Kia Ora Auckland

Kia Ora - Meaning Hi / G'day in Maori the native language of New Zealand (Aotearoa) is the first word you you would come across as you disembark from the flight. New Zealand - one of those countries that has been on my "To Visit" lists got ticked off last week. It was a short 2 day business trip to Auckland. Not much of a chance to look around but still had a good opportunity to soak in the sights of this island nation "across the ditch" as  they call it.

Took a Virgin Australia flight to Auckland from Sydney and was exposed to a different area of Sydney International airport. I understand most of the flights to New Zealand take off via those gates. It looked like a domestic Low Cost Carrier terminal and had to board a bus to get to the aircraft. Thanks to this trip - now I know to check my itinerary if a meal is included in the ticket or not. I just assumed that breakfast would be served being an international (non low-cost) flight. Apparently not. It was served to a select few who had it in their booking. Thankfully it was only a 3 hour journey and I slept through 90% of the time.

Auckland given its proximity to Australia has its similarities to Sydney or should I say Melbourne given the colder weather. However it does have some unique features. For some reason it felt more greener than Sydney. The first striking difference was the existence of pine trees which either does not exist or I haven't seen any in Sydney / Melbourne. New Zealand seemed to have embraced US culture a bit more than their Aussie cousins. I could see a lot of US food chains like Carl's Jr, Dennys, Burger King (not as Hungry Jacks). Tempted to visit Dennys - maybe next time. Stayed in a Park Regis hotel right in the middle of CBD (Central Business District / Downtown). Even though being one of the largest cities in New Zealand the crowd seemed quite minimal even during peak hours. The hotel was very so - so. Wonder how hotels these days can survive without providing WiFi in the room. It was such a pain to place myself in the lobby whenever I had to check anything on my phone.

The planned meetings went on well even though we had to move it ahead by 2 hours and one of my colleagues couldn't make it as a result. Post the meeting we (my boss and I) settled ourselves in one of the "virtual offices" nearby. This is one of the luxuries we enjoy to park ourselves in a business lounge globally rather than limiting ourselves to coffee shops. We spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on work and closed business at around 6 PM.

Ferry Terminal

We decided to go on a ferry ride to be able have a view of the Auckland skyline.

Harbour Bridge with Skyline

We were suggested to get on to a commuter ferry to a nearby island which will take about 20 minutes round trip. We waited at the pier and got on to a ferry without realizing where it was heading towards. Later on we came to know we got into a wrong ferry. It took about an hour for us to get back to our origin.

Harbour Bridge

We somehow negotiated our way to get out and come back in without having to purchase tickets again. Had our dinner at Nandos and went back to wait at the right ferry terminal this time. Got on to the ferry ride with a total of 4 passengers including ourselves. This ferry went through what they call as their Harbour Bridge and back within 20 minutes. Eventually managed to click a few photos along the way of the skyline.


Thus ended my 1st Kiwi adventure. Hope to have many more opportunities to visit in the near future.

Until then.. E noho ra (Good Bye)

C

Easter 2015 - Hunter Valley

So here comes the first story for this year. Since the time we've come to Sydney something worth mentioning happens around Easter. Last year it was the Gold Coast and this year it was Hunter Valley. 

We have been pondering over days and weeks how we wanted to celebrate the Easter long weekend and the decision was made a day before we left on our trip. Of course the next challenge was to find a location within reasonable weather, driving limits and accommodation available. We narrowed down on Hunter Valley - being a 2.5 hour drive from home. After a bit of research we figured out a hotel - more of a glorified motel at a town called Muswellbrook that was affordable and also available for the weekend. What we did not realize was it was actually about an hour's drive longer than where we had expected it to be. 

