Staying Alive

Within a span of just four months into my pursuit, I have made more mistakes than I have made for as long as I could remember. Blame it on the break-neck fast paced life with no excuses for errors. Thats the MBA life, thats the professional life, but I have learnt so much from them, where each time I did/do something stupid, I took a time-off to reset my life. This is not the story, like that Chetan Bhagat's book, these are not the mistakes of my entire life, as I have been into bigger unmentionable shitholes, but they are making me to live, and not letting me to live. Contradictory..well I am a Gemini!

Four months, four mistakes, three of them are my own fault, one of them, perhaps that could be the most profound, it is not my fault...or thats what I think. But it is not anyone's fault either, but it is still a huge problem for me. But for the other three problems, there is a common theme running through it. "I can handle anything." Trust me, that wasn't the story until the last 5 years, some freak incident changed my belief system. From a guy who was always nervous and worried about anything and everything, I became someone who believed that everything happens for good,..worse..that I could get out of any pickle. Now thats all and fine, but problem started when I subconsciously let most of the situations get into a pickle because I kept thinking...well..to quote Barney Stinson.."I am Awesome."

Apparently, I am not...at least not as awesome BS is. BS here is Barney Stinson...clever huh. When I asked myself, why I shouldn't make mistakes, my mind posed me a different question: "Why aren't people trying to make mistakes. " The mistake here, which I should clarify, will affect oneself and not the others. A doctor or a  judge shouldn't make an error in his profession. But the kind I am talking about, only you are affected. Now that I have clarified, let me move on.

Almost everyone I know, is so scared of mistakes. No one wants to be around them. No one wants to admit them. No one wants to try them. It is so very true, that you learn a lot from your mistakes. You can be luckily correct. But you are never wrong by luck. There are others who fret about their mistakes and let them be defined by'em. There are others, who accept that they have made a mistake and move on. And then there are the successful bunch, who commit, admit it, learn from it, and try to not repeat it. History has taught that they have done well. Try out new things. As I always say, there is only one way to find out whether something will actually work; by actually doing it. Try it, the journey is exhilarating. The more mistakes you make, the more confident you get about yourself. Your mistakes is the testimony that you believed in yourself and decided to bet on yourself. if you can't do that for yourself, don't expect anyone else to do it for you.

Aaaaand then the fourth category, those who seem to make the mistake coz well, they can. Yours truly is dabbling with the fourth category now.May be, I am trying to compensate for the insanely boring guy I have been since I was a kid. I have begun to explore, and the more you want to do, the more you make. It is indeed stupid to repeat them, but given the sheer number of stupid things I am doing, they repeat. They aren't identical...but they are similar. Now I am intentionally not specifying what mistakes I had made so far, definitely not the fourth! But that has been the most memorable and most exciting mistake so far. My mistakes, the results of my escapades, my penchant to look "over-the cliff", and my itch to look on the other side, have made my life in this new country more memorable and fun.


P.S:
As I am writing this blog, I got out of the first one. I am awesome...

Stupidonymous

I love my name a lot...it is short and sweet (??). Easy to remember, and as I found in many cases, it is also easy to pronounce even by people not from the same cultural background. But when they ask what my FULL name is, that is when the trouble starts.

You see, till my tenth grade, my name had gone under a multitude of evolution (no numerological or astrological reasons btw) to get to a point where I can write my name with a constant spelling, and took painstaking measures to have the same name in all school records. From Md. Riaz -> Mohd. Riyazudeen -> Mohamed Riazudeen -> Mohammed Riyazuddin -> Mohammed Riazuddin. This name was great, I thought, and I begin to practice my signature with this specific spelling with my dad's initials A.G. (the reason behind my "silver") at the front. Things were fine, not so much so when I appear for the exams (think CAT), where I had to shade my full name in all those ovals. But it wasn't until I wished to apply for passport my troubles started. You know that the passport requires a last name to be filled. In our community, there is no concept of last name. A person just has a name, with no links whatsoever to the family name, mother's name, dad's name or whatever. We were never the "Mr. & Mrs. Sharma" types. So when I required a last name, I went the "western" way by expanding my initials and putting them after my name. Got the passport as "Mohammed Riazuddin Abdul Gaffoor" a name with 32 characters  including space, the significance I didn't realize until I got my job at Verizon.

It seems like many of the systems have a limit of 30 characters for name. So at VZ, I was given Mohammed as first name, Riazuddin as last name, with Abdul as middle name. Even my id card said I was "Mohammed" and I was being called by that. It was very different at the start, as in my then 22 years of existence, I was never addressed as Mohammed. So every time I was addressed as such, I took the pain to correct then and there.."hey you can call me riaz." But over the period of time, all was well, and since I made many "public appearances" my peers knew how to call me.

All was well, until I started to apply for colleges in US. Again the problem, I was called as Mohammed. What's worse, my name started to get cut as my whole name wasn't fitting in many of the application systems. I was Mohammed somewhere...Riaz...or just Abdul Gaffoor. I heaved a huge sigh of relief when my university (UGA) began asking whats my preferred name is, and I very happily replied, "Riaz."

