Let go

Let go of everything…
Holding you back…
And fly high…

One closed door

“One door closes and you notice another thousand were open all along for you to enter.”

Another day in the life of Haniel. Another setback. Another door closes, temporarily, when I wanted it to be the most open. Another disappointment I have to overcome. Another interview that has kicked me to the kerb. (oh, boy could I do any wrong… 17.5/100 was my interview score)

I was kind of disappointed about my results. After three years of running around and looking at different paths for me to to pursue, this failure knocked me down hard. I started questioning myself, doubting my abilities and interpersonal skills.

It took me some time to pick myself up. In fact, I didn’t pick myself up. Some people put me back on my feet. People who cared about me so deeply. people who I had my back when I had nowhere to go. People who supported me when I had no idea. My family, friends and teachers.

So, here I am. Writing after a failed interview.  An interview that has almost changed my life, when I think about it. An interview that made me meet some of the wonderful  people in my life. An interview that has once again realize the value of people around me. An interview that has given me another chance to have a go at certain things.

A closed door that has opened my eyes to the million other possibilities there could be.

Again

Again, I fall on my face.
Again, as if I have no grace.
Again,  in the last leg of the race.
Again, will have to pick me up.
Again, to face my fear anew.
Again, to start a new run.
Again, not to know how it will end.

An Entangled Hit

It was  Wednesday. I had to wake up in the morning. I had so many works. It was busy day, I had it all planned the previous night. Rain was drizzling on this fine morning of a summer after pouring enough in the previous night and the day before that. The cool atmosphere made me want sleep more, but I had to wake to catch up with my works. I managed to roll out of bed and got ready for the day. The drizzling rain was stopping me from stepping out of home. I was thinking, ‘how  am I going to make through this rain!’. Something happened  before I could even complete the question in my mind. I was already on my two wheeler, helping it come out of the shed. When I pulled the handle backward, I pressed the ignition switch. The engine was refusing to start because of the cold.

I knew that I would not need to use the kicker. The self ignition will somehow work as it did on the previous days. The engine roared. The cold engine fumed some smoke. I noticed the head light beaming on the nearby wall. I could also see the raindrops falling down through the light. I switched off the head light thinking, ‘I saved somehow, the effort of a stranger who would sign me to turn off my headlight like most of the days’. I was scolding myself for the bad habit of not caring about my headlight during day. Now, I was out on the street and was going on towards our Tahsildar’s office, for applying for some land related documents that were mandated by a bank manager, who was trying  very hard to reject my loan application.

I knew people who had availed loans for lakhs without any security, that too in recording breaking  3 business hours. Wonderful thing was that the borrower was not even an account holder in that bank. During the drive, I was wondering about the banking personnel who asked me for the  death certificate of a person who died almost before India could make her independence. In between, the rain got heavy. I don’t have the habit of searching for shelters to escape rain during drive.I tell my friends that I like to drive in rain. But, some days I feel, ‘why am I going like a madman in this rain? Should I stop somewhere!’. Before I could convince myself to stop, my mind would remember the days I have told my friends about my rain drive. So my thoughts of stopping got washed away in the rain. I would keep on going.

But, today was not a day to thinking about rain shelters. I was enjoying the rain. Within 20 minutes, I was at town, where the government office is located. I saw a busy road only after reaching this town. so far, my travel was almost lonely, with one or two vehicles passing me. This lonely road had made me untrained enough to wait to cross the busy market road. I waited patiently with my indicator on. I was seeing both the sides of the road at-least  for a couple of long minutes. When the road was almost empty on either sides as long as I could see, I re-ignited the engine which turned off because of rain and crossed the road. I entered the government office. It was busy and alive even on this rainy day, that too in the morning itself. I thought, this rush may be due to the previous and forthcoming election related holidays.

I parked my bike under a tree, where a “No Parking” board was painted, being the only place where one was able to park their two wheeler without much disturbance to the public. I had to ignore the cautionary board like my fellow visitors. Now I was heading to a Parking shed that was originally meant for two wheeler parking and was currently occupied by “form writing helpers”. These “form writing helpers” are peoples who have strong ties with the officers inside and are power intermediaries. One has to approach these people for anything to be happen, like getting certificates, land related documents etc. Approaching the government officers directly with our self filled forms will not be welcomed, the officers will be offended and would reply with repeated rejections citing procedural errors.

Afraid of such offends and procedural error citations, I had no ideas of visiting the govt officers directly. I went to a helper and asked him for help in getting so and so documents for loan, like an ignorant and uneducated person. After hearing what I had to say, he started to question me in a joking manner. ‘who asked you such documents, we can not get them’ and so. I said nothing and was looking at him blankly. I knew that he will do it somehow. After some jokes and laughs, he told me to buy some forms from the nearby photocopy shop. He asked me for details and filled the form.