We left on Saturday evening at around 6.15 after Nandhitha's tuition class got over. We picked her up from her classes and hit the highway straight away. It was raining cats and dogs through most part of the journey and it was not a drive to cherish. For a change we had to rely on 3 GPS systems - one from my good old GPS system - whose maps I had not updated since the time I bought it (about 5 years ago), my mobile using Google Maps and finally of course my own vague memory. The reason I had to move to Google Maps was after a while our traditional GPS started showing that we were driving in the water or forest every once in a while. Not sure if the weather had any impact - but definitely we couldn't rely on it. Google Maps came in handy - but that couldn't be relied upon totally as well as the signal and data connections kept dropping out in some areas. Eventually relied upon my memories of a few towns I have passed through the previous trips and decided to take that exit from the highway. It turned out to be a good choice because we could find something for dinner before it became too late.

We reached the hotel at around 10 PM. Being the Easter long weekend the hotel support was minimal. The front office was not manned (or womanned) and there was a sign to go to an after hours entry. Apparently an SMS was sent to me with instructions on what to do. I did not notice that until I was walking up and down and another desi family saw me and suggested that I check for messages. Thankfully I had the SMS - it had the instructions to pick up the keys from a safe. The hotel was fairly newly built - hence quite clean and well maintained. The kids were very thrilled at the hotel stay. This would probably be Nandha's first hotel room that he explored

once he started talking. He was exploring and showing off every switch and fitting in the room. Thanks to the long drive they all slept for a while during the journey and it took a while to put them to sleep.

Easter Sunday - we had pretty much only ONE thing on the agenda - to take part in the Easter Egg Hunt at the Hunter Valley Gardens. We had done that a few years ago at the same location but not a very enjoyable experience then for multiple reasons. This time we had the entire day to spare without any distractions or hurry. The Hunter Valley Garden is almost like a collection of themed gardens like Italian Grotto, Oriental Garden, Indian Garden etc.

Prize for Egg Hunt

Egg hunting

To keep the visitors (read kids) engaged and also to encourage us to explore the entire garden they had given us a "treasure hunt". Where we had to find answers to certain clues in each section of the garden. For e.g., (What distinct smell can you find at the Indian Garden - the answer was curry leaves). We explored about 70 - 80% of the garden and decided to go on the egg hunt which was at a story book themed garden called - well...Story Book Garden. Plastic eggs were thrown around the area and kids had to collect as much as they can and each of them were given a "prize" at the end. I still remember the first Easter egg hunt in Sydney about 7 years ago when Nandhitha was just over a year old. After the egg hunt, finished lunch in the garden and completed visiting the rest of the garden. Nandhitha had her face painted and Nandha was chasing a few girls while waiting for his sister.

Headed back to the hotel at around 5 PM. Thankfully the rain gods waited until we got back into the car. Being the Easter weekend not many eateries were open in Musellbrook. We ended up ordering Domino's Pizza for dinner. The next day left the hotel at around 10 AM and went to a nearby cheese factory for breakfast. Sampled a few cheese varieties and got home a couple. One interesting variety was a beer flavoured cheddar - and I could actually make out the beery flavour as an after taste. Headed back home after breakfast. The journey back home was almost uneventful except for a traffic jam on the highway which would have slowed us down by about 30 minutes at most. Reached back in time for a good lunch at Anjappar and also finish up some shopping.

Thus ended the Easter holidays for me. Thought I will put this down before the deluge begins tomorrow. So long folks!!  

C

2014 - A Year that Zoomed

Oh what a Year!! While FaceBook and Times helped some of my friends to summarize their year - thought now would be a good time to look back and retrospect. 2014 - it's been a year of progress all around. It is also time to Thank everybody who contributed to it in many many ways. Gracias!! 

The biggest milestone this year has been moving into our home in Sydney. Yes, for those whom I haven't shared this earlier - we have moved into a townhouse in a suburb called South Wentworthville. After moving from Salem and having lived in rental properties (for more than 18 years!!)  this is truly a different experience. It gives a whole new perspective in the place where I live. It truly could not have happened without timely help from family and friends. Can't thank them enough!! I will have to write a separate post on all the drama and experience of buying a house. Am glad it's over - at least for a good while.

