Life history again .. :)

EDUCATION & CAREER -- A significant portion of my schooling was in BHEL Township at Ranipet, the one that brings me nostalgic memories. I completed my high schooling in one of the best schools in TamilNadu, DAV. I bachelored in Mathematics in 2001. And completed my Masters in the most privileged institution which every student, if not all atleast most of the student would aspire to study. Its none other than the PSG College of Technology at Coimbatore. I had the privilege of being one among the toppers of the class. I have survived 3 years working as a software engineer in a top Multi national company. Very soon I realized my buried fascination for coding, testing, design and documentation. As destiny would have it, Im continuing to do my best in my work.
FAMILY – Eldest daughter of a small but a very loving family. A righteous Father who's my hero and role model. He's known for his humility and supreme assessment skills. An incredibly sweet & gorgeous Mom who is just fun to be with. She's the lord & master of our household. A very talented artistic sister whose presence enlivens the home. Gold Medalist in her undergrad. The rest of our extended family are scattered in parts of TamilNadu, mostly in Chennai with few of them in parts of Karnataka too.
ME -- I'm extremely vivacious, pleasant and reflective. I consider my formative years in DAV a treasure. And life in PSG a boon. I'm an enthusiastic conversationalist and strongly believe that communication is key to any relationship. I'm quite inquisitive about everything in life and have a queer eye for a wide range of things; some you might find mundane, some exhilarating! Im a blend of conventional and modern values. I believe in following certain principles in life. Come what may, any deviation from the principles is unacceptable. I believe in doing things with perfection. If u cannot then better don’t commit for it. Meticulous planning, time consciousness, cleanliness, orderliness are few things that I consider important to live a decent life. With all these, Im still a fun loving person. A good companion. I always look forward to sweet surprises in life. Im not too sensitive as most of the woman are. More of a happy-go-lucky kind.

I love to call myself an amateur traveler. I've traveled most parts of India, from Kanyakumari to Delhi, Bombay, except eastern parts of India. I have also visited the best place in the United States of America, Disneyland, Las Vegas, Chicago and have felt the Singapore soil.
I have a fantastic set of very close friends who are my pillars of strength. They are extremely successful, perfectionists, and are famous for their pearls of wisdom. Blessed I’m, I could nt ask for better friends than this lot. We're basically a strong blend of hard work, loyalty, and a lot fun.
Coming to Cuisine (everyone's favorite): I'm a strong food lover. Very finicky abt the taste and can never sacrifice anything for a tasty food. I can eat everything that I cook :) from the unparalleled Idly- Sambhar to some scrumptious complete Tamilian meal. And NO, I don't weigh 200 plus pounds. I'm not athletic either. I pretty much keep a watch on what I eat and make sure I maintain my weight Im supposed to be.

There are three things that fascinate me: Computers, Music, and Cooking. I have always been amazed by the technological advances and computers have always made me crazy right from the day I learnt about them. Leave me alone in a room with a computer and ofcourse an internet connection and don’t be surprised if I get confined to the room for days together. Apart from computers, Im an ardent fan of Music and music gurus. Some of the musicians who ve been a rock solid influence are MS Subbalakshmi, Sudha Raghunathan, Bombay Jeyashree, KJ Yesudoss, Nithyasree Mahadevan. One other thing I'm passionate about is cooking. I've realized over time that cooking bestows a diverse sense of satisfaction and can be a single man's best friend!! Only thing that is difficult abt cooking is deciding on what to cook. I always prefer to do a job right from the start till the end. Same holds for cooking too. Im not too keen on anyone helping me in cutting, cleaning and all such stuff.
Long story short, I lead a contented life and I always look forward to everyday of my life with enthusiasm. I have never repented for what Im and what I have. I deem it a privilege to be born as I and to live a life of this kind.
My sincere thanks to every single person who has been a part of my life and who has made a difference in my life.

Gone are those days …

In today’s fast moving technological world, education is considered to have the prime importance in the life of a human being. Albert Einstein once said-‘I was born Intelligent, But education ruined me’. This might not be true to everyone. Atleast not me. The journey from my kindergarten to post graduation was something that I always cherish in one way or the other. So many lives touched my life in due course of this journey. Some taught me lessons on how I should be and some on how not to be.

