How Hari Singh Nalwa set an example to uphold the dignity of women

Dear Readers,

Wish you all a very happy Diwali!!! May god bless you with a happy, safe and joyous Diwali and help you to fulfil all your good wishes. Today, I want to write about a very sensitive and important topic. I will be discussing on the topic of "How Hari Singh Nalwa set an example to uphold the dignity of women" with an excerpt from the Sikh history. I want to dedicate this article to all the women in the world.

Women have always been respected throughout the ages. Women have been an integral part of the society. They have been warriors, queens, doctors, discoverers, inventors, engineers, lawyers, accountants, CEO's etc. They have held an important position at home as well. They have played the roles of daughters, sisters, wives, mothers etc with great dignity and humility. We cannot ever imagine a world without women.

Yet, these are troubled times. We see everyday in news how people are humiliating women. Whether these people are terrorists or Presidential candidates they should learn how to show respect to women. After all, have these men forgotten that they came to this world out of a Mother. I hope if this message reaches out to such people it may bring them some shame and  remorse. At the same time, I want to show my support to all the women and inform that not all men are bad. There are other men who promise to support you and stand up for you. I come from a country where we revere women as Goddesses and with that sentiment I want to tell you a real incident that will infuse each women with pride and self respect.

India was the richest country in the world for a very long time in history. As such her riches have attracted several discoverers, scholars, traders and also plunderers. The Indian sub continent is surrounded by the sea on three sides and has the great Himalayan mountains towards the northern side. Most of the invaders have attacked India from the Khyber Pass in the North. Most of the invaders have been the Pathans from Afghanistan. These are tough people and nobody had ever defeated them in their own territory. This history was changed when the mighty Sikh general Hari Singh Nalwa defeated the Pathans and setup the Sikh kingdom in Afghanistan. He secured the Khyber Pass and prevented any invasions to our country from that route.

One night, two Pathan spies were watching over the Sikh tents at night from the cover of a few bushes. There was a lady spy by the name of Bibi Bano (Bibi means respectfully Lady) and she was accompanied by a male spy Gul Khan. The Pathans were bewildered by the grit and courage of Hari Singh Nalwa and his Singhs. Bibi Bano expressed her desire to meet Hari Singh Nalwa to Gul Khan. Gul Khan told her that the conquerors never showed any respect to women from the conquered lands and it would be very unsafe for her to meet the Sikh general. He said that he would not allow her to take such a risk and held her hand tightly. But, Bibi Bano was adamant and also she pointed out that she had heard that the Guru's men (a reference to Sikh people who have ten gurus) always showed utmost respect to all women. Saying this she pushed Gul Khan aside and ran away from the cover of the bushes to the place where Hari Singh Nalwa's tent was setup. On approaching the tent she found that two Sikh guards were posted outside. The well armed Sikh guards on seeing her asked the purpose of her visit. So, Bibi Bano expressed her desire to meet the general. One of the guards noticed that she was carrying a dagger. But, the other guard told him not to worry and said that that all people were welcome to the Guru's home (a reference to the belief that the homes of all Sikh people are Guru's home) even if it happens to be an enemy with a weapon. Saying this informed the general and arranged an audience of Bibi Bano with him.

On entering the tent, Bibi Bano greeted the general with the words "Sat Sri Akal" (a greeting in Punjabi language which means God is the Ultimate Truth) and he greeted her with the same words. The general requested her to be seated and got seated himself. Bibi Bano then asked the general why he had conquered her land. Hari Singh Nalwa asked her with humility if it was wrong to defend one's own land ? He said that the Sikh people had only conquered this land so that they could defend their mother land. He said they had no interest in establishing any kingdom but that they only wanted to secure their people from the repeated invasions of the Lodhis and Pathans from Afghanistan. After this conversation they both discussed on lot of other topics. At the end of their conversation, Bibi Bano was very much impressed by the Sikh general. So, she mentioned to the general that it was her desire that if she has a son he should be like Hari Singh Nalwa. Put in other words, she expressed her desire to marry him.

