Kuldaivat

 Last  week, I went to my hometown – Shiroda. My hometown is close to Goa and has a beautiful virgin beach lined with casuarinas and coconut trees.It is a place of considerable childhood memories for me -Long idyllic summers spent with hordes of cousins who arrived from Mumbai to enjoy the sun, the sand, the mangoes, jammuns, jackfruits, tender coconuts and a lot of fish.

Last week, once again everybody arrived at Shiroda. The occasion was the bi-annual celebration of our family deity or Kuldaivat(Shree Sarangdhar). This tradition has been carried for more than 150 years. The story goes that my ancestors who stayed then in Goa fled into Maharashtra because the Christian missionaries tried to convert Hindus to Christianity. It is said that these missionaries threw bread in the well and the Hindus in those time believed that if they drank the water from these wells they would be converted to Christianity. And, so my ancestors fled into Maharashtra with meagre belongings and the statues of the family deity.

Some of them settled in Shiroda and some of them in a neighbouring village. Every two years, the  birthday of the family deity is celebrated. And so the descendants of the family come together. They come from Mumbai, Pune, Goa for the celebration. The family members have built a beautiful marble temple with contributions from all. On this day, food and other offerings are sent to the temple by every family and villagers are invited to participate. At night, a theatre group is called which stages a comedy play next to the temple.

In the evening, an elder family member prays to the Kuldaivat on behalf of all. Each member of the family comes forward and requests him to pray on their behalf – it could be for a child, a daughter’s long pending marriage, a good job. As the elder says the prayer, all present say ’ Hoy Maharaja’ to show their support towards the prayer. There is a sense of joy and camaraderie as everybody joins in unison.

I can’t help marvelling at the wisdom of my ancestors in setting this tradition to celebrate the kuldaivat’s birthday. It has certainly kept the family together for more than a century and through generations.

On the third day of my journey we went to Pernem, Goa to visit Shree Bhagwati Devi’s temple. She is the Kuldaivat of my husband’s family. On every important occasion in the family, we remember and pray to her. This time, I visited her with children after nearly two years. Last couple of years were very difficult for me with the PhD studies, the job and the demands that are placed by growing children. Often, I would fall short of strength – both physical and emotional. At such times, I would pray to her for strength and the ability to help me successfully see through this phase.

This time, as I stood before the goddess, her large luminous eyes glowed.  Was it just my imagination- or did her eyes really glow with pride and satisfaction at me. Like that of a mother welcoming a triumphant child.

I left the temple feeling blessed !!

Less than perfect

I must admit I am a perfectionist at heart...

I want to make a success of everything I do. If I were to take up a project, I want to deliver it to perfection; If I  have to make a presentation I want it to be perfect. I think a lot and from different perspectives to turn out a perfect piece of work.

But I am realizing that it is okay sometimes to not  be perfect.... 

During my daughter's term exams, there was a part of her studies which was difficult and would require a lot more practice. The day before the exams, we were short of time and there was no time to revise. While I stressed about it, my daughter saw no reason to do so. She said if there were questions on that chapter they would at the most carry two - three marks.It was okay not to get full marks in one exam - what's the big deal she said.

Got me thinking - really what was the big deal? If she did not get full marks and she was less than perfect in her third grade what really was the big deal. I guess, I am learning to be cool from the kids :).

Sometimes, the imperfections lend beauty and charm. My son, when he was a kid would love to dine at hotels and appreciated the good food. Now as a young teenager, I find he loves to eat at home. Even his most favorite dishes, he insists I cook it for him. While I can cook the dishes, I am sure they are far from perfect and perhaps nothing close to what is available in the restaurant. But he relishes the less than perfect dishes at home.

At office, I see sometimes the upcoming managers do work which is less than perfect. It is not well rounded, all perspectives are not well thought out, but the  innovative approach, underlying passion and good intentions shine through. And I am impressed...


Over the years I have also realized, that most times, conditions are not perfect whether at home or office. In any situation, I have learnt to identify that which can change and that which cannot be changed. I have learnt to accept that which cannot be changed.


It is the less than perfect conditions that bring out the best in us.

There is no education like adversity

There is no education like adversity - Benjamin Disraeli

Recently, I learnt the role of adversity in bringing up children.

I have a young lady-Suchi in my team whom I find remarkable in many ways. I find that at a young age, she has the ability to review a situation, size up the challenges, make decisions  and move ahead. She is very well organized and plans her tasks well. Apart from this, she is very balanced, collaborates well with others and has the ability to make non-issues out of issues. Needless to add, she has quickly become a valuable team member.

Three months back, Suchi lost her father quite suddenly.

Obviously,  it was a big blow to her. After she resumed back at work,  over our early morning 'chai', she often recounted memories of her father and her growing years. While it helped her healing process, for me - they were big lessons in parenting.

Her father had suffered a major accident when her tenth standard year had just started. He was in hospital for a few months. He recovered from the accident but had to leave his job.  Since her mother was not working, this naturally put a strain on the family's finances. Suchi had a younger brother and this adversity suddenly made her a responsible elder in the family.