Nandha's development has come about as a huge relief. Here again a lot of support and help from multiple sources. A lot of credit goes to Uma of course for pulling it through and taking him to all the necessary support activities.

I had promised Nandhitha to send her to India on vacation this year and am glad we could keep up the word - in spite of few uncertainties. An added bonus was for me to take a short break in India as well. A wonderful, short, hectic trip. 

My frequent visits to Singapore this year must be noted as well. Great bonding time with family and of course many many treats to my taste buds. My camera had a fantastic time as well and has resulted in some decent photos.

A few things didn't go well this year, which I hope to work on next year. That has been Tennis and Blogging. Have been very bad - thanks to multiple factors but mostly work and travel.

On the work front it has been a fantastic year. It had a good start in March with me getting an award for Sales Excellence for the previous year. Something I definitely did not expect being a newbie in the field. There were a few setbacks but still managed to add a few more accounts under my hat. It has been a roller coaster with ups and downs every now and then. I guess it kept me on my toes and a great learning experience - though stressful at times. As many people tease me - Manila has now become my 2nd home with so many trips this year. Work related travel also gave me opportunities to enjoy a grand slam experience and other interesting places in Manila and Singapore. 

2015 is already looking to be quite exciting. Expecting to have many new experiences at home and work.

Until then...

Wishing you A Fantastic New Year 2015!!

C

David and Goliath - A Book Review

Before you go too far - if you came here looking for the biblical story about David and Goliath sorry you may not find much here even though the premise is taken from there.

A bit of background on how I laid hands on this book. This was a key "take away" (yeah literally) from our annual corporate conference in Jaipur few months ago. Hence I now have a copy signed by our CEO. We not being a "large" organization (a David) we've always wondered how we can compete with the biggies (the Goliaths). It was quite a timely piece of insight given to us as we started a new year with rather audacious goals. 

The general context of this book is that a strength is not necessarily a strength and a weakness is not necessarily so. Malcolm Gladwell being himself goes to a great extent to prove this. Most of it of course does make sense. The text in bold and italics below have been taken verbatim from the book.

To be true to the title of the book, it begins with an analogy based on the biblical David and Goliath story. It talks about how David's agility overcame Goliath's raw size and power. Also, the fact that how Goliath's source of power - his giant size also became the source of his weakness not to be able to adapt to David's attacks.

The next chapter talks about why someone who is lacking something is necessarily not at a disadvantage. He bring about various examples from Lawrence of Arabia to Vivek Ranadive - a silicon valley nerd becomes a basketball coach at his daughter's school. He says "To play by David's rules you have to be desperate. You have to be so bad that you have no choice." He claims one's disadvantages makes themselves to be desperate and hence to be able to win.

He then talks about parenting which of course struck a very close chord here. He talks about rich vs poor parents and how being rich is not always advantageous beyond a point. He even claims that as the income of parents get high enough parenting actually becomes harder. This probably explains why riches of one generation is not always sustained in the next and then the cycle repeats.

He talks about an interesting concept called "relative deprivation" coined by a sociologist Samuel Stouffer. According to him "we form our impressions not globally, by placing  ourselves in the broadest possible context, but locally - by comparing ourselves to people "in the same boat as ourselves. Our sense of how deprived we are is relative." A very interesting statement was "one of the things about Harvard is that there's just so many smart people there that it's hard to feel smart there".

He moves on to mental disabilities and how it actually works out in favour of them and the people around. He says innovators need to be disagreeable. "They are people willing to take social risks - to do things that others might disapprove of". Maybe this is what is also known as the ability to challenge the status quo?

Another interesting quote - "Courage is not something that you already have that makes you brave when the tough times start. Courage is what you earn when you've been through the tough times and you discover they aren't so tough after all.". Read that twice (or more if needed) but it does make a lot of sense. :-)

He goes on to state many more examples from history such as Martin Luther King's struggles etc where someone literally leveraged on their disadvantages to turn them to into advantages.