Hearing this, the general became very offended and questioned her if she was trying to humiliate him? He said that all Guru's men were ordered to have only one wife by their Guru and they were asked to show respect and treat all other women as their sisters. He asked her to take leave immediately . As she was going out Bibi Bano snubbed him saying that she had heard that no person had ever left the Guru's court (or home) without have their wishes fulfilled. But, today this was proved wrong. Hearing her snub, the general became thoughtful and told her that if no one had ever left the Guru's home empty handed then neither will anyone leave the house of a Guru's Sikh (Sikh means Disciple) empty handed. Saying this he ordered the guards posted outside to get an expensive Shawl from the nearby tent. The guards brought the shawl and handed it over to Hari Singh Nalwa. He asked the guards to put the shawl around Bibi Bano. After this was done, the great Sikh general fell to the feet of Bibi Bano (touching feet of another person is a way of showing respect in Indian culture) and told her that from now on she was his Sworn Mother. He said that since she wanted her son to be like Hari Singh Nalwa then what better than Hari Singh Nalwa himself becoming her son.

Seeing his humility and greatness, Bibi Bano was so touched that she started crying. Tears rolled down her cheeks and could not stop weeping. She said that she was proud to be the Sworn Mother of a great person like Hari Singh Nalwa. Saying this she departed with her heart full of pride. And, while leaving she quietly proclaimed that if a normal Sikh was this great then how great would be their Guru ?

I hope we should all follow in the example of the great General and protect the dignity and honour of every woman. Please provide me your valuable feedback by writing your comments or sending me an email.

With Love,

Gunjan.

How E-Commerce is slowly killing Malls ?

Dear Readers,

Welcome back!!! It is great to see you again. Hope you are having a great day. Today, I want to discuss about How E-Commerce is slowly killing Malls and Why Malls may not be the best places to open your shop or start a new business in Bangalore anymore.

The Mall culture is a relatively new one in Bangalore. We had large shopping complexes when I was growing up in Bangalore. We had large shopping complexes like Gupta Market, Alankar Plaza, Jayanagar Shopping Complex, Utility building, Unity Building etc. We would get all sorts of clothes, shoes, food, toys, beauty products, travel bags, purses, perfumes, watches etc in these shopping complexes. But, there were no movie theaters in these shopping complexes. There were lot of single screen theaters in Bangalore in areas like Majestic, Malleswaram, Jayanagar etc. But, then came along the ingenious business idea to club the two things together. Hence, started the Mall culture in Bangalore in the late 90's with the advent of multiplexes inside large shopping complexes.

The Malls were much bigger and grander in scale than the largest shopping complexes in the city. People were excited to see the glittering lights and escalators. The well dressed house keeping staff added a very professional look to the area. There were all sorts of small and big restaurants also stacked into the same area. There were scary houses, bowling alleys, pubs,  paint ball, Gaming areas etc. People were lost for choice when it came to shopping for clothes. There were the world's best brands competing alongside with the local discount brands. There were numerous electronics stores as well. People could buy their dream TVs, Cameras, Refrigerators, Washing Machines, Cell Phones etc in these stores. There were also stores for beauty products, hair salons, massage parlors, coffee shops, ice cream parlors, toy stores, book shops all in the same mall. There were also Grocery stores and Vegetable outlets. In short, people were spoiled for choice. But, the icing on the cake were the multiplexes. You could now watch your favorite movies by booking them in advance over the internet. There was no longer any need to stand in long queues or pay for black tickets anymore. Someone had just brought the entire city together and placed it in a single mall.

Malls have been a successful business venture for almost two decades now. The success of this venture has grown like a wild fire in Bangalore. Now, we have malls in every major part of the city. In fact, we would rarely find a prominent area without a Mall these days. In fact, real estate people also promote their new apartments by saying that they are in the locality of a major Mall. But, then the days of every successful business venture are numbered. The down slide of this business has also started already. With the advent of E-Commerce people are getting great discounts on almost anything they purchase. Also, there is the ease factor of buying stuff without leaving the comfort of your home. With the middle man (read the show rooms or the mall stores) out of the picture warehouses are shipping products directly to the end user. There is no longer need for a retail store to sell the product. This new marketing model has hit the malls very badly.