Problem over, no! In my SSN, my name was cut, Riazuddin became Riazudd...and only god knows where these details would be propagated. Add to that, while introducing to my peers, I go, "hey my name is M..R...A..G.. but you can call me Riaz." I lost them at "M...." Then one day came where I had to give what name I wanted to put on my business cards and resumes, and after much deliberation (unfortunate people who were with me when I deliberated know how bad it was) of Mohammed Riazuddin, Riaz Abdul Gaffoor, AG Mohammed Riazuddin, Superman(??), ...I FINNALLYY became Riaz Gaffoor. This ain't my official name as that is still what is in my SSN, but for everything else, the US will now know me as Riaz Gaffoor. Sorry mom, sorry dad, but you shoulda asked me what name I wanted before you kept one!

Rumination

• Tried unsuccessfully to fit my 27 years of existence in 2 bags. Said to myself, "I can't believe I am doing this..."
• Bid a final goodbye to my erstwhile home. Said to myself, "I can't believe I am doing this..."
• Walked away from the airport visitors counter to a place after which I would be so far away from my dear parents and friends. Said to myself, "I can't believe I am doing this..."
• Boarded the plane with a very heavy heart for a long journey. Said to myself, "I can't believe I am doing this..."
• Called home after landing in Franfurt, asked whats for dinner, only to realize that I won't be there. Said to myself, "I can't believe I am doing this."
• Landed in Atlanta Airport. Waiting for the bags to come on the belts, and after getting them, momentarily waited subconsciously to check whether there is anyone for company. Realized that I am all alone, walked towards a shuttle to Athens, saying to myself, "I can't believe I am doing this..."
•  Moved into my apartment, my empty apartment, and slept on the carpet floor amidst bugs and roaches. Said to myself, "Can't believe I am doing this...". (Bought a sleeping bag immediately)

There are a few other things here that cannot be mentioned...but the last two weeks in my life I have been doing certain things that I never thought I would in my lifetime. This new life is scary, exciting, interesting, fast, lonely -- all at the same time. The only thing I keep hoping is that my time away from family and friends is compensated by the experiences I have here. Thankfully, so far, everything has been more than adequate compensated BUT I still miss you mom, dad, and my dear friends. I'll see you soon....

Count your friends before you hatch.

"How many friends do you have?" If someone had asked this question at various stages in my life, I would have given varied answers. Around 150 -- when I was in middle school, about 50 -- when I was in junior high, about 20 -- when I finished school. I am not talking about the status the facebook gives to the contacts in the network. I am talking about those, who stood through thick and thin, mostly thin, over the years. Now you honestly tell me how many of those you know will you tag as "friends." The count has more or less remained constant to this day. In the first 15 years of my life, I had met 90% of people who would be my life long friends no matter what. Even if I get to meet any of them after a decade, I bet we would still talk in the way we used to do. On the other hand, I have been a lot more uncomfortable with certain people with whom I had to share my daily existence in the near past.


I always tell that it is so easy to make friends while one is a kid. There are almost no requirements to become friends with someone; same pencil box - Friends!, same school bag - Friends, near by - Friends. In fact, the reasons to become enemies with someone is as silly and as irrelevant as it is to become friends with one. The favo dialogue I grew up with: "missss, he is pinching me." We became friends and enemies LIKE THAT.When I was in school -- kinder garden and middle -- my classmates were either my friends or enemies. There was no middle line. I knew everyone, likewise, everyone knew me. We were innocent, laughed at the most innocuous of the jokes, played harder than ever, collectively afraid of our teacher, and stuck together -- no matter what. We never asked anything from each other. It didn't matter who was someone's father, how much lunch money he/she had, whether he/she looked good, or if the person had enough potential to succeed.

It amazes me how little we do nowadays to keep in touch with our friends. Yes, I am talking about this time -- the era of SMSes, googles, facebooks, twitters and what not. It is now appropriate to wish someone's birthday or anniversary via a scrap or on a wall; and its not just for those who are abroad or in a different city. I feel that we are sometimes forced to choose friends who happen to be near us just to keep us sane and safe from the grip of loneliness and depression. And this makes us to act in a way we are not used to or not supposed to. (A hyberbolic treatment of the same point in one of my earlier posts.) I wonder why has it become so difficult right now to make and keep friends. Nowadays I feel that relationships are formed on the basis of convenience. And it ends as soon as the location or any other scenery changes. Nobody seems to stick with anyone "till death do them part." A hundred friends on facebook or orkut, but no one to talk to when in need. Gone are the days when friends come to someone's home just for an aimless banter going for hours.

I ramble because I get a feeling that I will be away from my friends -- for a long time. If there has been one constant in my 27 years of existence, apart from the usual suspect a.k.a family, it is my friends. I can bet, you take every possession I have, my bank balance, my inheritance, anything -- and I can earn almost all of them back, and then some more. But if you take my friends, I am not sure if I would be able to find at least one who is of the same caliber. No offense, but you've got to meet them and you'll know that its an understatement.

I dedicate this post to all of my estranged friends with whom I now have little or no contact.

அழிவி னவைநீக்கி ஆறுய்த்து அழிவின்கண்
அல்லல் உழப்பதாம் நட்பு.

(Friendship from ruin saves, in way of virtue keeps;
In troubled time, it weeps with him who weeps.)