Overhaul your salary!

Overhaul your salary!

How to overcome loneliness while working from home?

How to overcome loneliness while working from home?

Why work-life balance is perceived as an issue for working women only?

Why work-life balance is perceived as an issue for working women only?

How not to disengage women from Sciences? | Workplace | SHEROES

How not to disengage women from Sciences? | Workplace | SHEROES

Tantrum busters for toddlers

Rena had a long and tiring day at office, traffic was horrible on her way back to home and then at last when she reached home she found that her two year old little son is in his worst mood and the baby sitter is completely bewildered about what to do.

Sweta is a homemaker; she gets completely frustrated sometimes to control all the tantrums of her one and half year old daughter.

Toddlers, they are like sunshine in the family with their innocent smiles, small walking steps and broken sentences but these tiny tots can also sometimes behave like thunder storm crying, yelling and shouting at everyone around.

In the children of age between twelve months and three years almost can feel just like us but the only difference is that they does not know how to control those feeling. Instead of shouting or giving punishment or getting depressed on a yelling child just take completely opposite approach to cool them down and see how you are also feeling much better. Here are some tips to calm down your angry little one.

Hide and seek

When your child is demanding for a third chocolate bar and you cannot divert his mind then just be quiet for few seconds and hide yourself behind the curtains/ doors and ask him to search you and you will see how he will wipe his eyes and will start searching you.

Pillow war

You had a very bad day at office, you left office quite frustrated. You came home and you found that your tiny one is really tired after whole day of separation and is shouting out of frustration. This is the best moment to play pillow war. Before starting the war be sure that both of you eat something together and then go to the bed and start! Throw pillows at each other, roll on the bed, laugh loudly, cuddle your child tightly and soon you will see the vapors of both of your frustrations near the ceiling.

Comedy of errors

Sometimes just bend down to the level of your crying child and point at her hand and say “Oh my god what happened to your legs” and see how she gets confused and then starts laughing! Repeat this with all other body parts until all her tears dries.

Indigenous bowling

It is a Sunday morning. You have invited some guest in the evening and for this reason both of you are busy. Your child on the other hand is moving behind you demanding some attention from you. Come on take a break from the continuous house chores and have some real fun with your child. Arrange some empty plastic bottles of cold drinks/ water in a row and then bring the big ball of your child and start. Throw the ball to the arranged bottles just like in bowling places. See how your junior gets busy with this game.

Published in www.sitagita.com

Indian festivals dedicated to women

Month of October and November brings festivals in almost every place in this world. Summer harvest gets over and the season of autumn knocks the doors. India is no exception. Sky wears a poetic  blue color and the monsoon clouds floats away, sun-rays losses its heat and becomes softer. Many will agree with me that autumn in India does have a special charm. The charm increases its depth as most of India celebrates this season. Ramadan Eid, Ganesh chaturthi, Paryushan Parva, Visvakarma Puja, Onam, Navaratra, Durga Puja, Dusshera, Diwali, Nabanna and more. India is a conglomerate of several religion, cultures and society here is layered with the history of invasions and immigration. So most of the time it becomes very difficult to disentangle just one reason behind any festival. Hinduism being the major religion and one of the oldest religion of the world is full of myths and behind each festival several stories come alive. In India religions melt with each other and it is a common scene that one community celebrates Eid and other celebrate a Puja may be on same day.

Just now it is time for celebrating different forms of womanhood -  Navaratra and Durga Puja. Hindu religion does not mind to give the super power to a woman and make her goddess with 10 hands holding different symbols of power. Devi Durga in her different forms and her daughters Laxmi and Saraswati are visiting earth just now. This is also the time when in olden times daughters used to go and visit her parents house for celebrations. Several rituals carried out even today shows that festivals during autumn were mainly to thank mother earth and with time they took the color of certain religion. Just like how rabbit and eggs, symbols of spring and prosperity became part of Easter celebrations in Christianity.

I come from eastern India, a state called Bengal or West Bengal to be precise (after division of Bengal into West-Bengal and Bangladesh).There  Devi Durga is worshiped during this time as she is involved in fighting with a green colored monster (as 'J' named him) called Mahisasur. Devi durga was created for this particular purpose by different Hindu gods and she fought with him for 10 days and at the end she won over him. Parents of married girls say, Ma Durga visits her parents during this time and comes to earth with her kids from Kailash parvat.