You could argue that there are still so many people venturing into the malls. Yes, that is true. But, let's analyze which stores are these people actually visiting and what are these people actually buying ? Most malls have several budget restaurants. There are lot of affordable food chains like Mc Donald's, KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, Domino's Pizza etc in every mall. There is also a large food court and one or two affordable restaurants like Sagar, Kamat, Rajdhani etc in every mall. But, the maximum percentage of the people come for only the movies. Malls were mainly targeted for the middle class families. And, middle class people are the smartest buyers. They are the most careful people when it comes to handling their finances. Most of the people just window shop. Some smarter people planning to buy some phone or electronic product get a nice hands on or a demo from the mall retail store. But, they always either end up buying in the E-Commerce store or ask the retail store to reduce their price to match with the E-Commerce store. This trend has started to slowly kill the mall business.

Many shops are shutting down in Malls each day. In fact, maintenance cost of a mall is so huge owing to the 24*7 lighting, house keeping staff, security staff, business tax etc. Also, the malls are mostly empty on week days and generally have large number of visitors only over the weekends. There are many malls like Gopalan Sirsi Circle Mall, Magadi Road ETA Mall etc which have only got a multiplex along with few shops. Most of the mall is deserted and the shops are all shut down. The few open shops are having very few buyers and they are not able to afford the exorbitant mall rents. There are few new malls which are under construction since several years or where the construction has been abandoned owing to huge financial losses.

While nobody can predict the future of the mall business. But, it may not be a great idea to start a new shop or business in a mall without carefully evaluating the risks involved. The people will still continue to enjoy the multiplex experience and the fast food centers would also continue to be full. Maybe the business men now need to focus on what really the customers want ? Maybe opening multiple multiplexes in a single mall and increasing the fast food centers could help to revive their business. Also, people like to buy discounted clothes, beauty products etc. It may even be useful to have a Grocery store. After all, a profitable business is always the one which keeps up with the changing times.

I hope you all liked this article. Please send me your valuable feedback and I will be happy to reply back.

With Love,
Gunjan.

Campus Placement

Dear Readers,

Welcome back!!! It is great to see you again. I thank you for your continued support and encouragement.

Today, I want to discuss about my campus placement in my engineering college. I studied Computer Science engineering from VTU University in Bangalore. My college used to prepare us for campus recruitment during our sixth semester holidays. Since, most of the companies started visiting the campus from seventh semester holidays. We prepared for technical questions as well as in soft skills. After about a month's training, the companies started arriving to our college.

The first company which arrived was Infosys.  Infosys is one of the biggest Indian IT companies. It is a great company to join as a fresher. Since, the freshers are trained in a world class training center in Mysore. It paves a good platform to start one's career. The company arrived with several technical people and Human Resource professionals. The HRs explained about the company background and policies. After that there was the aptitude test and English verbal and non-verbal test.

I am good at aptitude questions. But, I used to take more time to solve questions in those days. However, I was relatively better at English. So, I solved a majority of the questions in the stipulated time. But, the competition is always tough. Since, it was a pool campus. In a poolcampus companies from several colleges participate in the campus placement. For this test, about six colleges had participated in theplacement. There were about five hundred students attending the test. And, each of the student was highly talented. So, the chances of selection were less.

After about an hour after the test, the company people started announcing the names of the selected candidates. The first name called was that of the topper girl from my department. Next, person was some other topper from another department. Slowly, about fifteen people in my class got selected for the next round. Unfortunately, I was not one of them.

I was very disappointed and heart broken. Since, I had worked very hard for the interviews. But, I was determined to perform better in my next interviews. The only disappointing thing was that next day my teacher asked in front of the whole class why I had not gotten selected ? I felt very embarrassed and did not know what to say. Also, the campus selection officer started showing too much attitude to students who had not gotten selected in the last placement.

