Stress

A common word used by most at least once in their lifetime, and most by few others.

I read many articles speaking about stress how to deal stress, what causes stress and even there is a subject which has evolved “Stress Management” but suddenly I had a different perception altogether of it, if stress is really a stress or is it that we stress the word stress to make it stressful?

But I wonder why does a person fall stress? What causes him to feel stressful? And how can he overcome that. Now I don’t want to talk pages on this but want to give a small example which inspired me to put these ideas together and bring it as a blog for you.

I was once told we should never carry huge loads on our head. E.g. My mother always use to advise not to hang my school bag belt on my head as it causes neck pain and other side affects, I never dared to ask that but I agreed then, I agreed it till I became young enough and started having my own perceptions rule others words of thought.

After 26 years now I suddenly observed something, a lady carrying a half ton of some spices and some items on her head, balancing with a cloth tied around her head to form a groove to rest the bag on it, I hope all especially Indians would have seen such women walking distances carrying such heavy weights selling there items for their livelihood.

Now two points how could she manage such heavy weights on her head though we cannot? Another point is she not going any stress while performing this daily as part of her livelihood!

Now I leave it to you as to what to grasp from the incident I came across and how is it related to our stress but before that let me put my perception backed by my persuasion of that event.

Imagine I ask her to carry a bag half the weight she is carrying daily and now imagine her carrying a bag almost two times the weight she is carrying?

May be we should know to what extent we can with stand pressure and slowy increase it to the level we cannot withstand it and start maintaining that threshold on a regular basis.

This way we are creating an indicator for our own self to avoid stress instead of managing it :).

As they say prevention is always better than cure!

Now other way of dealing stress is what harm can it cause to us so friends here is an image which mentions the impacts of stress on our body organs

onsite Call

Onsite call:

It was Monday morning; by the way do you know that more people die of heart attacks on Mondays than any other day? Hmm I think we should rather remove Mondays. So is a dialogue from the movie Garfield supporting my view.



I entered the floor as if Russell crowe enters the field of battle in the movie gladiator. Except that I have an ID card hanging around my neck and he has an armor worn. Except that in the movie you find the audience shouting, screaming and clapping for him, hear I have words penetrating from my onsite coordinators mouth into my ear like missiles. Phones ringing on every one’s desk, what you think the calls correspond to they are onsite calls one of the most crucial things in every software engineers life to be faced and to live with.



I sometimes get a feel of working with stock brokers in BSE/NSE handling calls day in and day out, typical comparison but very much true as you see people holding desk phones on one hand working on a mail the other hand, at the same time even sighing there team of what is happening with weird facial expressions and signs.



I wonder why can’t IT folks try as gymnasts at world sports why? Cause you see a man taking a call from a VOIP on the other desk by holding it to his ears by his right hand as if he is stretching his upper right body and at the same time to balance stretches his two legs as wide as he can to maintain the balance and to reach out to his computer on the other desk with his left hand. Typical gesture is like a sarvangasana posture in yoga but without laying on your back mixed with arthachakrasana and dhanurasana. And for those who could not understand yoga it is as simple as tying threads to each of your legs and hands and stretching them in all the four directions☺. In this process of reaching to his desk by holding on to the phone against his ears he might forget that he is dragging the phone slowly from its place on to the floor and phone suddenly drops on to the floor with a ka boom!



Now I have an instance where the employee was asked to pay for the VOIP phone where it got completely damaged due to such a stunt, I think he should reconsider taking gymnastic classes and get time to become a better athlete.



Having said much and coming to my team, ours is a big team equal to forty odd people out of which testing has one onsite coordinator (cord) and dev team has one. Our testing onsite cord is too cautious or I can say over cautious. He has no room for a mistake to occur and so calls up daily in the morning around 08.00 IST and starts telling about every task step by step, I feel as if sometimes he should have been a teacher in kindergarten as he is so elaborate. That does not end there he pauses in between and says hold on please I am getting another call and then resumes back. On an average he speaks for three to four hours easily for a given one hour task. I sometimes thought he should have been a girl!



At the end of the call we run of time and rush doing the tasks. This is from the onsite frond but actually what could have been happening at offshore during such a lengthy call? Well as simple as that after the call is connected all of us greet and then only one person is near the VOIP phone keeping the call on mute. Rest all immediately check out there outlook, send good morning mails for that day, reply to the good evening mails for yesterday, send greeting cards for those whose birthday falls on that day and some already busy attending personal calls on their cell phones. Sometimes at the very moment you get a waiting call and you think its important and attend it which turns out to be a call from ICICI for a personal or a home loan or insurance gurrhhh!