Another story from other parts of India says the Lord Rama fought with Ravana and at the end of 10th day killed the 10 headed Ravana. Dussehera is celebrated in northern India believing on this story. There must be many other stories. I consider myself very limited in terms of my knowledge about India.

Here in the western parts of India where I am living now, Navaratri is celebrated, where for nine days nine forms of Durga (goddesses) are worshiped. Different forms of Indian goddesses includes that of courage, power, calmness, riches, knowledge and so on.  People here indulge themselves in colorful attires, jewels, songs and dance during this time of the year. Many of them eat only fruits or some specific food (known as fasting food - a word found only in Indian English) made from certain grains and legumes. They wear dresses of particular color on each day of celebration representing the saree colors of Devi's from different temples present in this region. Today the color was green. There are rituals were certain grains are sprouted in earthen pots may be to symbolize good harvest or new harvest I guess. Songs are sung in groups around those pots and many games are played. Little time of fun and relaxation after tiring period of harvesting and collecting crops from fields I guess. Today with so many women working in India's booming IT sector or in service providing companies, such rituals seem to come from far away land.

It is inspiring to see how women here are balancing the demands of old traditions and immersing themselves into the color and sounds of festivities and then on entering into the offices, they are picking up the phone to make an international video call for bringing business from their peers sitting in the other side of the globe.

Indian women definitely owns several facets just like their goddesses!

Reflections

Weekends are busier than weekdays:

This is a typical problem I face whenever I opt for full time work. Weekdays get very organised, predictable and sometimes boring. If I feel like watching movie, I don't watch as next day I need to get up early, 'J' gets exactly half an hour of pampering and 3 and 1/2 hours of instructions, orders or scoldings. Yes I have counted it, that a full time working mother (9 hours + 1 hour commute) gets 6 hours of parenting plus housekeeping time and that is if her sleeping time is 7 hours. So that boils down to 2-3 hour of parenting and 2-3 hour of housekeeping plus entertainment (entertainment for me means; one cooking/travel show on TV, two cups of relaxed tea drinking in morning and evening and little chit chat with neighbours/phone or husband).
So all my quality parenting desires (baking, art and craft, playing cards, cosy afternoon nap or story telling) needs to wait for the weekend. I am a lazy woman and so all my not to be disturbed laziness also needs to wait till weekends. Grocery and other shopping and socialising also get cramped in the weekend. We need to do our weekly cleaning up  of the place we live in and then we crave for small outings which again needs to be done in weekend. I yearn to do some freelance writing and that too get snuggled in the weekends.

So although friday evening I feel very elevated about the weekend but by end of Saturday I start looking for calm, quiet and boring weekdays!

Back into 9 to 6 time table

Yes, after few months of hiatus and afternoon naps, I am back in the work life. For this moment this job is providing me the specifics of living in same place as my husband's, allowing me family time and a decent packet. Although this is not first job for me but there are many things I am doing in this job for  the first time.

• This is the first time I am working outside of an university.
• This is the first time I will not be handling any chemical.
• This is the first time I will not be collecting data sitting in front of a big machine.
• This is the first time my supervisor's designation is a manager and not a professor.
• This is the first workplace for me where I see lots of women from lower level to the highest level of the career ladder.

My inspiration: My women

My inspiration-My women are like a flow, continuous, gentle, patient, adjusting yet strong, free, imaginative, idealistic and eternal. They are unbelievable! 

She is extremely superstitious, upfront and dangerously direct. She was married when she was 16 and had six children till she got 30. She is a vivid reader, although her brothers were doctor, engineer or lawyer, but she can read only Bengali. Never mind, she has read Ashapurna Devi to Ravindranath Tagore to Bani Basu. She took care that her daughters could do graduation and she pursued her daughter-in-laws for the same. She wants her daughters/DIL to be the best and shining and never shy to criticize them in their face. She never hides her pride about her grand daughters for their post graduations, acquiring jobs and for their love marriages. She keep doing fasting, keep bothering others with her superstitions and hard remarks and keep praying for all her family confined in her small Puja (prayer) room, but she also keep telling the girls of today, who might be her grand child or niece, "Go out, reach out find out a new niche, bigger and brighter than my Puja room."