Although, I felt sad that I was not selected in the previous company. I continued working harder for my next interview. My next interview was in a company called Perot. Later, this company was taken over by Dell. This company had shortlisted candidates who had secured 60% or more aggregate and who had never failed in any exam during the complete course. So, the shortlisted candidates were all very good and competition was again very tough. Even this time there was a pool campus but it was in some other college. After the regular exercise of explaining company policies the exam started. This exam was difficult as it had very complex technical questions and aptitude questions. After a few hours when the exam results were announced there was again disappointment in store for me. But, this time I did not feel as bad as last time. I was happy with my preparation and knew that if I continued working harder then definitely I would achieve success.

My next interview was in the same college. It was in a company called iGate. This is a US MNC which has recently been over taken by Capgemini. This company had raised the bar even higher. They demanded candidates with more than seventy percent aggregate. Also, the interview was difficult. In the first round we had to answer about fifteen questions. Also, no multi choice answer options were provided.

As the interview started I took a quick glance at the questions. I knew how to solve most of them. So, I quickly finished the test well within the stipulated time. After the exam, I was feeling relaxed. This time I did not feel any anxiety or stress.

When the results were announced, my name was called in the fourth place. I felt relieved. But, there was a long way to go still. There was still a technical round and a HR round remaining. One by one, the candidates were being called inside a room for technical interview. I was eager to attend this round and was feeling more excited than nervous. Somehow, I was not caring about the outcome but just was enjoying the interview. When my name was called I went with a quick pace and politely asked the interviewer if I could get in. After the informal courtsies were extended the interviewer started asking the questions. He asked me many complex C, C++, Operating Systems, Data Structures and questions from OOPS. He also asked me to code some programs. The interview lasted for about thirty minutes. It was quite intense.

As I stepped out of the room, there were few candidates having tea. They were accompanied by the HR. I greeted him and had tea. We had a casual conversation in which he asked about my college, hobbies etc. We also discussed about sports and movies.

The results came out after another one hour and out of three hundred people who had attended the interview only forty students were offered jobs. I was one among those few lucky students.

When I look back at this chapter of life I feel very nice. Although, a lot of hiccups and obstacles came in my life I always believed in myself. I continued working harder to achieve my goal and did not let negative people influence me. Finally, I tasted success. Perhaps, we should all believe in our abilities and not lose focus when we meet failures. We should pick ourselves in the face of adversity and remain focused on our goals. Like someone has said "God helps them those who help themselves".

I hope you liked this article. Please drop in your valuable feedback.

See you very soon again,

With Love,
Gunjan.

Diwali in the U.S. vs Diwali in India

Dear Friends,

Welcome back !!! Hope you are having a great weekend. With the festival of lights Diwali just round the corner I thought I would share my experience of celebrating Diwali in both India as well as in the U.S.

Diwali also called as Deepavali or the festival of lights is among the major festivals in the Indian calendar. It is a very popular festival in India quite similar to the popular Christmas festival in the Western countries. On this occasion, men dress up in Kurta Pyjamas and women dress up in beautiful Salwar Kameez or Sarees. The houses are decorated with beautiful light lamps and decorative lights. The courtyards are decorated with colorful Rangoli designs. People visit their near and dear ones and exchange greetings, sweets, fire crackers and gifts.

As a kid, my preparation of Diwali used to start a good one month in advance. The Dushera or Dasara festival falls normally in the month of October. And, Diwali falls generally towards the end of October or beginning of November. Me and my friends used to buy toy pistols which would have a fire cracker roll. We would run through the streets playing chor (thief in Hindi) police. We would take a packet of bijli (small size fire crackers) and fling the crackers with bare hands pretending it to be some small bomb. We used to burst lots of variety of sound crackers like Lakshmi bomb, Hydrogen bomb (this was the loudest), butterfly crackers etc. Then we used to fly rockets with lights, whistle and multi sounds at night. In short, we used to have a great amount of fun. Just like Bilbo Baggins and his hobbit friends in the Lord of the Rings movie we would act like little Imps running here and there and enjoy the festival.