Normally, I don’t think of myself as an Engineering graduate, who does not  even know even how to fill up a Banking challan. I have availed  for driving license, PAN, TAN, Passport directly without any intermediates. I should admit, that these are not basically complex, but have been made complex by the pre-colonial custom+broker+officer tie-up. It is hard for any one to get these things done directly without intermediary help. But in the course of time, I understood, even If someone is capable of receiving things directly, he is actually wasting  more time, energy and money when doing things directly. That is why we move things through a broker or as we call them, ‘A form writing helper’.

I paid the necessary money, including his writing charges. After securing his assurance that I will get the certificates on next Monday, I was coming back to the “no parking” area, where I parked my bike. This area was now flooded with more two wheelers. I found it very difficult to take my bike out of the messy parking.

Once I came out of the building compound, I waited for the road to get empty again, so that I can cross it safely. This time I had to wait for more than 4 minutes, until my savior, an auto-rickshaw that came out of the campus crossing the road without even checking the traffic. The auto-rickshaw was followed by some pedestrians and even some two-wheeler that were waiting to cross the road. I tailed a two wheeler and crossed the road. Now I was returning back to my kingdom of traffic-less lonely road slowly. I remembered that I was going on the wrong direction. ‘I have to go to my college to get my observation report signed’, meant for the exam, day after tomorrow.

I took no time to stop. I checked both sides of the road and came back to join the busy main road, to reach my college. The rain had almost stopped, but the cool breeze was still there. When I stepped into my college class room, I remembered, for a record breaking third time, I did have my observation report with me. I planned to go back home for taking my observation report and come back after having my lunch. I reached home, took my observation report and had a quick self served lunch.

Again, I was igniting the engine to reach my college. I was thinking random thoughts all the way. I entered an almost empty, well maintained half lane riverside road. There were tall bushes and shrubs on both the sides. Everyone loves to have a fast ride in this road, except me. Because I loved the surroundings, I drive slowly enjoying the greenery.

I was thinking about my plans after getting observation signed by the faculty. An yellow scooter with the usual fast pace meant for that road was coming in the opposite direction. Before my  brain could process the distance between me and that vehicle, my inner-conscious was telling me ” Okay, its going to be a  entangled hit”. I still remember, the voice sounded very cool. Before I could think of anything further, my hand, without any further instruction from my thinking brain, impulsively made a slight left turn. There was a pause.

Still there was a pause.

Until I realized, the hit had happen already. Yes, It did and that too an entangled hit, obviously. My vehicle stopped and fell down along with me onto the river bank. I narrowly escaped falling into the river by a few centimeters. The pause continued until I got out of my fallen bike and managed to sit in the near by road. I had no pain. I had no thoughts. My mind was clearly blank. In a few seconds I turned to the two boys who rolled over quickly to get up. They were pulling their vehicles out of a shrub. When this was happening, their vehicle roared and made a climb onto the nearby shrub. The boys who were quick to get their bike back on road still did not come out of the shock, neither did I.

They narrowly escaped from the roaring, climbing scooter falling over them for the second time and made it stand up. They approached me for helping. By this time, there was a passerby who stopped near us to provide support. He helped to get my bike to back on road from the channel side. He inquired about my wellness and advised me to take a TT (tetanus toxoid) injection immediately. He also advised those boys.

I noticed a plastic piece, a long triangular shaped, metallic painted material that was alien to me bike, being  struck in side the brake pedal. It has stopped the bike running into the river along with me. I managed to pull the plastic piece out and handed over it to the boys to whom it belonged to.

I requested the passerby to reverse my bike to the direction where I am coming from. He asked me and the boys about our actual direction of travel and collision. I was quick to clarify the direction I came from, but now I wanted to go back home. He helped to reverse the bike moving it out of a small pothole.

After that, I tried to sit on my bike. I felt a pain on my feet, a deep cutting pain. I did not have the usual curiosity to check the status of my wound. I understood that I was in some short of shock. But, I had no other choice, but to press the ignition switch. At this juncture, I thank my bike’s never ever failing self starting system.Without it, I would not have been able to start the bike with the wounded right foot. At least, it saved me from asking the stranger to help getting my bike started.

After the start, the pain increased. I realized that the brake was damaged when I removed the struck plastic piece. Even though if it is working, I was not able to apply the brake as my leg was hurting. I could not rest my right foot over the pedal because of the pain. Another reason was that the pedal was twisted and not usable.

I could notice the scooter having suffered serious damages, more than my bike. I had sustained more injuries than those boys, who show no immediate symptoms of injury. I drove the bike slowly. The pain increased. I was losing my confidence of being awake due to injury and pain. I reached home somehow, was taken to a hospital, treated and am recovering  well with no serious injuries.

Important point is, I got my observation report signed and even finished my exams on the consecutive days.