She was raised to be a home maker. And that she became, uprooted umpteenth time from the homes she made as she was married to an army man. Home was her office and children were her projects. Unaware of whatever happening in the whole wide world she kept packing lunch boxes for 30 years of her life. Although never into any profession but the passion one can see in her eyes while she busily toils soil in her garden, any passionate career woman of today can get ashamed. Along with her homes she also had to leave her gardens every three years; never mind, in the next home, just after entering she always sowed few seeds of spinach, two of tomato and chillies each and some seasonal flowers using her spatula, sprayed some water from the water bottle and this became a gesture of entering in a new home for the family in the coming years.

She keeps telling her girls, "Be patient and firm and things will fall into places." 

Dichotomy that continues

One morning in the news paper on the same page;

the dichotomy came alive;

A homemaker and her mood swings

My mother, a homemaker, just. I have never admired the effort she gave to keep a neat and clear flowery and fruitful garden, the three to five course lunches and dinners with no repeats and additionally the breakfasts (seldom cornflakes and milk) and evening snacks she kept putting on the table for a family of five for years. The endless number of buttons she had sewed on our school uniforms or other dresses. The table covers, sweaters, the art works she had made just to define the place with four walls which we called home. The endless questions she had answered each time asked by her three kids.  She never complained when every three years my father would announce his transfer (posting we used to say) to yet another unknown city. She absorbed it all.  

I never noticed the effort went behind those as a kid/teenager but, I always noticed those  mood swings she went through occasionally. I noted the cringes on her forehead when she had to straighten the bed cover umpteenth time. I reverted back with resistance on seeing the cloud in her face when I demanded to go to a friends house living in the other end of the city. I never failed to notice the irritation on her face when in spite of having an exam the next day, I would switch on the Television. I  observed the ultimate desperation on her face when my father on some evenings after coming back from his work would casually ask "What were you doing today?" My mother would just firmly comment "I don't have papers to show you what I did." 

I an ignorant teenager then would easily generalize that mothers mean mood swings. They are always angry. They are always there to say 'no'. They can never get the jokes. They are always serious. I decided in my mind I will be different, much much different, I will be a funny wife, a friendly mother (how? by allowing my kids to watch TV whole day I guess!) and a smart woman.

Years have passed, I am years into being a wife and a mother, I enter in and out of home making on my will. After two days of cooking two times a day, I die for a takeaway or eating out. I seldom sew any buttons (thanks to to the zippers they put now a days on clothes), I don't believe in straightening  the bed covers and they remain crumpled and ugly many hours a day, all our table covers and show pieces are ready made,  I complain each time we need to move or relocate houses or places. Dare any one ask me on the end of the day (when I am at home) about what I did the whole day! My daughter hates me when I take the remote and switch the TV off after an hour of her watching.  She gets off crying and complaining  "You are always in a bad mood".

Standing with the remote in my hand then, all the underlying efforts of my mother becomes bare in front of me. All those thankless efforts she has given just as a homemaker, to keep her home effortlessly ongoing. 

I suddenly start to identify a home maker and her mood swings.

Extensions: A sister and a daughter

I was in class six when my sister was born, though both exited and relieved from the strict life of a single child, I was little doubtful whether the little sister will  ever be a friend to me. I seriously showed my doubts in front of my mother, and I can still remember my mother's face who although might have been amused in her heart, explained me very honestly that, one day, eleven years between us will be parted and we will be very good friends, who will share  secrets, dresses, junk jeweleries, watch movies together and talk about recipes to cook.  While growing together, I figured out that my little sister was more like a living doll for me than a sister. I enjoyed caring her, making new styles to her hairs, teaching her how to write alphabets, telling her stories. Of course, I will be lying if I say there were absolutely no bouts of jealousy, when sometimes I saw my parents were doting on her only and not on me. But those moments were rare and  not that intense. 

An usual scene was, she sitting on my lap and I holding the science reference book of class X written by Lakhmir Singh, she asking me questions seeing the figures in the book and I telling her fun stories about them. Another scene very deep in my heart is my mum telling me to take my sister with me while going for an evening stroll with my friends. I hated to do that, as my sister a three year old baby could not walk that fast, but I remember I took her along most of the days, she was a darling amongst my friends. After three years, we got a brother, and I a teenager with a baby sister and a brother had a different time than most of my friends. Those were most funny days of my life where the tensions of school exams used to get evaporated by the giggles and tickles of my sister and brother.  Also I was not that interfered by my parents for studies as lots of their attention was also channelized  in caring two toddlers. That helped me a lot to find my own ways in terms of education, career and life. Then I had to leave them, when they were around seven and three, as I had to go to another city to pursue my education in different universities, of my country, of another countries, one by one. 