From the past few years, I have started using crackers that sparkle more and make little or no sound. We bring home sparklers, flower pots, pencil sparklers etc. Also, we have stopped bringing crackers that cause lot of smoke or pollution. We perform Lakshmi pooja (praying in Hindi) on the day of Diwali and pray to god to dispel evil through light.

A couple of years back, I was in Atlanta city in the U.S. for work. I was invited by a colleague to his home to celebrate Diwali with his family. I was very happy that I would not feel alone on this happy occasion. Since, Diwali is not a holiday in the U.S. I had to go to work. When I reached office in the morning, I was surprised to see that the entire floor was decorated with light lamps and beautiful rangoli colors. I came to know that our company had recently started celebrating all the global festivals to make the employees happy and to promote cross cultural awareness. I was very happy and looked forward to celebrating Diwali with my colleague's family in the evening.

In the evening, my colleague picked me up in his car and took me to his home. A few of my other colleagues had assembled at his place with their families. We were served a great dinner by my colleague's wife who was an exceptional cook. After the desserts, we decided to light some fire crackers. Now, my expectation of fire crackers was like some rockets, sparklers, flower pots, 100 wala ladi (bunch of 100 bijli crackers tied together like dynamite sticks). But, my expectations were diffused when my colleague said that we could not light all those crackers due to various restrictions in the U.S. So, we had to be contend with lighting a sparkler and posing for pictures. My colleagues seemed little scared when the neighbors opened their doors and started seeing us. They also seemed little too anxious about the smoke as it could cause fire alarms. Their tension caused us to miss the regular fun which we have back home.

My colleague also narrated an incident that accidentally they had burst a fire cracker. And, instead of just sparkling it had caused a huge explosion. So, my colleagues and their families had got scared out of their wits and ran away from that place. They were afraid that the cops would question them or the neighbors would complain to the police. They said that only few temples had the permission to light fireworks. Also, there were some public grounds where they could burst the fireworks.

After lighting the sparklers we returned to my colleague's home where we started playing cards. Playing cards on the day of Diwali is very popular in India. And, although we did not gamble with money. But, we were just playing for fun. I returned to my hotel room at around 1.30 am in the morning. I was feeling lot of mixed emotions. I was happy that I was so warmly hosted by my colleague. But, still I was missing my family. Also I was missing the freedom of bursting fireworks on the streets and making merry without the fear of my neighbors calling the police.

I believe initiatives like my company promoting awareness about festivals from other countries are very important. It would help the people to understand each others cultures and respect them. After all, we are all children of the same God. We need to care for and love each other.

I wish all of you a very happy Diwali and may the Goddess Lakshmi bring peace, prosperity and lots of joy in your lives.

With Love,
Gunjan.

An Exemplary Teacher

Dear Readers,

Welcome back!!! I hope you are all having a great day. It is a beautiful evening in Bangalore while I am writing today's blog. Today, I will be talking about an exemplary teacher Mr. Shankar. I had the privilege of studying under this great teacher.

Mr. Shankar is a lecturer of Graphics Drawing for engineering students. He had been a senior faculty in the famous R.V.C.E. Engineering college in Bangalore with several years of experience. He also has a coaching center in Prashanth nagar area. It is a very famous coaching center and engineering students from all over the city come to study here.

In the first year of engineering, students from all the branches have a common subject called Engineering Graphics. It is a mechanical engineering subject where we need to draw engineering structures in three dimensions. It was an interesting subject. But, it required more attention to detail and imagination. Also, it was a very tricky subject as we were only supposed to draw structures and there were no theory questions to fill pages. When my lecturer at college used to teach this subject I used to find it very difficult to follow him. He would say imagine there is a line in space. How would represent this line in three dimensional space using two points. He would then go on to explain the orthographic projections. I have always had problem in imagining and visualizing images in my mind. So, imagining complex engineering drawings was beyond the question.

