Nursery admission and us!

Tomorrow is a very important day for us, we are finally going to get our daughter admitted to nursery. It may sound funny to some and familiar to some of you, what I can guarantee is that the people whom this sound funny have never been close vicinity of a 3-5 year old kid.

I am not sure about the other cities in India but in Delhi, getting admission to a "good" nursery school is a pain at all the wrong places. I think we were lucky to see our daughter get through more than a couple of schools. Once you get through a school the next step is more painful, getting ready and paying through your nose. Take this, the average admission fee of any school here is 50K to 90K and then you have to pay quarterly fee of anything from 15K to 30K. The books, dress, shoes, etc etc are on the top of this amount.

My sense is there is something fundamentally wrong with our education system, the primary problem being confusion between the school and govt laid processes, another being no transparency in the admission process. Noone is sure of the final criteria and the no. of points you would have got as a parent. My worse experience was with a school which asked for grandparent's education qualification, my and wife's yearly income, our 3 year ITR, the car we drive and if we live in a owned or a rented house.

I hate to say that the whole system stinks, but are we ready to stand up and say a firm NO. Unfortunately, the answer is a firm NO.

Reincarnation of my blog!!!

It's been really really long since I last came here. The last year has been quite amazing in all sense of the word :) I changed my job in Aug'09 and joined the whole new world of Management Consulting, at least I thought it was the whole new world ;) It is quite different from the world i have been used to for the last 4 yrs at IBM, the first and the foremost was the personal life which took the hit! I was used to WFH atleast 3 days a week while at IBM, my family was so used to seeing them at home. These days I have to go to office everyday, sometimes on Saturday as well.

Of course, my online life took a beating as well, Post coming back from the long rip to the US in May,I hardly got any time for the blog posts. My friends have been pestering me to write stuff, updates, etc...but honestly, no time at all. I have so much to say, so much to share, I guess I need some serious sessions on time management.

Anyways, new job brought new challenges and new learnings of course. Some of it has been overwhelming and very difficult to cope with at times. Having said that, I am very exited and anxious...to learn, to contribute, to make a positive change, so copy book.

I will try and keep my bog alive, I hate to see it stale and would try and make sure there are some updates. Look forward to the excitement and happy blogging!!

Transition: From College to Corporate

I went through a 2 day training at my workplace recently (Building Relationship Versatility) and today I read a nice article on Rediff, and it prompted me to think...and go back in life. I have changed a lot from what I was as a person, an individual from my college days. I was an introvert, very shy and would never dare to initiate a conversation. I was almost scared (well, almost!) to strike a conversation with the opposite sex (blush!!!). Things have changed, and may I add for better...

In the training, I was categirized as a "Driver" or essentially a leader. I am also now seen as an extrovert from people around me (I asked this question recenetly to a group of coworkers). Working in a corporate environment and being successful (or atleast thinking am successful) gives me confidence to approch people, strike a chord and initiate a conversation (and thereby a relationship).

I am pretty confident of the fact that most of us go through these tranitions. Life teaches us a lot and so does our environment, our workplace.

You can read the full article here: http://www.rediff.com/getahead/2008/feb/04coll.htm