She often recounts how she learnt to organize finances, manage banking transactions and take overall responsibility in the house. Over the next couple of years, the family learnt to manage with limited resources. All major decisions in the family were taken keeping the children's education at the highest priority.

After completing her engineering degree and starting to work, the financial situation improved. This event had made Suchi realize the need for financial security and she systematically invested in gold, bought a house in a far off suburb and saved for her marriage expenses. She proudly told me once how she did all the property transactions on her own. Later she married a colleague in her first job, had a daughter, bought another house with her husband. Her parents and brother (who in the meantime, also completed engineering and started working) sold off their old house and took a flat in her building to help her with bringing up her young daughter.

Suchi always had tremendous support of her parents - throughout her difficult pregnancy, her child's growing years, whenever she needed to travel for office work. Her parents have always been there for her and her husband. She often told me how much pride her father took in his daughter's achievements and how much both the grandparents enjoyed bringing up the granddaughter.

Suchi's story to me has valuable lessons in parenting for all of:

(1) While all of us want the best for our children and try to clear all the hurdles in their path; here was an example of how adversity had helped shape Suchi's personality. It gave her lessons in planning, foresight and focus that no B.school could teach. 

(2) Suchi's parents may not have been able to provide financially very well for the children but they made sure that all their efforts and money was prioritized towards the children's upbringing. This made sure that the children were even more focused towards education and career. The children knew that they needed to succeed and bring happiness to their parents. Her parents compensated for the lack of finances with a lot of love, attention, support and confidence in their children's abilities. 


Compare this to the situation around us today. We see many rich and well-to-do families send their children to the best of schools and colleges with the power of money, provide children with branded goods and provide for costly tuition's. They compensate for their lack of attention with all that money can buy. We also often hear and read about children from well to do families who go astray, loose ambition and even while away their life. 

(3) Suchi once told me that after this particular incident, she has not been fazed by any other problem in life. Every other problem seemed trivial as compared to what she went through. I think she also learnt valuable lessons in how families need to stay together in the face of adversity, prioritize on the most important things of life and help each other succeed. 

As for her parents, what better rewards in the autumn of their life- than to see their children turn into fine and capable young people who will pass on these values to the next generation.

To the Women in my life

Today on Woman's day, I want to pay a tribute to the many women who have made a deep impression on me.

Ofcourse, the list has to start with my mother. She started working immediately after matriculation at 17 with a Government office  to support her family of three sisters and one brother. Married at the young age of 20, and a young mother at 21. I was her firstborn and my sister came five years later and the youngest son another two years later. What was remarkable, was that my father encouraged my mother to continue education after marriage and even while working and with three children, she managed to complete her postgraduate studies. Some of my early childhood memories are of my mom locking herself in a room to study because the three of us tried to trouble her. While she completed her post graduation, she never tried to climb the career ladder till I got married and the other two were well in college. I think she sacrificed on this front to ensure that she did not neglect her family responsibilities. My father passed away fifteen years back and while I was married, the younger two were still to settle down. Looking back, I realize how important her support was to all of us through our life struggles. Often, I reach out to her on phone to talk about the turmoil in my mind and feel much better after talking to her. Many a times, I have realized many of her friends and relatives do the same with her.

Another woman in my life, from whom I learnt much is perhaps my mother-in -law. The key lesson I learnt from her was how to economize on the household front; how to run the house with a limited budget and yet ensuring everybody's needs were very well met. I got first hand lessons on financial planning from her which will stay with me for a lifetime.

There were many women who impressed me over the years- My maid of fourteen years who looked after my kids and who worked herself a lot with the dream of making her son an educated man, an elderly professor who did her Phd along a corporate job and then got into teaching (my inspiration to do the PhD), my sister who has managed to use her creativity to run a successful business from home, a neighboring woman who spent an entire year trying to nurse her sick husband back to health, a very successful estate agent with whom I interacted and realized that behind her successful professional face was a  mother trying to cope up with a young son with Attention Deficit Syndrome(ADS). I often meet women trying to cope with difficult in-laws, difficult husbands, trying to balance home and work, striving to be financially independent, striving to give time to their children, trying to give support to loved ones, trying to nurture their talents and dreams, trying to grow wings, competing against men and outwitting them and all the time striving to find the balance between all the different worlds before them.

I also learn all the while from the young one at home growing into a young lady with her own heart and mind. I realize, she too will one day face the real world  and perhaps realize that the world is not as rosy as her idealistic mind would want it to be. But, I also know that she will find the courage and the will to face the world on her own terms.

Happy Women's Day !!!

Life is simple

I love doing the mundane chores..

I love making the beds, cleaning the cobwebs, hanging out the clothes, folding them neatly and keeping them in their proper places. In fact, after a hard day at office I appreciate the chance to do these mundane chores.

Some people find it surprising. But, I like doing these little things because it helps remind me that life is actually simple.

No doubt, Our metro lives and competitive careers have made our lives complex and stressful. We are continuously running, stressing and worrying about doing everything right and being successful. 

But life is actually meant to be simple. 