After a month of futile struggle with this subject and getting low marks in my first internals I decided to do join a good coaching center. I came to know about Mr. Shankar's coaching center from some of my classmates who were already enrolled there. Now, this coaching center is unlike most other places. It is a one man army run whole and solely by Mr. Shankar. I joined his coaching class and was lucky to be enrolled as there are limited seats in each batch due to the huge popularity of this coaching center.

Although Mr. Shankar is a senior aged person but he is very energetic. He used to conduct classes for at least  three to four batches every day. Each batch was around two to three hours in duration. Each batch had around a hundred students. But, he still extended courtesy to each student and addressed them respectfully and answered each of our questions with utmost patience. He was a brilliant man who had mastered this subject. He had invented his own methods and formulas for drawing. He never once asked us to close our eyes and imagine. Rather he would break the problem into separate parts and device a method to solve each part one at a time in a mathematical fashion. In short, I was thrilled to be studying this complex subject under this great man. The subject which was seeming impossible now suddenly was making a lot of sense.

There were a few incidents during the course of my six months of studying under him which made me appreciate his personality. Once during the middle of a session, we were interrupted by a student standing in the door way. He requested to speak to the lecturer. Mr. Shankar went out and spoke to this student. Since, I was close to the door I could overhear their conversation. The boy said that he was a poor student and he could not afford to pay the tuition fees. But, he was very interested to attend the classes. Mr. Shankar welcomed him immediately and asked him to attend the class and forfeited all his tuition fees.

I was also very surprised that many of my college lecturers used to attend his classes. I also came to know later that lecturers from many other colleges also came to attend his classes. Since, many of their own students were also in the same class. A few of the lecturers used to feel a little embarrassed. So, Mr. Shankar used to conduct a separate batch for these lecturers so that they would not feel embarrassed.

Since, Mr. Shankar was one of the most senior lecturers in the VTU university on this subject he was invited by the university for setting the exam papers and also to find out any problems with the examination questions. Once it so happened that a very tough paper was set by the university and a lot of students had obtained very less marks. There was one question of around twenty marks which was strongly considered as an incorrect problem with mistakes by majority of the students. This was brought to the attention of the university. So, they invited Mr. Shankar and few other senior lecturers to discuss about this question. One of the lecturers told the university board that this was an incorrect question and was impossible to solve. The University accepted their mistake and gave grant marks to all students who had attempted this question. So, many students were able to clear their exams and saved repeating another year. Later, Mr. Shankar revealed that he knew how to solve this problem and although it was a complicated question he kept quiet during the discussion in the interest of the career of several students.

During the last course of coaching an unfortunate incident happened. Mr. Shankar's dad passed away. So, we did not have coaching classes for a couple of weeks. The final examinations were only a couple of weeks away and there some important syllabus still left to be covered. All the students were left in a fix. But, Mr. Shankar sensed this and the dedicated teacher that he was, he came to the class with eyes swollen and wiping his tears and started conducting the classes even in that sad situation. He even politely answered a student's phone call during the class and explained to him politely as to why the classes were not conducted for the last two weeks. I was very stunned and awestruck by his humble and exemplary attitude.

Mr. Shankar used to learn new subjects every year in order to try and help as many students as possible. I salute my teacher from the bottom of my heart. My highest marks in engineering were scored in this subject. This goes to show that how a great teacher can make any subject interesting and give his students valuable lessons for life.

I hope you all liked this article. I would love to hear your feedback. You can drop me your comments or send me a mail.

With Love,
Gunjan

Why people end up in huge debts by over usage of credit cards ?

Dear Readers,

It is great to see you again!!! I hope you had a lovely weekend. It was my birthday this Friday and we had a nice family get together. The kids as usual had lot of fun and it was a nice evening.

