I think English was the best thing that happened to India. This belief was reiterated during a recent trip to Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. There was no way of communicating with the driver and the respective locals, other than by using English words. English has seeped so much in our daily lives that it goes unnoticed now.
My domestic servant uses words like "late", "tension", " right-left", "finish" and many such more. I am quite amused I must say. She cannot read or identify a single alphabet of the English language. In spite of this, there is a good chance of her becoming decently fluent in the so-not-"phoren"-any-more- language. If she is exposed to more English speaking people, she will definitely grasp many such operational words. I think, for her that is a sufficient level, since she is not aiming to become a blue-collared worker any time.

No more arbit news!

We read newspapers. It is sometimes difficult to read news everyday. We tend to scan and choose the important ones or relevant ones, on account of less time to read in our everyday schedule. On some days, we don't have the time or the inclination to even take the newspaper in our hands. I have been a victim of this on several occasions.
This blog is going to cater to people who want to catch up on certain news. My interests are Economics, Banking, Finance, Entertainment and Social issues. The intention is to maintain a regular blog of certain interesting news in a chronologically arranged manner.
Every news will have an individual post. The respective posts will be continuously updated. If something new catches my fancy, a post will be started about that too. Conscious efforts will be taken to use reliable sources to update the blog. You are all welcome to give your inputs only if you are willing to use reliable sources.
No news is interesting without the comments of the readers. So comments are definitely welcome. But, make sure you do not end up using offensive, abusive, derogatory language about anything/anyone on my blog.

A sister is someone who is your only link to your parents

She is someone who can see you transparent !

She is someone you can call at 3 am in the night

She is someone who doesn't require a sorry after a fight!

She is someone who doesn't deny by saying can’t

She is someone who will readily be your agony aunt !

She is someone who will call you a sentimental fool

Yet she is someone who will teach you how to keep cool !

She is someone who will scold you about your calculations

Yet she is someone who will be the reason for all your jubilation !

She is someone who will always take your case on Facebook

She is someone who will take in stride all your childish tuk tuks !

She has been your partner in crime when you were kids

Also someone who has many a times blown your lids !

 She is someone who is ever ready to share

All this, is my  Gargi Tai and I bet, is now giving me a glare (sorry, nothing rhymes with share ;) !!

Work. Office. Sincerity. Deadlines. Code of conduct. Ethics. All these words take a serious hike when I am bored. I have a day or two every month when I am super bored of doing the work I am supposed to do. I am not sure of the reason. Reasons could be multiple or just one. 1) It could be because of the fact that my work is so not related to what I have studied over the past 20 years of my Life. 2) It could also mean that I am insincere or am lazy. 3) It could also be an extremely natural thing. 4) It could also be that my non-work life is not a lot of fun. That I do not do a lot of things that I want to do to keep my mind vibrantly alive. 5) It could also mean I am not exercising enough (or at all), so inadequate amount of endorphin is not released in my body, so I feel lethargic. The effects of this are really diverse though: 1) most importantly, I do not finish some important jobs. 2) My colleagues treat me like a no-doer 3) I like every status update that comes on FB. 4) I watch crappy videos and get more depressed. 5) I lose track of my work and the next day is full of blunders and catching up with deadlines. 6) I feel extremely guilty 7) I chat with people with whom I have no common topics to chat about 8) I send a lot of emails. 9) Ideas like a group email of friends hits me on such days 10) I start thinking that am lethargic today because I am not getting enough sleep. So, I start sleeping an hour more after such days. So here you are. A complete cause-effect analysis of my non-productive day/s at work. Solution/s? 1) I sleep on time 2) I do what I love to do 3) I exercise more 4) I just become non-lazy by just doing things. 5) I accept its a natural thing and continue. Well, today is one of those days. So I will chose solution no. 5. I will accept that its a natural thing and will continue having such days. Cheers ! :)

Life is never fair !

I am a frustrated individual and since i dnt knw any other way to vent out my frustration i am blogging. Well i do know how to vent out my frust, by giving ppl looks, by turning the volume on loud, by keeping mum thruout the day, answering in monosyllables, cry out loud etc etc...But today I am in search of a better and a more effective way...I am gonna beat the keyboard and write a blog which will go in circles, which wont have any meaning mostly and basically will be all bitchy...

Nothing seems to go right in Life when u utmost need it....I dnt even know if i should give life any respect and start it with a capital L....let me just say life..