After two days, When I recall the situation, I can see dark and bright sides of this chaos.

The dark side is the “Entangled hit”. It means, I had no chance of escaping the accident. The bright side is the “piece of a plastic sheet” that struck accidentally between my brake shoe and pedal in the collision. It stopped my vehicle from falling into the river,

I understand that an entangled situation may not be diffused  by human actions, but incidentally, accidentally , naturally , randomly  or otherwise collectively “by the act of God”.

 

The wait

‘Waiting’, the inevitable part of life. I write this because most of you are waiting for something and I am presently waiting for an interview on Friday. I was thinking of getting things done quickly, when I reported my attendance yesterday. But, my interview is scheduled on Friday. so, I have to wait.

We all have to wait for things to happen in life. Waiting in queues, waiting for the page to load, waiting for people to understand, waiting for results, the list goes on and on. Sometimes the wait is beautiful in its own way. Sometimes it leaves you frustrated.

The  wait becomes more agonizing, when you are able to do nothing but wait. That helpless situation when you have to absolutely wait. A state where I find myself more, when I depend on things and people I cannot control. Times when I am in need of people, who don’t necessarily need me.

Even though, I was trying keep myself busy and occupied, thoughts of the upcoming interview were making me feel a bit anxious. I was feeling that it would have been good, if my interview was over yesterday itself. I was reading something random, and that is when I stumbled upon this quote:

After reading this, I felt like I was being a little impatient. Was my faith so low that I was wanting things to happen in my time? I started thinking. After a while, I was feeling happy that my interview was on Friday. I can stay in this city for 2 more days, I have more time to prepare myself and there are lots of things I can do in these 2 days.

So, here I am waiting for my scheduled time to come. Thinking of ways to keep myself calm and composed. Watching movies one after another, reading, sleeping long hours and thinking of random things to write about in future.

When its your time to wait, have this in mind: Have some faith, in people, in God and most importantly in yourself. Most of the time, its not bad to wait. We get to learn a lot in our waits. In a sense waiting is also like a journey. Enjoy the journey, the beautiful destination will eventually come. 🙂

Journey and destination

I find myself in a journey again. Another train journey and 8+ hours to spend doing something. I slept for some time, watched a movie for a while and finally, ended up here. What is important? The journey or the destination? Such an old question. But, still it gives you a lot to think about, a lot to reflect and remember.

I thought, the destination is more important. It is the most important part of any journey.  Without a destination, your journey won’t have any direction. Without a destination, a journey would’t be a journey. It would be just wandering around aimlessly. When you say someone that you are going on a journey, the first question they ask back is, “Where are you going?”. All the other questions about how and when come after that.

And suddenly, another thought crossed my mind. There were those journeys in which I enjoyed the travel, the places I saw and people I met before I even reached my destination. Those journeys themselves were important, even without the destination. Maybe, how we go is more important than where we go.

My mind was like the famous Tamil expression “மதில் மேல் பூனை” (mathil meethu poonai meaning, cat on the fence that could jump to either side). I still was unable to come to a clear conclusion. Two kids near me were flipping a coin and playing heard or tails. I was watching then and suddenly a thought popped in my head.

Maybe, journey and destination are like two sides of a coin. Both are to be present for the coin to be valid. I doesn’t mean one side is more important than the other. I have often heard people say, “The mean is as important as the end”.

When I thought more, I felt, In some cases, you might have to go through a wonderful journey to a destination that is not so pleasant or undertake a difficult and unpleasant journey to a beautiful destination. Whatever the situation is, try to enjoy the things that come your way.

Think about the beautiful destination, when you are having a tough time in your journey. Think about all the experience and enjoyment of the journey, if you are not happy with your destination. It doesn’t matter if it is the journey or the destination. All you have to do is find reasons to be happy, like those kids flipping coin happily.

 

The interview

Recently, I had  the chance to talk to a friend who had gone through an interview. I casually asked asked about his interview experience. He said that the overall interview experience was good, but something funny happened right before the interview. I asked him for details and here is what he said:

‘… I was waiting in the allocated area for people to wait before the interview. I was a bit nervous about my interview. Many different thoughts were bubbling in my head. I was trying to be cool and not show my nervousness. That is when I noticed that guy ahead of me in the waiting line.

He was very nervous and was shivering like a leaf in the wind. In the 30 minutes I was watching him, he drank 4 bottles of water and went to the washroom 5 times. He looked so pale and was looking as if he will faint if someone touched him.

Looking at him, I got a bit nervous. People are taking this interview very seriously, I thought. I was trying to change my thoughts. I tried not to let the shivering person influence my interview mindset anymore. That is when a guy came out the interview room.

People were flocking around him to hear about his interview. He sat next to me and was narrating the details of his interview. He was talking so fast, all I could think of was, ‘ how can someone talk this fast!’. Without any thoughts, I too started to listen to what he was saying.