Today, I want to discuss about the disturbing trend of over usage of credit cards. The credit cards were invented by Banks as a means of a quick loan. Most people who were in need of some urgent money used to use the credit card. It served as a great financial scheme for making purchases or for shopping and helped to prevent the burden of handling cash.

But, over a period of time the credit card is being overused by people. The market group of young people between the ages of 18 to around 35 are mostly under huge debt these days. This is a direct result of instant purchases made without proper planning. Most salaried people these days complain that all their salary gets over within the first four or five days of the month.

How is this happening ? This is due to big financial mismanagement. These days everywhere we see that there is a huge sale happening. Every big e-commerce company or retail store keeps showing up advertisements with huge sales with great discount. These sales maybe authentic as the discounts are for real. But, what we have to decide really is whether we actually need what we are purchasing.

Just because someone has a huge sale going on should I go and purchase a new expensive TV or a washing machine. It maybe that I already have a good television at home. Also, this irresponsible shopping trend is mostly visible while purchasing smart phones, tablets and laptops. Every year a big company launches a new product. Now, just to look trendy and to keep up with other people in our social circle we go and purchase that expensive phone or tablet. It looks cool to flaunt the newest phone on the market for the first few days as lot of people are in awe. But, what after a few months ? Who cares ? Now, really was this is a good choice ? What is the cost of reselling this product ? If I am right, it is not even 50% of the actual purchase cost just after the first year.

It may even be possible that this latest phone or tablet is of no great use to us. We may not even know how to use all the features of our current phone or tablet. Then, why go and purchase something if we do not really need it ?

Also, everyone these days wants to travel the whole world. Movies which show that the world is ending is creating a sort of panic in the people. So, they want to borrow money from banks and see the world. They think that they have their whole lives to earn money. This is a very wrong notion. We have to remember that most companies do not offer pension schemes to their employees. The savings that we can make in our age group of 20 to 50 years is what would be helping us for our retirement.

I am not implying that we should stop enjoying and only save money. But, I am suggesting that we should save enough and make purchases only when necessary. If we get carried away by every single advertisement and start buying stuff indiscriminately that we really do not need then definitely we will end up in a financial crisis. So, be smart and make small investments. Always remember to strike the right balance and have your own game plan to be a smart buyer.

I hope you liked this article. I would love to hear back from you. You can write down your comments or drop me a mail.

With my Best Regards and Love,
Gunjan

Celebrating three decades of my existence

Dear Friends,

Welcome back!!!! Lovely to see you again. I am writing this article on the eve of my 30th birthday.

So, today I will share with you all my fond birthday memories from my childhood. As a kid I used to look forward to my birthday. I would ask my mom every day how many days were left for my birthday :-)

The reason was that I would become very rich on my birthday. I used to get very nice clothes and toys. Since, I was from a middle class family my parents would not be able to afford to buy me expensive gifts throughout the year. But, they would make sure that on my birthday I would be treated like a king. My mom would cook my favorite dishes and desserts.

I remember my elder sister bought me a He-Man action figure on my sixth birthday. I was so fond of this toy that I kept it safely for many years. Once I got a nice car (not a remote controlled toy which was still out of reach for me). I was playing car racing with my friends when accidentally my friend sat on the car and it got smashed. I remember how badly I wept that day knowing that I would not get another toy till next year.

There were lot of things that I wanted as a kid like a cycle but we could not afford to buy these things. However, I thank God that he gave me so many things even without me asking for them. It helped me to learn the real value of all the things in life.

He gave me a wonderful mom. She used to dress me up for school, cook for me, help me in my homework and do a million other things for me. My father always took care of all the financial burden of the house and always made sure that my studies continued without any problems.My elder sister always loved me and introduced me to the magical world of books. He also gave me wonderful cousin sister and uncle and aunt. As a kid I was too naive to understand the value of these people. Luckily, today I realize this and I want to thank all of them for being with me whenever I needed them the most.

I would also like to thank all the readers for supporting and encouraging me.

With love,
Gunjan