While this was happening the guy who sat beside the phone started something weird he started to record the onsite call using the headphones he had on his desk. And of course no one noticed it and suddenly in this process he removed the mute and suddenly at the very instance some one shouted “abbey kitna time aur kha jayega, usko bolna ki abhi call end karde, taaki hamara kaam shuru kar sake, kaise kaise log chale jaate hai yaar US”, and suddenly he bites his tongue. But these are very common for onsite folks so he never cared but from then on his call hardly lasted an hour ☺. Imagined who was the chap who had removed the mute and sitting beside the VOIP it is me Mr.Hari when I was a fresher. Well the mess I created is less compared to the fun that happens around me.



Well onsite calls are not always so instructive it can be destructive too. Now the lesson I am teaching you here which I learnt as a fresher is the use of an option called speaker in the VOIP phones/ ordinary phones during a call onsite/offshore especially when your manager is around. Do not ever use a speaker phone when you did not complete a given task or the task is done incorrectly or when you can sense that something is wrong with your IT-Sense, you know why ☺. And do make a habit of keeping it on speaker and in high volume when it is the time your onsite cord appreciates you.



Well how did I learn that, my onsite cord uses this technique very affectively, when he has something to say to a team to appreciate our work he asks us to keep on speaker, when the time comes to rectify one’s mistakes or things to be taken care of while sending a deliverable he would ask us to remove the speaker. What an idea sirji.



Things could go very nasty sometimes with calls, one of my friend and batch mate who used to work for production support was working on a serious issue and was there on a conference call with all the major heads of business. And suddenly he gets a call to his cell and guess what, she is a customer care rep from HDFC bank, called to know if he is interested in loans but he was so fed up that even after telling them not to call back they used to, so he thought to teach them a lesson.



“He asked the girl if she is really working for HDFC and she says yes, then he asks if she were alone then she says yes and says if he needs a loan, then he suddenly asks will you marry me, lets run away and get married and told some arbitrary address, she was confused and did hang up the call as was expected. From then on he never got a call from HDFC regarding loans” we still recollect that incident whenever we get calls on loans and smile with in ourselves.



My friend belonging to my batch is a good writer and already working as an assistant director for telugu movies. He used to work for the client named Linda and one day he had to work late night and he was so frustrated that he had mute the call and started singing a song on her which goes like this:



“Hey Linda, aaja khelenge gilli dandha
Kya karna hai is assignment which is like anaconda,
Aaja thoda break leke khayenge little little mysore bonda,
If you say I cant, I will through on you rotten anda…..!!!
Coz I am lil goonda from the place called borabanda…..”



Well folks those are the glimpses from my good golden days and past experiences hope you had good time in reading them.

Rain

Things never are same and one cannot expect them to be. Today I sat in my seat and working seriously on a white paper, I stress seriously, now I always wondered why should one work so seriously? Nevertheless when I say seriously my way of doing it is to work joyfully but seriously concentrate on the lyrics of the songs playing in my I pod , well I am built like that I cannot live without Ipod or music working all the time even while studying. Now why did I suddenly deviate to another topic altogether! Not sure but I hope you will find a link as you go through.

It was a cloudy day in Pune the weather was measuring 22 centigrade, the sun looked as if it took a day off, but bright light filtered through the dark clouds was appearing so good as if it were the intersection of dawn and dusk. Even the birds were confused of whether to start from home thinking it was day in search of food or at the same time to stay back in their nests as it was looking the sun had just set. It appeared to me as if some how few birds faced a weather lag just as one faces jet lag while traveling far places with a considerable time zone variation and so were out roaming in search of food. So one could hear the sweet sounds they make and the good koel too singing to the tunes of the other birds. The droplets of water on the leaves due to the drizzling of the rain illuminated by the light were looking like the pearls shining with a glossy texture. While I was cautiously making my way through the pits containing the rain water to avoid any dirt to my trousers I saw two kids thumping the water pots with their legs by the road, as they were playing with least botheration of the dirt or the consequences later, the drizzle slowly turned heavy and started to rain.