We need food, we need shelter, we need to educate our children and we need to grow and learn. To do this, we need to work and we need to earn. Sometimes, we forget this simple truth and end up working ourselves for all the wrong reasons - to buy a bigger house, to have a foreign vacation, to get one up over our competitors. We want to get it right and perfect and want to portray a successful image.

Not only do we stress ourselves, but we also stress our children and want them right from childhood to be role models of success. Many parents stress their children over studies and push them to their limits.

But, we have forgotten that life is actually simple- it is about satisfying our basic needs, about taking care of our loved ones, giving them support,  and appreciating the good things of life. It is about growing ourselves not only professionally, financially and intellectually but also about growing spiritually, in spirit and grace and in generosity. 

The next time we stress ourselves, we need to rethink our priorities. It is important to put our best efforts in everything we do, we also need to  keep motivating ourselves to achieve higher goals - but, we need to ensure that we maintain balance in all the areas of our life.


And, sometimes it is okay to not be perfect and to not win the game. It is okay to lie low, mull over what went right and what went wrong, re-energize our batteries, set new goals, take some risks and set out once again with renewed energies.


Confucius had once said 'Life is simple'. It is-based on the attitude we adopt.

God exists..

There are multiple times when I send out silent prayers to god and marvel at how they get answered...

Today was one such day.

My college going son called up in the afternoon to say that he needed to submit an assignment and he had forgotten to take it to college. ' Can you please check out my cupboard and keep it ready.. I will come home in the next ten minutes, pick it back and rush back to college'. And so I searched for his assignment papers but could not find it. When he reached home, both of us searched once again but could not find it. He had to rush back to college to give a presentation; so I told him I would continue to search for the assignment.  I searched high and low but could not find the papers and silently  sent out a prayer to god.

Half an hour later, as I sat at my laptop; I received a call from my mobile operator to check whether I had made a payment on my bill that was due. I said I had given a check on the previous day to the person they sent to pick it up. The caller asked me if I could give him the receipt number. The receipt was in my bag and as I took out the receipt, I happened to see the book I had carried to office on the previous day. To my surprise, the assignment papers were in the book. Probably, yesterday when carrying the book to office I had not realized that the papers were in there.

I gave the receipt number and closed the call and once again checked the assignment papers. All of them were very much there. I called up my son and told him about the papers. Had it not been for the call from the mobile operator, I would not have thought of checking in my bag for the assignment papers. 

I marveled at how God had answered my prayers. 


There have been multiple times, when I have had this feeling that God had helped me out. That somebody was watching over me and helping me.There have been times, when in my mind I am searching for answers and those answers come to me in the form of a conversation with somebody, or through something I see on television or something I read . 


And there are also times when I want things to go a certain way, but they are delayed or don't happen the way I want them to happen. Often enough, I have realized when things don't turn out the way I wanted them to happen it is because it was not right for me in the first place - that; I was meant to take a different path(most times, a higher path without narrow or petty considerations). There is a lesson in it for me to learn. 


And so I accept his will.. It teaches me acceptance and helps face the highs and lows of life with balance and equanimity.

Green and Sustainability

In recent times, Green and  Sustainability have become corporate buzzwords. Organizations take great pride and interest in aligning to such strategies. But, I often think Green and Sustainability have to become a philosophy that we once again must adopt to.

I say once again, because in earlier times people led simple lives where environment conservation was part of the lifestyle.

When I was a young child, my grandparents encouraged us to write on black slates and practice the newly learnt alphabets and numbers. When I started going to school I saw the other children write on notebooks. I did not like writing on slate since I thought it was unfashionable. Today we are told to save paper - this in turn would help in saving the trees. I realize how effective slates were in keeping the environment green.

Milk was delivered in glass bottles and cloth or jute bags were used to carry the items purchased from the market. Today, even a little bit of effort on our part could help in saving tons of plastic usage. And yet most of us do not bother to make that additional effort.


In earlier times, Banana leaves were used to lay a good meal. Marriages where hundreds of people would eat were served on well stitched leaf plates. However, today eating out of leaf plates  would be considered de'classe; so what if it helps to save a lot of water - who cares ?


Clothes, Textbooks used by the elder siblings were passed down to the younger ones. Unused papers from notebooks were stitched to make good rough working notebooks. This was considered a sign of prudence and not lack of money. People mainly used public transport. Taxis, autos were rarely used and only the very rich indulged in cars. Today having a car is considered a necessity. The roads are full of traffic, Fuel prices are continuously increasing and the environment is polluted. To counter that, everybody is trying to promote car pooling!!

Earlier, Indians believed in simple living and high thinking. This meant minimalistic living, careful utilization of resources, preserving things for the long term along. We believed in spending on what was really important.

In today's times, we believe in having an entire wardrobe of branded clothes, shoes, watches. We get quickly tired of using the same things and don't believe in using any of them for the long term. We buy things which help in establishing our status symbol. And to meet our growing needs(or is it greed ?) we even take loans.

And then we champion for green and sustainability...

Perhaps our forefathers were far ahead of us in terms of sustainability and also sensibility!!