Of course it doesn't mean that disadvantages turns into miracles by default for everybody - one has to really work at it and yes it can be overcome. 

Happy Reading!!

C

Mabuhay Manila

So Manila it was - to begin this year's overseas visits. Mabuhay apparently has many interpretations one of which is Welcome. After all these visits to the airport and chatting up with cab drivers I got to know some intricacies of the taxi world in Sydney. Even though every taxi can only charge the same amount, the type of service and the car type varies from different company to company. They have something called "Executive Service" which always has a nicer car and guaranteed to have an experienced driver behind the wheel. So now I've found a guy whom I can book to pick me up from home and the airport. The airport pickup means a saving of about 30 minutes waiting time at the taxi queue. Ok... so much for taxis.

Thanks again to the OneWorld points I was able to get a priority check-in done with no wait time. It was "interesting" to see a newbie / trainee handling a priority guest line. She had to take approval on everything she had to do. Managed to "negotiate" an aisle seat on an exit row. It was a luxury indeed. Enjoyed the Malaysian Airline lounge prior to boarding for a few hours. Came to know later on that the food served at the lounge was the same that got packed as the in-flight meal. It was an 8 hour flight from Sydney to Kuala Lumpur (KL). Then the dreaded part started. I had a waiting time from 3 AM - 8 AM in KL. Horrible time to be waiting at an airport. Neither could I sleep nor could I look around or go out. I suppose that was a trade-off to avoid an early morning flight. Got to change my strategy next time (which I already did BTW).

The flight from KL to Manila was 4 hours. Being a day flight I was able to enjoy the views of the thousands of islands along the way. It was quite interesting to see the pristine blue borders along the islands. Am pretty sure they make wonderful white sand beaches as well. Maybe sometime... Reached Manila at around 2 PM. This time I could not arrange for my company car pick up and got to take a ride with the airport taxi. Came to realize later that it was like 3 times expensive compared to a metered ride. Worst part the driver couldn't find the hotel with the address I gave. Apparently he was a newbie!! Oh well.. managed to reach my hotel after a few "on the road" enquiries. The hotel had a unique "Water Spa" to which I had a complimentary access. Apart from the usual steam and sauna it had a few herbal aroma therapy jacuzzis. The best part was the water jets around. They had specific jets to address different parts of the body. One of such spots was like standing under a water falls (almost) similar to standing under the falls at Kutraalam or Hogenakkal? There was one area which was like a cylinder with water jets coming in from different directions top to bottom - well...what can I say...had to be a little careful there. ;)

Manila as a city is very similar to Chennai  in terms of look and feel. Yes there are a few high rises around but the surroundings felt very much at home. The only thing that was probably missing was the cows and stray dogs. One of the days I had to wait for about 20 minutes for a taxi outside my hotel and then started on foot to work. It was a good 15 - 20 minute walk - but not a fun thing to do in a 28 deg weather with my laptop bag and blazer on!! The next 2 days went on pretty busy. Started back to Sydney on a 1.30 PM flight via KL. Manila airport has multiple queues before one could actually get to the gate. The gate locations were not quite straightforward too. Flight back was quite Ok. Saw a movie called "The Counselor" - now if anybody can explain what they were trying to do please do ping me. Could not make head or tail except that someone gets killed for some reason.

The stopover in KL was just perfect to have a quick snack, a few photos and then headed over to the gate. Had a Chennai vaasi accompany me to Sydney. He was migrating to Australia for the first time. Being an "investment banker" he gave me some insights into the market. I suppose that might come in handy somewhere.

So long folks. Singapura - here I come next.

C

A Grand Slam Experience

After all these years finally got to see live professional tennis in action and that too in a Grand Slam. It definitely was an experience right from booking the tickets to choosing a game to watch. 