I am 22 yrs old....smart enough to make my decisions...i might go wrong...since am nt the know all...but just once i would love to go wherever i want to....i mean in life..... do whatever i want to....with whoever i want to....i am really tired of all dos and donts....

How seriously should one take his parents? This is an unanswered question in any young grown ups mind. Different societies answer this question very distinctly. The society I belong to, tells me that my parents are always right, no matter what. It tells me that they are in the driver's seat of my life. It says that I am answerable to them at all times.
I do not like this. But then again nobody has bothered to ask me. I feel parents need to draw a line between parenting and over parenting. Parenting should include being a friend of the kid too. Well, I cannot change my parents now and I have grown to love them they way they are (the way they have too). So, I can only try and make myself the kind of parent I wanted them to be. Firstly, I genuinely am going to let my kid make his own decisions from a very young age. Even if it is regarding clothes, regarding food, regarding friends. Anything. Of course, for me to give him that freedom I need to make him responsible enough. But I believe that responsible attitude can be developed only by making him practice decision making. Finally, what matters is how you make the decision. Any decision needs to be balanced. It cannot be based either on too many emotions or too many facts. It has to be a holistic process. So, I believe for that a holistic approach is also required towards child raising. Secondly, I plan to encourage my kid's inquisitiveness. I hope I keep the patience and never answer, 'just because I say so' to any of his Whys. When I was a kid, I had this habit of asking Why for everything. My parents used to get bugged because of it. But I think, a kid should never hear the dreadful statement 'just because I say so' from his parents. Because, when a kid is a kid, he believes his parents are there to answer his every doubt. When they refuse to answer the truth, he learns to accept a lie as an answer or even anger as an acceptable reaction. Whereas, we do not need to lie to the kids or get angry because they ask questions. I will have to continuously bear it in my mind that he is asking because he does not know. And because he does not know, he is asking the best source available to him. Thirdly, every kid in the age group of 5 to 15 must be exposed to whatever there is to be learned in this world. It is a common known fact that in this age, all kids are like a sponge. They absorb whatever you say to them, whatever you show them. IF the kids know a little bit about everything, they can choose much better. I wonder why none of the parents I know, take their kids out for a walk and talk to them about the surrounding environment, the different trees, the infrastructure around them, the kind of vehicles on the road, the right way to fill potholes on the road etc. There are so many interesting topics that can be discusses. Instead, parents waste time on scolidng them about not studying, not playing enough, for some school problems etc. I went for a walk with one of my uncles one day and he spoke to me about such a variety of things, that I was left astounded and excited for weeks later. He spoke to me about the Rickshaw unions, the type of dogs, dog shelters in the city, minimum wage of workers working on the road, the afforestation project going on the hills of Pune, Abraham Lincoln (since it was his birthday that day) etc etc. Phew ! I think every kid wants his parents to be a treasure of knowledge and information. What a shame if we are unable to fulfill this wish every time.

Gimme my Space !

Space....most commonly used word Today. Everybody wants some. Nobody wants others telling them what to do. Everybody dislikes anybody who takes care of them. Still at the end of the day everybody is looking for a person , the person, who would do that for them. Weird. Ironic. Even arrogant.
Some people intrinsically give everybody their space. Some , fail to do so in spite of trying hard. I am one of these. If I am friends with someone it becomes my responsibility to take care of them , to stop them from doing wrong. I can be pushy,argumentative, encroaching idiot. I don't understand why some people don't like this about me. I like the fact that I care. I cant not care.
But I have to learn to do that. Else I might lose all the people I care for. My loss either way. So now onwards, whenever someone tells me that he has a problem, I am going to keep my mouth shut. Whenever someone doesn't tell me where he is, I am going to shut up and not ask where he is. Whenever someone doesn't want to eat , I wont persuade him to eat. Whenever someone says he doesn't want to do something, anything, I ll let him be. Lets see how this works out. I will give everybody all the space they want.

Your spaced out,
P r a d n y a .

What was I doing in grad school?