I immediately opened my umbrella and started protecting myself from the rain and these kids were enjoying inexorably, mean while I opened my I pod from my back bag and started humming to the lyrics of Black eyed peas. In the whole process I was still watching them and slowly I recollected something, when I was a kid though I had rain coat to wear in my bag I cleverly used the rain coat to cover my school bag to avoid my books getting wet due to rain and I used to get wet top to toe, it was just not enough for me, I used to sway, nod, stamp my feet on the muddy pit pots of rain, raise my head up and feel every drop of rain on my eye, my cheek, It was like a moment where I had nothing coming in way of joy not even what my Mama would say after I reach home.

But now here I am with gizmos all around, hi-fi mobiles, I pods, laptops, multiplexes, we protect us from everything and anything, we rarely observe what nature is offering us, we shop we celebrate we spend money, but we spend no time for ourselves. As a great writer said money, technology and science make things complex, it is very much true.

My Gran used to say, we lived when there were no televisions and no internet, we lived even when the television was invented, we lived even when everyone was so oblivious of the fact that all the information is at a click away due to presence of internet.
But she always said we truly lived than you are living your life today.

I hardly see any IT guy coming out of his desk to see the rain fall, or to see the sun set in the evening? We do come out but we do so to use it for some other things! Dude life is not just earning it is earning a true life for yourselves. Love and get loved, give and get given. We worry about everything but we never care to worry about ourselves? It is still time that you start enjoying every moment around you! Enjoying is not partying, enjoying is not just discoing, and enjoying is not just all that!

I always had this vague feeling that all of our good things are outsourced to westerners. When I (not me its my friend but lets assume I am speaking on his behalf) was in Netherlands(in dreams he he lets assume I went) for an assignment I was rather exuberated with surprise when all my colleagues suddenly started getting out from their desk to see the clear sun light and most took a day off to spend the warmth sunny time with their families. Of course they rarely have the sun light in an unseasoned year but the way they made me recollect how small things in life should not just be taken for granted but to live the fullest is what amazed me!

Hope you had good time while going through the blog, I do not know how many of you would agree or you do! But as they perceptions through persuasions are never the same on a given thought 

A journey to.....

Well today….I have been to yadigirigutta, a sacred place of Lord Laksmi Narasimha. You can find the significance and history of this sacred place at the site http://www.yadagirigutta.in/significance.aspx

The journey is a collection of various emotions and scenes clubbed in there. Obviously the first thing when one has to look for is the transportation means, and since a distance so 48km cannot be traveled on a bike that too on the constraint that your mother is scared about sitting on bikes, we had to go for the cheapest and best transportation in A.P. the APSRTC, name so big services so wide but always the ground rule never expect any bus on time….and I just forgot that and we waited for an hour nothing to do and waited enough, we had decided to reach our destination faster by changing two or three buses ( from KPHB>Upppal and then Uppal>Yadigirigutta).

It took almost 2.5 hours to reach the temple, not a bad thing. Now the story begins having entered the premises of lord Lakshmi Narasimha, I was just startled to see so many things changed, ofcourse things are meant to change. So we started searching for the Dharma(Free) Darshan (seeing god) and the special VIP darshans ranging from 25-100.

As it was already too late we had to choose some darshan apart from the free one, so we opted for 100 one and guess what you get 2 laddus free(in year2009). You get in line and voila in 15minutes your darshan is done. And the folks who cannot afford so much 100 even in the year 2009 go for free darshan and had to slog for 5 hours in que. Well I think even god knows whom to see, when to see, how to see …he just see’s and see’s coz he is god and see’s everything is our belief.

Well people it was always said that small happiness’s last longer and give us a moment of bliss so probably this could be the reason of you being dragged out of core temple premises when you finally reach there to let your wishes before the almighty, there is another logic there added to it, everyone starts asking a list of wishes standing before god if given enough time for each which means the next person had to wait longer implies number of people getting out are less than coming in and then it’s a chaos.

I never get angry if someone grabs me and pulls me out when I stand for hours together in que and finally reach the temple to see the lord, coz I never ask any wishes as I already do at my home and only when fulfilled I start to temple, that’s a nice piece of idea everyone can adapt, if you think someone did not give time to let your wishes to be put before god. See god is now pleased for being so good to others.

Having blessed by god and seen him for sufficient time, well I am blessed in height so I can watch god for longer than others when I enter the Mukha Dwaram(main doors) itself. we went to collect Prasad, as always ladies have quota in the Prasad line too and their que is almost a third less than ours, so mother joined it and I sat down under the shade in front of the counter.

