A Bird in Hand!

Life's amazing journey has many different things on offer for a person. But one of the most precious things that it gives us all, is experience, the lessons that life teaches us through the highs and lows it makes us undergo. As the month of November comes to an end, I could not but agree more with the idiom "A Bird In Hand Is Better Than Two In The Bush". 

I recollect hearing a story about a person who had a hen which laid golden eggs. This oft heard childhood story, a part of Aesop's Fables, goes that the man gradually became rich selling the golden eggs that the hen laid. Then he became ambitious or in other words plain greedy. He was not happy with what he was having. He started expecting more from life than it was giving him at that point of time. Maybe he wanted newer experiences, maybe he wanted to emulate his richer peers, ignoring the others from whom he was in fact much better off, maybe there was family pressure or maybe he thought of enjoying life in the faster lane. Whatever might be the reason, suddenly the thought of two birds in the bush started to look more lucrative for him.

This illusion made his present miserable because he constantly thought of things that he perceived would accrue to him in the future. He got into a tangle, a tangle in which he looked forward towards the bright perceived future and looked down upon his 'miserable' present. With such cobwebs of the mind, the day was not far when he took a decision, a decision which to him seemed a perfectly logical decision. He decided to kill the golden egg laying hen in the hope that he would get all the eggs that the hen had to offer at one go. He swiftly and without remorse killed the hen.. only to find that in the hope of getting rich quickly in the near future, he had completely destroyed his beautiful present.

Even from first hand experiences that we all encounter in our day to day life, all of us (members of Blue Caramel not excluded) don't seem to follow the idiom of "A bird in hand is better that two in the bush" and try running after things which we don't have. This is not to say that being fully contented with life is the way out, this in fact leads to our degeneration. What I am trying to emphasize is that in the hope of a better future we should not ruin our present by our actions, just like what the man in the Golden Hen case did....

  

Where there is a will there is a way!

There was an interesting article in the local language paper this morning and it was about Jorma Ollila, the former Chairman and CEO of Nokia Corporation, the Finnish Multinational mobile telephone and telecommunication behemoth. In it, Ollila quotes an incident from the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics which involved his fellow Finn, the athlete Lasse Viren.

Lasse Artturi Viren was a long distance runner in the mold of the "Flying Finns" of the early 20th century like Kolehmainen and Nurmi. After disastrous performances in the events leading up to the Munich Olympics, Viren was not expected to make any mark in his pet 10,000 metres race. But Viren had other ideas. Just prior to the Olympics, he embarked on a brutal regimen of physical endurance and "willed" to bring in laurels for himself and his country.

The race began and as luck would have it, Viren took a nasty fall in the 12th lap and lost out on 20 to 30 metres from the leaders of the race. But he did not loose hope and with supreme effort was able to bridge this gap in less than 150 metres. The rest as they say is history. Not only Lasse Viren won the gold medal, he also created a new world record, which still stands.

Similarly, Jorma Ollila with his dedication, focus and will power was able to channelize the varied interests of Nokia, from spheres as diversified as logging, paper, electricity and rubber products to mobile phones and telecommunications, in his single minded pursuit to make Nokia Corporation, the best in whatever it does. He consolidated the operations of Nokia in 1992 when it was decided that Nokia would only concentrate on Telecommunications and mobile telephones and the rest again is history.

As the penultimate month of the year 2012 draws to an end, all members of Blue Caramel in Jaipur, Jodhpur, Udaipur and Mumbai should grasp the fact that "Where there is a will, there is a way". The way would automatically unfold when one has the will to succeed. As, the quote goes "Nothing is lost till hope is lost and everything is lost when hope is lost", so hoping for a terrific closing from all the locations in a month that has been very kind to us. God Speed!!   

Oysters, Pearls and Life's Lesson@Lake Chilika

Having just returned from a most memorable journey to the East Indian state of Odisha, I could not help but  post today's post on a very remarkable experience in the backwaters of Lake Chilika, (misspelt as lake Chilka by most).

The largest lagoon in the Indian subcontinent and the second largest in the world, Chilika sustains more than 130 villages with a population in excess of 1.5 lacs villagers along its shores. The fast disappearing dolphins are a highlight of the boat ride on Lake Chilika, but for me the live demonstration of the extraction of pearls and moonstones from mollusks, shells, mussels and oysters on the Red Crab island was the icing on the cake. In the following snaps the entire process of the extraction is illustrated.

Shells

Mussel

Hammer it open

Out comes the gem

Handful of gems

The genesis of a pearl is very unique. Unlike others, pearl is an organic matter derived from living beings- Mollusks and oysters. Sand and other impurities nestle within the body of the mollusks and oysters and over a period of time get converted into Pearls, which the world considers priceless.

For all the members of Blue Caramel Jaipur, Jodhpur, Udaipur and Mumbai, there is a great lesson to be learnt, which is even if we have impurities in ourselves in the form of doubts, negativeness, jealousy or the like, if we are focused enough and have the desire to excel, then the time will not be far when these impurities will become subordinate to our work ethic and we will become priceless like pearls, pearls of the professional sphere.  

Sufi, Obama,Puri and Diwali

The first week of the penultimate month of the year has been dominated by four things in the Blue Caramel universe as well outside it. Discussions have made headway for Blue Caramel to partner International Sufi Festival India for the next festival, Barack Hussein Obama got re-elected as the American president, I would be leaving for my tryst with Lord Jagannath in Puri and Diwali, the festival of lights would be celebrated in a week's time.

After the success of the International Sufi Festival India, Ajmer in its first two editions, in which Blue Caramel and mydestination.com were associates, talks are on to take this relationship to a new level. Sufism has always been associated with mysticism and has been popular all over the world, the ISFI festival envisages to propagate this very essence along with the teachings of the great Sufi saint Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti.
In today's world, when materialism is at its most ugly, Sufism preaches that you can draw closer to God through personal deeds that are selfless. It propagates the theory of Unity in Diversity and universal brotherhood.

"Four more years", became the most retweeted tweet in twitter's history. This tweet by the incumbent US president Barack Hussein Obama capped the amazing race for American presidency. The "Dead heat" as was prophesied by many, turned out to be dead meat for his Republican rival Mitt Romney and Obama after his Change of 2008 has ushered in "Forward" of 2012. The rise of Obama, the first non-white president in the history of the United States and his re-election re-emphasizes the fact that there is no substitute for dedication and hard work and also one needs to be always connected to the grass roots to be able to have a formidable base.

The holy city of Puri in Odisha (formerly Orissa) is the abode of Lord Jagannath. It is here that the famous "Rath Yatra" or the Chariot festival takes place every year. After prolonged procrastination, finally this year it seems that my tryst with the almighty will finally take place.

In my absence, the festival of lights-Diwali would be celebrated. I am taking this opportunity to wish everyone within the Blue Caramel family and also everyone else a very Happy Diwali and a very prosperous year ahead!!!!!