‘The interview panel is very harsh. They don’t give me time to think. They didn’t even want to see my work. I had to ask them to see my works.’  He kept on talking. I was feeling nervous again. Fear of interview had crept into my mind.

On my right was a person so nervous about the interview and on my left was a person who was worrying people with his interview experience. Now, I was feeling so nervous, I was almost like that shivering guy (Except for the bottles and bottles of water). I had to reset my mind.

I went out of the waiting area, took a walk around the place, calmed my mind and came back just in time to attend the interview. I didn’t look at or talk to anyone before or after the interview. I didn’t want anyone to get tensed because of my babbling.’

I was listening to all this and was laughing uncontrollably. When I was done with the laughing, I thought about the incident in a different way.

Mostly, people when attending an interview will be nervous. Try to act in a way that doesn’t affect the psychology of people waiting for their turn. Even if people are asking you about your interview after coming out, just say that it went well, wish them all the best if possible and leave the place as quickly as you can.

Each interview experience will be different. Let others discover and enjoy the process. Don’t discourage people before they even start their journey. Have a good time

Memories

Sorry for being away for a while. Was a bit occupied with my studio test and interview for the National Institute of Design and my travel back home. My stay in Ahmedabad this time was a life changing experience in many ways. I got to meet a lot of interesting people, had a lot of fun and expanded my skills and imagination. Now that I’m home, I miss Ahmedabad and all the people who made my stay so wonderful. Here are some things that I enjoyed and learned during this trip.

1. Knowing Hindi is important. But, not so much if you are always with your friends 😀
2. Don’t fuss about learning new skills. You will acquire the skills you need in the right time.
3. Midnight snacking in aunty’s shop and relish
4. First surprise Birthday celebration (It was my first birthday away from home) and Shreya’s Birthday song “Haniel ka birthday hai. Haniel ka jaeb cut ni wali hai” which made my Birthday pretty well known.
5. Holi celebrations are pretty messy 😛
6. You can enjoy tea time even if you don’t drink tea. All you need are friends.
7. Tom and Jerry games with Vishal. (Dude, I love pulling your leg) 😀 😀
8. Great friendships bloom out of nowhere.
9. Exploring things without inhibitions.
10. Onion + Vinegar = ‘Bad combination’. (I don’t know how they eat it)
11. Don’t try to change yourself too much. People love you the way you are. Have some patience.
12. Hard work and determination commands more respect than skill and natural talent.
13. Shank 2 survival ends at level 30 (seriously!!! I thought there would be tougher levels 😛 😉 )

I hope that I have covered almost everything.  Will add things if I remember or my friends remind me.

With lots of love and memories… Haniel

I’ll be missed

Why do I walk alone?
In this lonely path.
Why can’t I join them?
They are just walking ahead.

Why this forlorn thought?
No one really cares.
Am I being Ignored?
Will my voice be heard?

A friend stops and turns back.
‘Idiot, why are you so slow?’
Still giving that feeling,
I’ll in some way be missed.

Share Market Trading for Dummies

Author’s Note and Preface

I planned to make just a single post titled ‘Share Market Trading  for Dummies’. After completing the first post,  I was amazed, I still had much more to write. The topic couldn’t be finished on a single post.  God’s grace and nature’s wonder, an unknown source of tremendous energy compelled me to  make five more posts. On reaching the sixth post, I stopped because I had no ideas to expand the topic further. But, I felt four more chapters were essential. I planned to write them on the coming month or there after. Normally this means, it was plan that had 10% probability of accomplishment.

At this juncture, I must acknowledge our beloved editor, Haniel B Daniel called me and was talking about his days in Ahmadabad. He gave me some critical insights about ‘For dummies’ posts on ‘Share market trading’. This gave my writing sails a second wind that helped me to write the remaining matters comprising 4 posts immediately after our phone call ended.

I must thank him for his efforts in tailoring the entire series with his editorial skills, commitment  and utmost patience. A think I admire on his editorial-ship, he strikes the right balance between me and the reader, by exactly representing what i wanted to say in the language a reader can understand easily.

Hope, Haniel will be posting a “Editorial Note”  comprising his length and breadth of experiences in editing this series including My Preface Note.

-Ponram P

About the Author:

The Author is a Bullish trader. He is trading since 2009, since his early undergraduate days. He started trading just out of curiosity. His search for the news end item “Share market price” dragged him to the doors of share market trading. He loves writing. Otherwise he is an Engineer and an environmentalist. He occasionally blogs at Haniel’s blog.

Editors note:

Thanks for the kind words. It’s a great feeling when someone finishes their work. I am glad that I was able to help Ponram in finishing his series. Hopefully, He will write a lot more and I will be able to edit them.