switching technologies frequently. And there is no dearth of opportunities in most sectors. Plus there are so many of technologies beyond these two with amazing scope.e.g SAP, Business Intelligence, driver programming, testing automation etc.

Development or testing- There is a lot of work beyond these two types of projects. As an example for analysis, Infosys has only 17% of its revenues coming from developments and even in the annual report they list 5-6 types of work. So this is the risk of big companies as usual. If you are fixated over a technology or a type of work, you may not necessarily get it. Live with the risk or know your escape routes. On the other hand maybe being flexible is not that bad. In the short time I have been around, I have worked on a testing project , two core development project and now a migration project.

Service sector versus product companies- The IT sector consist of the out sourcing and service sector companies like Infosys, Wipro or product based companies like Adobe or Microsoft. Given a choice unless you get a better profile, go for the better payer (product companies). Money is a big satisfying force. Also the benefits in service sector companies are petering out because of margin pressures.

IT sector versus other sectors-This is a purely personal choice. See what your heart wants. And have a flexible plan in place. There are so many people I know tired of the IT sector but then I also know people who miss the IT sector times. Every job has its share of positive and negative points(repeat this again and again. The grass unfortunately always looks greener on the other side). Choose well.

MBA versus MS (or M.Tech)-Again a personal choice. For the MBA aspirant I would from my opinion suggest some years of work experience. To see an actual business meeting, to see great incompetence and huge employee dissatisfaction is a great learning as well as a change of perspective. It becomes so real. Employees cannot be kept happy as easy as many people suggest. For the MS person, work experience is not a prerequisite. In fact for those planning on getting some work experience before MS or M.Tech I would suggest that you try to get development experience. For the MBA guy it does not matter but for the MS it could make a difference in your university application.

In the end I would suggest everyone to be brave try out changes and new things each day of your life. And remember you need to have a rough idea how your today fits in with your tomorrow. This will help you keep a straight perspective and objectivity. Don’t stop your education once you get a job. Plan for a higher education degree. And enjoy your days in college as they fly away. You will feel nostalgic about them someday.

S.A. Husain,
AIT Comp class of 08