When i was doing graduation, my class had 120 smthng ppl....ppl from various backgrounds, of various religions, of different ages, from different countries and ethnicities...a large diaspora of human beings....from all those 3 ppl (girls) were reeli good frnds of mine .....outside this core grp, i knew a couple of guys , some girls etc...but i hardly knew the rest ....and i mean i actually dint even knw the names of the rest....which is a bit odd since i am known to be quite a friendly person...infact when i was a kid, my grandmother used to tell her friends who were visiting us for the first time, "u can ask anyone at the start of the lane where Pradnya lives and they ll bring u here to our place" . This was the scene...I was a common factor in the players of all age groups...i ve even sat with a group of oldies and gossiping women for many days....so thats friendly right? i mena i was definitely not an introvert....i used to love being with people...love talking to them.
Then why did nt i take the effort to know all the 120 odd ppl in my class...rather in my case, the question would be, why dint i naturally feel the urge to talk to them, get to know them...
weird i would say....let me introspect a bit...bear with me ! :)
well by the time i reached graduation, there was too much fuss abt me beign friendly in my family.... it was to an extent that one of my uncles suggested me being a VJ....my parents were shocked ...hehe i mean kids whose families expect them to grow up and get a blue collared job dont expect close relations to suggest the profession of a VJ for their kid...they would rather ve loved to hear smone saying that Pradnya should become an engineer or sm equally intellect related profession.... and by saying this i mean no offence to the ppl who are VJs , DJs, Rjs etc....I am just stating a widely held opinion abt ur profession ...and that opinion is because the visible part of your job is "talking"..which doesn seem a very difficult thign for most...but i am quite sure that anyone of those most ppl would not be able to speak so much without a script(assuming VJs dnt have a script)...neways i am doing it again..straying from the main pt...
so ! I was saying that my parents did some introspection and concluded that ppl are getting the idea that i am just a chatter box and no brain bcos of a one sole reason which was i talk too much ! Well i guess any level headed parents would ve thought that....ad thank god they did...o/w i would ve been a VJ and i dnt think i could ve done it well !
So the process of making me less of an extrovert began thus....i started getting scolded for talking so much and being so excited perpetually and making so many friends and etc etc....
Gradually it started penetrating me that i shoudl not talk so much...i should make few friends...i shouldn go and talk to absolute starngers and i should become a ladylike girl...i ve still not reached that ladylike level...but yeah i dont talk to absolute strangers anymore and i have become a pure Puneri and dnt say hi to anyone before they say hi to me, i dnt tell ppl too much abt myself, i dnt bring my friends home that often, in short i ve changed....
Well i ahve still not realised what the advantages of being such a person are...mayeb i will in the long run...but i do know one thing...that i missed out on a lot of stuff ...i missed out on the opportunity of making sooo many friends...i could ve known sooo many ppl liek i said earlier...i coudl ve learned sooo much frm them....i would ve been able to look at life frm so many different angles....but i got stuck to just one way of thinking abt life...the maharashtrian middle class academically oriented family's way.....
i dnt knw whats it like to take challenges...I dnt knw what opportunites lie ahead of me...what assorted opportunites lie ahead of me....i am stuck in this frame.....i am just not ready to get out of my comfort zone...i lack the guts ( not innately though) ...my boldness got snubbed....
Today i look at the ppl who were in my class....the places they ve been to...one is helping the Chinese govt to structure their education system according to the global needs...one is wokring in Dubai....one keeps travelling working with NGOs.....one is learning to play the guitar in the US...one is into journalism....one is totally into adventure sports....I mean ppl ve actually gone palces ....and I am stuck here i feel....maybe i am wrong though....maybe even my time will come and ill spread my wings and take a test flight smwhr....there i will defintely wont shy away from making friends....

Writing after 7 months is embarassing !!