On flash back I can still  see the time when I got married and my sister a class six student holding me tightly and wanting me to promise that I will always love her the most.  After that our meetings were discrete, some times once in a year, some times after many many years. We were though very well connected in minds, they shared most of their secrets, worries, dreams and jokes with me and I did the same, told in details the life I was having in different places, about my work,  my life as a new mother. I  tried to help them out with their studies and other worries, all by telephonic conversations. Although years were passing by but they remained kids for me in my eyes. 

Along the line I always had great confidence  mothering 'J' using all the experiences I had while handling my much younger siblings. In 'J' I could sometime see glimpses of my sister, or sometimes the attitude of my brother. 'J' 's favorite bedtime stories still are the childhood incidents of my sister and brother. 'J' unknowingly started sharing a great companionship with them. On our short visits to home I could get only glimpses of my sister and brother, and each time I could feel that those small kids I left years ago are growing up. Specially my sister was becoming my extension, a stronger one. I myself was becoming a bridge between them and my parents, I tried to explain my parents the logic of my siblings and I tried my siblings to understand why parents keep worrying about their children, more so because  I after being a new parent was understanding these feelings first hand for the first time.

Recently after coming back home, my sister came to visit us. We had great fun shopping on the footpaths, bargaining, eating street food and discussing fashion. She is now a working woman, living in another city away from my parent's. She is walking on a tighter rope than I walked in her age. She  has cultivated strong opinion about life,  seeing her this time  instantly I can feel the prediction my mother had made long time ago has come true. I was always an adviser to her but this time I wanted a role reversal, I asked her suggestions on several points which I have been facing while working. I never told her, but she is the symbol of today's Indian women for me, those who are trying to extend their paridhi (limits), little by little in every way. I love the sense of confidence and carelessness they possess. I look towards them with great expectations as they are laying the path for generation of 'J'.

This time, I also saw repeat of history where 'J' was sitting on her lap and she was reading a magazine, I saw that my sister was doing the hairs of my daughter with great care. I saw how 'J' was telling her small secrets to her Masi (Aunty). I saw how my sister was seeing 'J' as her extension.

And I smilingly with a cup of tea in my hand was doting on two of my extensions.

A ladies night out

Recently I was invited for a "ladies night out" organized by  'J''s friend's mum  and in oppose to other times, I accepted the opportunity, one because 'J's best friend's dad offered that he will be happy to babysit 'J' too, along with his daughter. As 'J' friend's mum (and she has become my best friend in my last two years of living here) was also invited in the party and two, because this might be the final occasion for me to meet all the fantastic women who happened to be also the mums of kids going to the same class or to the same school as 'J'. Here are the few points I observed that evening and would like to share with my readers.

They are a bunch of wonderful and happy women, working full time, working part time, work at home mums (WAHMs), stay at home mums (SAHMs) having one two or three kids.

It was a fantastic evening,  I met with many of them for the first time and it took no time to gel, the common grounds for discussion were of course kids, health, work,  travel, politics, UK, India and so on. Topics very diverse and very much fun.

It was a group of around 20 mums, all of whom came to the party looking very pretty and chic. All are very hardworking women, and as an Indian I respect them a lot as they take care of there houses, kids, work, extended families, gardens, extensive hobby and also find time to get involved in some volunteering activities.

This completely Do It Yourself  (DIY) concept is still unknown in India. Having some sort of domestic help is a common norm in India. May be Indian women will say that life is easy in out here with all the modern facilities. But I having seen both sides of the world,  still think it is very very hard to do everything on our own albeit having all those modern equipments. And this DIY brings a special kind of satisfaction and happiness, also keeps those vital bones fit. A 75 year old lady, coming to do her weekly shopping in a supermarket, or a gang of them having a chat with afternoon coffee in a corner cafeteria is a common scene in Europe. No it is not all about money, it is about the art of living, enjoying and appreciating the life that we have got.