I saw three children playing, a small girl (3years of age), other girl( 7 years of age), and a boy (5 years of age) playing with balloons. They just are so happy by hitting the ballon back and again by pulling the elastic thread tied to the balloons.

The small girl was enjoying so much and was so lost that finally in the emotional battle of “thread and balloon” thread won and balloon was burst out leaving the winner (Thread) in her hand, well the most funniest part and sorriest part is when you look at her face at that time, a mixed emotion I call, of loosing the balloon from her side and funny to us, of her blank expression and stiff body due to the sound of balloon burst.
It did not lost for long she again started asking her brothers balloon and he is so nice that each of them shared the time with balloon.

They just were playing and I recollected.. whirl into flash back tuiiii tuiiiii tuiiiii as in movies….my childhood in black and white where I was totally opposite I used to think what was inside I used to examine the elastic thread and the balloon and the slight noisy sounds of sand grains in the balloon when we shake it.

Then I understood I was so stupid, instead of enjoying it I started analyzing it, I laughed at my own child in me at that time in the stupendously stupid manner. Some things in life had to be just enjoyed, we should never analyze them, you start analyzing things you keep missing what most pretty things life gives to you in free. And some moments and people we meet cannot be present again so never lose anything you feel don’t loosing as
You might not get it back when you search for them.

Well a journey is worth a mile books read, is true I felt. You just observe and many things can be seen where you never would have imagined in your grey matter through books.

Well the humor is of course bound to happen when one goes on a journey, while way back. I happen to over hear the conversation between two college students, in fact let me call two folks of my age, as you see I look much younger than them. Sometimes you never know what is true and lie when you read books.

A lady entered our bus she is so fair, infact it’s a disease due to which she is so white and that’s their topic of discussion.
Chap 1: Hey look at her man she is so white
Chap 2: idiot, its not her color it’s the disease
Chap 1: oh, yeah its anemia
Chap 2: ha ha, I know the answer, keep guessing and I will tell you what it is.
Chap 1: oh yeah, its anemia only due to lack of iron in her blood, she is so white
Chap 2: No, dude its not that.
Chap 1: you know what it is, why don’t you tell?
Chap 2: yeah, its melanin disease, due to absence of melanin in her blood she is so white
Chap 1: huu, I think even Michael Jackson was so white right
Chap 2: yes, he did has this melanin problem after he changed his sex.
Chap 1: oh, that was bad.

And the conversation turned to different thing. Now first of all please excuse me as I almost forgot what exactly the disease name is, associated with the women after hearing the conversation, let me Google it, yeah its albinism and secondly I just want to see them as they sat back to me before I leave. I am sure Michael Jackson was so white coz he had plastic surgery done and not any transgender problem. Now there are so many problems one can chat on daily and you can just relish it, if you quietly sit and listen to them, provided you don’t get overridden by their perceptions and finally what the truth is unlike me and start Google’ing it

Cultures....and Communication

I knew that cultures and traditions vary from one region to region but never thought that such an affect could be inducted on IT ….want to know…….here it is .

The emoticon for “smile” in most western cultures is this :). One of the ScienceBloggers does it backwards (: (can you guess who?), but the symbol is essentially the same. In Japan, however, the smile is depicted like this: ^_^.

You might think that’s just because the traditions evolved separately, but emotion researcher Masaki Yuki doesn’t buy it. He argues that the difference in Japanese emoticons is related to cultural differences in real smiles.

when Yuki entered graduate school and began communicating with American scholars over e-mail, he was often confused by their use of emoticons such as smiley faces and sad faces, or :(.”It took some time before I finally understood that they were faces,” he wrote in an e-mail. In Japan, emoticons tend to emphasize the eyes, such as the happy face (^_^) and the sad face (;_;). “After seeing the difference between American and Japanese emoticons, it dawned on me that the faces looked exactly like typical American and Japanese smiles,” he said.

Later, Yuki worked with a team that asked Japanese and American students to rate the emotional valence of real photos that had been manipulated in Photoshop to emphasize happy and sad emotions in the eyes and mouth. As predicted, Japanese students responded more to eye expression, while Americans responded more to the mouth.

There was, however, one interesting twist to the research:both the Americans and Japanese tended to rate faces with so-called “happy” eyes as neutral or sad. This could be because the muscles that are flexed around the eyes in genuine smiles are also quite active in sadness, said James Coan, a psychologist at the University of Virginia who was not involved in the research.Research has shown that the expressive muscles around the eyes provide key clues about a person’s genuine emotions, said Coan. Because Japanese people tend to focus on the eyes, they could be better, overall, than Americans at perceiving people’s true feelings.