Well , I am writing after 7 months. Does it mean that in these past 7 months I dint have anything worthwile to write about?? I wouldnt say so. Its just that half the times I couldnt put my thoughts in words(the most common ailment that works against blogging). And the rest half were maybe not worth or too private to be shared on web. Anyways, I am blogging today with a specific purpose in mind. Venting out !! I am a 22 yr old female, living with a family for whom acadmeic success is top priority, living in a city full of intellectuals, friends who are doing extremely well in their chosen field. And even when I am living with them, I am not a part of them. I dont understand the importance of topping the class, scoring the most, knowing the most, getting admissions in top ranked univs etc. I somehow don't care. And the fact that I dont care is frustrating for me. Because I so want to care about all these things.I am practical enough to understand why this rat race is dragging everyone in.Its finally about leading a good,healthy,happy contented life. But still, I lack the pereseverance.
I dont know why I am like this. Maybe I am plain lazy. Maybe I am an ambition less person, good for nothing types. Maybe the most I can come close to these people is by achieving few As and a B (never i mind that I just managed the A). Or maybe I am by nature a very satisfied person ( naah not really). Then what is wrong with me? Why cant I pull up my socks and plunge into the mass of rats that are racing against each other. Its not that I ve not given it a try ( infact tried mannnyy times) But there is no consistency in me.
People reading this blog would wonder that why is she even writing. Well I dont know. I am getting a sadistic pleasure in making you guys atleast read(not live, mind you) my life. :)
Well I ll let the cat out of the bag(not that u had even noticed the bag moving vigorously till now). Today, I took an aptitude test for TATA Motors. 60 students took the test. The questions were easy. But the test was difficult because the time limit for each section was atrociuos for people like me. I ve always been scared and bad at maths. So I was a bit apprehensive abt the test. But when I looked at the questions, I found them doable ! Yaahoo ! My mind actually did a summersault ! Because finally there was a test which I could solve. I started solving the sums. I enjoyed it so much because the answers i calculated were atleast in the options given ! (which is a rarity in my case).
I enjoyed the process so much that I actually forgot abt the time limit and kept hammering a sum till I got it right. This led to solving the sections incompletely ! And ofcourse this resulted into me not being shortlisted for the next level of testing i.e. GD( in which i would ve done good since i can talk and fight too...most would bear testimony to that). The first thought that came into my mind was Damn !! If only I had done them faster. I come home. Told my mother what happened. First reaction was you should have practiced for it beforehand. You should ve come home early yesterday to practice it. You are among the top 5 in your class,arent you. They why couldnt you clear this exam. The point that they selected only 4 out of 60 odd students skipped her. I mean whats the point of me coming 5th if for them only the first 4 matter?? !! But I left it at that. I came in my haven and started working on my applications abroad. But it was not to be dropped at that. Unknowingly, without any intention to do so, she made me feel awful. even though I defended myself by saying that selecting 4 out of 60 is atrocious, I think I understood her point.
I actually should have studied for the aptitude test since am no good at it.
Today, I have decided to do one thing. I will do 15 mins (yeah 15 only...finally am also human) of math practice everyday, come what may. Becasue I do want a good job. I want a nice house to live in and a nice car to drive. I want to earn as much as my husband would and be independent. I want to do many things in life, which would need money. So today I willingly become a part of this rat race. Because I know that I have what it takes to be successful. I am not boasting. I am just reassuring myself and reiterating my confidence level. One slap in the face is enough !!!

Some stray thought

Aah ...my first blog....have no idea what to write about....
I wish i had something really interesting or funny to write about or a serious issue to be discussed. Alas! I just cant think of anything at the moment....Maybe creating a blog was a mistake !?! :)
Anyways ...i could tell u guys why I decided upon 'Everything is relative' as my blog name....its because lately i came across a lot of issues (since am preparing for some exam which needs us to think....finally!!!) which are debatable...can be argued upon....for hours after hours....and after thinking about it from all aspects...weighing its pros and cons....i often find myself wondering...well isnt it very relative?....i mean how can i decide what someone would, rather should do or not do...i can barely decide about my own worries most of the times....i mean it takes hell of a persons thinking prowess,analytical skills and other decision making skills to narrow down to one solution to his problem...then why the hell would anyone want to take up the responsibility to solve others...and that too uninvited...i mean using the phrase imagine urself in his shoes and think abt the situation is crap ! unless u experience the same feelings,undergo the same trauma,feel the same joy or fear...how can u imagine all these feelings and decide....well i dont think i can....maybe my imagination is pathetic...but i feel debates are useless....for instance...shouldnt ppl who cant hav a child of their own ,adopt? my personal opinion was yes..certainly they should...but apparently there are many ppl who believe otherwise....they say u cant love a child the way u wuld love urs...AGAIN....isnt this relative? why are they saying that abt everyone...why are they generalising it...I know many people who want to adopt and not because they cant have a kid of their own....but because they really want to make a difference in an orphan kids life...and to all those anti adoption ppl....one question...if a couple cant hav a kid of their own...and then if they decide to adopt...isnt the underlying reason to have someone to love...and if they dont hav their own kid ...this adopted kid bcoms their kid right? so wont they obvi love it exactly as they would have loved their own? OK now am straying away from the topic...but i hope u guys got my point... lemme knw if u think otherwise