I have always been proud to have been a part of the DAV family. That’s the feeling the institution has instilled in every student of DAV. Sprawling across a wide terrain in BHEL Township, DAV BHEL School stands majestically with the delight of a mother who has just made her child the best in the world. Days at DAV were deemed with such exuberance that thoughts of them have never once failed to invoke deepest of nostalgias in me. I still remember the day when my class teacher came running happily to my mom and Anandhi’s mom telling “Finally I separated Padmalaya and Anandhi and stopped their non stop talking”. Anandhi is my best friend from Class I. We studied together, we played together, we fought together, we had fun together, we got caught together. If at all there is anything happening related to me, she ll always be there and vice versa. The only time we remained separated was from 9pm to 8am.

My first step outside the BHEL Township was for my undergrad at Auxilium College, Vellore. It was a very uneventful journey and I dint feel so great abt the 3 years I spent there. The only achievement in those 3 years was the certification from my head of the department to our gang of friends (the so called super ten – that’s how we call ourselves) as being the naughtiest set of girls she has ever met in her 25 yrs of experience as head of the department. Well, all ten of us were proud abt this. The three years passed with not much of enthusiasm. It was time to think abt my post graduation and this time I dint want to get into “yet another college”. I put in my best efforts to prepare for my MCA entrance examinations to get into one of the best college of the state. Fortunately, after a long wait I came to know that I was selected for admission into PSG College of technology, Coimbatore.

When I first stepped in to the portals of PSG Tech on July 31, 2001 I was filled with a sense of pride to have got admitted into one the best colleges in TamilNadu. It was my dream come true. All formalities done at the administrative office. I, along with my parents went into the hostel campus to complete the formalities there. Although I had longed to stay in a hostel and do my post graduation, I was little skeptical when I started realizing that im going to be away from my home for the next three years. All set and done, I stood at the hostel gate waving at my parents as they disappeared into the crowd. It was late in the evening by then and I dint have time to do anything else other than going to bed early in order to get early to my classes the next day. I was in a room consisting of 9 girls who were also admitted to my class. Girls from different background, different place, different language. It wasn’t fun at that moment as I had thought it would be.

It was the morning of my first day at PSG Tech. Along with few of the girls from my room I entered to the class that was supposed to be for I MCA. It was a peaceful day with some orientation classes and introductory classes. By the end of the day I got along well with two of the girls, Srividya and Keerthy. Srividya was from Jamshedpur. She had done her UG at MOP Vaishnav, Chennai and Keerthy was from Ethiraj college, Chennai. We reached the hostel mess and had a coffee chat for a while and then got back to our rooms. All the girls from our class met at the dinner table and had a good introduction and got along well. All of us were interestingly chatting in our room after dinner when there was a knock on the door. The girl outside was not familiar to any of us. She just informed us that our seniors want to meet us in room no 109 at 10pm. Terror stuck all of us. Was it some kind of ragging ? With guts gathered, all ten of us walked towards their room. Surprisingly we had a very warm welcome. We were all happy about our seniors being very nice and sweet. But then the happiness dint last long. They started teasing us, making fun of us, asking us to do all sorts of funny things from christening them to putting up an orchestra. We were all on the verge of crying but then somehow managed not to and after about an hour or so returned to the rooms. Days passed by with all such sessions. Seniors remained terror to us for quite sometime. During the course on intro sessions and getting to know each other Srividya, Keerthy and Myself became quite close and we formed a gang with few of the guys in the class, Rajeev, Sriram, Satheesh, Amar and Arun. As days passed by we started realizing hostel life was fun. Every minute was filled with enjoyment. Starting from bunking classes in the name of login, making trips to other colleges for inter collegiate, birthday treats, visits to Sriram’s home, hostel day, login, login trip, delhi trip, friendship day, marudhamalai visits, class movies to internals, semester exams, placement preparations, we enjoyed every bit of these. We used to be in high spirits in hostel especially during the internals and semester exams.
With hard feelings I stepped out of PSG tech to start my career in the IT industry with INTEL. It makes feel very much privileged to be a part of Intel. I have had varied kind of experiences in the past 3.5 years. I have worked with 3 different teams, 50 odd people, learnt many new technologies. I have always enjoyed the workplace and the people and im sure there is no match for Intel wrt the workplace.

Now its time for me to step into a new phase of life. Its always good to have changes in life. Im looking forward to that.