As I will be leaving for India soon, they asked me about my plans, whether I am going to start on something, and I told them that nothing is clear yet, but I am fine with that, as I will be happy to get  few days/months of freedom form a 9-5 compulsive job. Last two years I had very busy schedule and there are many things I feel like that I need to catch up.

They absolutely agreed on it and I found almost all of them have gone or are going through this phase, and they absolutely don't aim for 24/7/whole adult years of work life. They are all qualified professionally but they have carved or are carving out a special path for their life where they can take care of their career/child/family in their own terms. Also, they are the second generation of working women in Europe, they have started taking it easy now. Europe also has many options for women with small kids of going part time or taking sabbaticals.

Any professional man can think that they are crazy, some of the ladies echoed that they do get guilt pangs occasionally but they all agreed that they think their lives are very enriched. Their motto in life is not to reach the top, but to live a full circle.

I was watching them, talking with them and appreciating them in my heart.

So ladies cheers, next time when you all will meet, I might not be there sitting with you, but your laughter and cheerfulness will remain as a treasure in my heart forever.

Life of a vagabond

Today was a very nice day, exceptional from regular routines, and anybody who is following this blog now and then, must have noticed that I am a person who does make lists but favours spontaneous moments of living.

I love the idea of finding something unknown as life unfolds into the next chapter. I hate having a clear cut image of what can or will happen tomorrow. To my great delight, life has been quite surprising till now, those what I had planned never worked the way it should be (or may be I never planned that good!), but on the way I had fun and lots of learnings, and every time I ended up into a new corner, thought for a while about what could happen next, started again and again ended up into a different destination then the one which I had in my mind before starting the journey. 

In this pursuit of living an unpredictable, constantly changing life, along with several memories, I have gathered many other wisdom too, which might be useless abstract whims of mind for many but for me they are extreme pieces of treasures.

Unforgettable friends and their friendship

When I call some old friend back at home, they sound so lonely even in their own land, they say they don't have any new friends, only some long distance ones like me with whom they have studied in college or university, and I in contrast  get so many hands to shake, and so many smiling faces wanting to be my friends to whichever new place I went. May be because at each place I know I will be here only for a short while and so in order to enjoy my days I open up myself without caring for any criticism or formality, and that helps.

Optimism and determination

As I normally don't know the next station where my journey will stop either in terms of place or in terms of work or culture, therefore I have learned to be optimistic and positively determined for the future. I have learned from my previous experiences that nothing can stop a desired journey, it might get a little late from some unforeseen obstacles, but the learnings from those obstacles can only help to move forward. From my past I have learned to believe strongly on the famous Hindi saying that when one door get closed, you will find several windows opening in front of you.

Flexibility and understanding towards others nature, culture and belief

I have got exposure to lots and lots of people, from different places, origins and religions.  I don't try therefore to analyse or criticise a person's comment on the perspective of how I felt about that, but on why or what made him say that? I try to find explanation regarding others behaviour, may be sometimes so much softness does not work, and I end up feeling useless but at the end it is not that harmful,  at least I never end up making an enemy.

Patience 

This is another virtue which I have learned, specially in Europe where people are very responsible and very patient, they will never burn a government bus for protesting against unsatisfactory Government bills or regulations. They of course show their protests, in newspaper columns or by an organised strike for one hour or so.

Taking responsibility of my own decision

This might not only due to my travel prone life but also due to some extreme decisions I have taken, I have often complained and nagged about them specially on those which turned out as a failure, but slowly I am learning to take responsibility of my own deeds both at work and at home, as a woman it is a great learning and I will try my best to pass this parcel to 'J' too, as unless and until we women are learning to do this, we will keep shouting of glass ceiling, inequality,  feminism and nothing will happen.     

Finally the biggest learning form my vagabond life is that life is once in a lifetime opportunity, so why waste it on meaningless demands, and why not let it flow on its own path, and while it flows why not try to enjoy the journey to its fullest?

p.s.: I will be lying if I don't add that, I do feel friendless lonely creature at times, I become an extreme  pessimist at many phases of my life, I do cringe on the person making silly negative comments on me and I do loose patience sometimes following several rules trying to balance the dual nature of an expat life. I do sometimes want be pampered like little girl in spite of demanding equality both at home at work. But in those situations I (most of the time) sit back and assure myself that at least I should  try to overcome these negative moments just by thinking that this 'time' is not going to come back, so it is not worth to waste it under the clouds.