Do different colors affect your mood?

Like death and taxes, there is no escaping color. It is ubiquitous. Yet what does it all mean? Why are people more relaxed in green rooms? Why do weightlifters do their best in blue gyms?

Colors often have different meanings in various cultures. And even in Western societies, the meanings of various colors have changed over the years. But today in the U.S., researchers have generally found the following to be accurate.

Black
Black is the color of authority and power. It is popular in fashion because it makes people appear thinner. It is also stylish and timeless. Black also implies submission. Priests wear black to signify submission to God. Some fashion experts say a woman wearing black implies submission to men. Black outfits can also be overpowering, or make the wearer seem aloof or evil. Villains, such as Dracula, often wear black.

White
Brides wear white to symbolize innocence and purity. White reflects light and is considered a summer color. White is popular in decorating and in fashion because it is light, neutral, and goes with everything. However, white shows dirt and is therefore more difficult to keep clean than other colors. Doctors and nurses wear white to imply sterility.

Red
The most emotionally intense color, red stimulates a faster heartbeat and breathing. It is also the color of love. Red clothing gets noticed and makes the wearer appear heavier. Since it is an extreme color, red clothing might not help people in negotiations or confrontations. Red cars are popular targets for thieves. In decorating, red is usually used as an accent. Decorators say that red furniture should be perfect since it will attract attention.

The most romantic color, pink, is more tranquilizing. Sports teams sometimes paint the locker rooms used by opposing teams bright pink so their opponents will lose energy.

Blue
The color of the sky and the ocean, blue is one of the most popular colors. It causes the opposite reaction as red. Peaceful, tranquil blue causes the body to produce calming chemicals, so it is often used in bedrooms. Blue can also be cold and depressing. Fashion consultants recommend wearing blue to job interviews because it symbolizes loyalty. People are more productive in blue rooms. Studies show weightlifters are able to handle heavier weights in blue gyms.

Green
Currently the most popular decorating color, green symbolizes nature. It is the easiest color on the eye and can improve vision. It is a calming, refreshing color. People waiting to appear on TV sit in “green rooms” to relax. Hospitals often use green because it relaxes patients. Brides in the Middle Ages wore green to symbolize fertility. Dark green is masculine, conservative, and implies wealth. However, seamstresses often refuse to use green thread on the eve of a fashion show for fear it will bring bad luck.

Yellow
Cheerful sunny yellow is an attention getter. While it is considered an optimistic color, people lose their tempers more often in yellow rooms, and babies will cry more. It is the most difficult color for the eye to take in, so it can be overpowering if overused. Yellow enhances concentration, hence its use for legal pads. It also speeds metabolism.

Purple
The color of royalty, purple connotes luxury, wealth, and sophistication. It is also feminine and romantic. However, because it is rare in nature, purple can appear artificial.

Brown
Solid, reliable brown is the color of earth and is abundant in nature. Light brown implies genuineness while dark brown is similar to wood or leather. Brown can also be sad and wistful. Men are more apt to say brown is one of their favorite colors.

You can be happy

You can be happy. You can live the life you want to live. You can become the person you want to be. This is what I've figured out so far. Stop assigning blame. This is the first step. Stop assigning blame and leave the past behind you. You know whose fault it is that your life isn't perfect. Your boss. Your teachers. Your ex-lovers. The ones who hurt you,the ones who abused you, the ones who left you bleeding. Or even yourself. You know whose fault it is — you've been telling yourself your whole life. Knowing whose fault it is that your life sucks is an excellent way to absolve your self of any reponsibility for taking your life into your own hands.

Forget about it. Let it go. The past isn't real. “That was in another country, and besides, the wench is dead.” If we're not talking about something that is real and present and in your life right now, then it doesn't matter. Nothing can be done about it. If nothing can be done about it, then don't spend your energy dwelling on it — you have other things to do. I may sound cruel, I may sound simplistic, I may sound like I'm saying you should just “get over it,” by suggesting that youshould let go of your past. I'm sorry for that. But life won't hold still and wait for you to lick your wounds. The race is still being run. Get up and keep moving. You can't do anything about yesterday.

You can do something about tomorrow. And about the next day.Focus your energies there.