The tickets had to be booked online and it was a very overwhelming process to choose the best seats. I truly hope they make it better for customers to know exactly where they would be in the stadium. I eventually ended up sitting in the last row in the stadium - which is definitely not the most comfortable seats to be in nor the view. I suppose it helps to book in advance as well. 

I booked the evening tickets on Rod Laver arena which was supposed to play premium matches. The best part being with these tickets we could watch every other match except in the Hi-Sense arena a stadium across the street. Got to see Azarenka Vs Zahlavova Strycova (that's just the last name BTW), a bit of Murray Vs Millot and then moved on to another stadium (Margaret Court) to watch the dramatic Paire Vs Kyrgios battle.

I suppose it is a matter of luck to get to enjoy a great game in the Rod Laver arena. While the Azarenka match had a bit of excitement towards the end, Murray's match was not great entertainment. Obviously Murray was great but the opponent couldn't do much and he was cleaned out in straight sets. Kyrgios' match was paisa vasool (value for money). Kyrgios being Aussie had great supporting crowd and the energy inside was something to feel. Being a smaller stadium got to get the match a little closer. Luckily it was not completely packed and I could get a great seat right behind the umpire. There was a Paire supporter probably a French girl who kept banging on the metal wall every time Paire won a point. Now that must've really hurt as the last 3 sets was completely in Paire's favour. It was sad to see Kyrgios getting a cramp towards the end and for some reason he did nothing about it - no medical time out - no assistance requested. It was quite awful to see 3 aces fly by because he could not simply move. Right after that game Kyrgios came out first after the change over trying to demonstrate his energy. End of the day his body gave up and Paire became lucky. Paire throwed 3 of his used t-shirts to those groups who were supporting Kyrgios. Not sure what he was trying to accomplish there. :-)

And yes, I managed to "appear" on TV as well. One of my friends spotted me at the end of the match when I was able to get down up to to the barrier. (Cheers Niven!!) One should plan to spend the whole day at the Open. This way one would get to enjoy many other off-court entertainment as well. Overall a great experience. Hope to repeat it next year.

C

Good Bye 2013 & Hello 2014!!

So...it has become a "tradition" now to post a blog entry at least on the 1st of each year - with a Hope that this becomes a regular habit through the year. However as every year passes by that has remained just that - a hope!! 

The last few weeks has been extremely busy on many fronts. On the work front I got a contract signed with my very first "new" customer or NN as they call in sales parlance. It was an exciting journey starting from wooing a prospect in a conference totally out of the blue to convincing them to sign up for one of the services I sell. It is a small deal - but nevertheless my First Deal. 

On the personal front I've never been as busy as the last few weeks starting from kids' birthdays to weekend outings almost every weekend. So much that I simply could not catch up to write about it (got to give myself some excuse!!). The holiday season has been quite busy as well. Have seen a few places around Sydney for the first time. Kids have been having a great time - mostly water oriented fun. The New Year's eve was eventful with a trip down to Parramatta river for an early evening fireworks and then followed by a small gathering in a friend's place to watch THE Sydney fireworks on TV. 

2013 has been quite exciting in many ways for sure. A life changing milestone of getting Aussie passports. That does open up quite a few avenues for personal and professional development. The biggest event of course is the trip to India. A long pending wish that got realized. It was also the year with many international trips to Muscat and China. Having my mother-in-law stay with us for a few months has been a great boon. Literally enjoying the best of both worlds. Can't omit reinstating my long lost hobby of photography. 

If I were to summarize 2013 - it has been a year of revelation. Got to understand and learn many things that were quite puzzling until then. I suppose I've just scratched the tip of whatever mystery it is - a long way to go for sure. Every year I begin with a premonition (in a positive way) of many exciting things to come through the year. 2014 does seem to keep up with the trend.

Wishing you all a Terrific and Effective 2014!!

Cheers

C