Monday, July 19, 2010

What to Express and what not to



As I start writing this while sipping hot tea, I have just entered inside my house experiencing the wonderful cool breeze outside. It might rain too if Lahorites get lucky enough.

It’s been an exact week since the football world cup final and this post should have come at that moment. However I felt writing it now before going for a power nap.

As soon as Iniesta scored in the extra time, I jumped off my table spilling tea into the keyboard of my laptop making it dysfunctional and making everything around caffeinated. I was still jumping around for no apparent reason with no one except my grandma at home. I felt happy doing crazy stuff.

I was still cleaning up the mess that heavy rain started resulting into power shut down as well. I went onto the rooftop in my T-Shirt and Shorts to experience the first Monsoon of the season. In all these long years, I almost forgot how the rain felt. I went straight into the middle of the rooftop at around 3:30 and stood against the winds. It was a lovely rain accompanied by marvelous lightning and thunder. I kept bathing for around 40 minutes and yelling like a happy lion against the winds. I wanted to express myself out and the rain definitely provided me the chance. Even after the rain stopped, I kept watching the thunder and lightning till 6 in the morning. These were the best I have ever seen or perhaps I didn’t have a memorable rain earlier. I was alone. I didn’t need anybody to be with me in all my craziness, wildness and remembrance of recent years. I caught cold later yet I enjoyed every moment of it.

It’s almost a year since I have shifted into my current office and life has been a roller coaster ride since then. I properly started my first venture from my pocket money and taking a loan of Rs. 30K from the dad, conducted interviews, hired people and did hell a lot of stuff which I couldn’t have done while being on a job. Fights with my co-founders at DesignMyWork & PrintMyWork, dusting of office furniture, cleaning the toilet, washing utensils, making tea and snacks for the employees and friends somewhat made me jack of all trades. Those around me never believed in me. I remember people feeding negative things about me to those who wanted to work for me. We wrapped up DMW on friendly terms in November 2009 for the reasons I mentioned in the post “DesignMyWork: My Stunt with the Graphics Design Industry in Pakistan”, and because one of our co-founders couldn’t differentiate between friendship and business.  The entrepreneurship and risk taking should have been over for me but I stayed put and God took me to the right direction.

What happened in last many months would require many lengthy posts which I might write at some other time but I am having amazing time at the moment. A lot has happened and is happening and we are MashAllah growing. I am at an ideal position with two amazing people around me. They are mentors, friends, well wishers, my current life makers and what not. They have faith in me and I have in them. Without taking their name, I would like to thank them for believing in me and trusting me. A bigger “Thank You” goes to Allah Almighty for guiding me to select my new partners amongst the lot that offered me to join their respective teams.

A lot of things have changed in my life in last 1.5 years or so.  I am currently cruising in the ocean of success and every few days we have some new achievement to talk about. In the last couple of months, I have also somewhat learnt the art to say “NO” though I don’t say that much often :) .  I have definitely reduced my college lectures and other social meetups. This can be evident from the fact that I didn’t even go to collect three awards and souvenirs in last two months. We have been nominated for an upcoming International Award with sponsorship of  company delegates for Travel, Tour and Accommodation but all of us are not going as we don’t want to waste our days while we can do few more amazing things in that time.

My CTO keeps on convincing me that I should now start charging for everything I do whether it be a college guest lecture or a social initiative as both Dr. Laltein and the Guru think that I am really bad at monetizing stuff. “Aapne Thayka Uthaya Hoa Hai Poori Dunya Ka Gandhi Sb.”  I do things from my heart while they do it from their brains and that makes us a wonderful combination.

The yelling that night was my answer to the life and to those who termed me a failure. For those who were sure that I have ruined my career by not accepting the job offers of some really good multinationals. For those who mocked me. I am still standing in front of you happily whereas you are still trying to find happiness. Now I don’t need your certificate of achievement. If a Director or a VP of an MNC calls you and requests to join him for a dinner, it speaks for itself.  You have been calling me “Senior” and you have made me one. 
Saturday, July 17, 2010

What the hell is going on?

Wait! Wait! Wait!!!  Sorry Peepz!  I am here. I am here to answer your queries and yes I apologize for the time off.

Ever since I won the Google & CIO Pakistan Blog Award in May 2010, there have been lots of queries that what’s going on and why the hell I am not blogging on my personal blog. I should at least show some “SHODISM” on the blog but why I am not doing so. Those who are in my FB list or following me on twitter knew that I have been micro-blogging as well as writing on other blogs. So why not here?

Well it’s a weekend so let’s sit down, turn on your AC (if there’s no power shut down at your place), be patient and I’ll try to answer as much as I can. When I wrote my last post, I decided that I would write the next post after couple of months and those who are regularly following should know that I am blogging less here since some time due to professional commitments & busy day schedule.

To be honest, I wasn’t writing here because I didn’t want to. A friend of mine advised me that I should only share exclusive news with my best friends and I have been giving his advice a shot. This experiment of sharing news with only close friends has been marvelous and I plan to continue it for a while. Meanwhile, let me broadcast now what’s been going on my side.

May and Early June 2010 were pretty much down for me. Though there were good news but yet I was overburdened with negative stuff. I lost one of my great buddies and yet couldn’t do anything about it. The thing I liked the most about me at that moment was that though I wasn’t talking, I managed myself to the office at 9 a.m. the next day.  Organized couple of events for few of my friends in last few months as well as helped P@SHA organize one at Royal Palm.

With the help of IEEE Lahore GOLD Team, placed around 23 students/recent graduates in summer internship program so far and am somewhat content with our performance this year.

Dad gifted me an iPed (http://roof.pk/bs) on Father’s Day and I loved sharing pictures with all my Facebook Friends. Even gave a test drive of it to few people at the P@SHA LaunchPad 2010.



So yes, before I close this post and move to another one let me get into some Shoda Mode. I won the Google & CIO Pakistan Blog Award in the “Gossip Blog” category and Yes I publicly admit that I am happy about that :) . Couldn’t attend the event due to some office commitments and would sometime soon collect my trophy from the organizers. A very special thank you to all lovely people out there who voted for me.

The announcement slide and a congratulation note from Sidra Iqbal’s “Status Pro Inc" follows this text.