Humanity... The most noble religion

The idea of this post came to my mind after reading an article.
I'm personally being brought up in very liberal religious environment and hence my thoughts are in sync with my upbringing. But as a educated, alert and well aware individual I seriously started thinking about the world around and the religions complications involved.
The most threatening 'Terrorism' is probably an outcome of religious differences and extremism. The lives lost because of terrorism cannot be brought back. In my opinion nothing is more precious than a life , no religion is big enough than a life.

Some people might think that I'm only considering extreme cases. But giving it a serious thought, on what basis a  person's religion is decided? Probably by birth, which is not really in control of the person. People differentiate and make groups based on religions and caste. But then the question comes, why do we want to be a part of a community if we want to be a part of all these differences. I live in a gated community in a cosmopolitan city for last 6 months. I consider last six months of my life really very fruitful in this regard. I learnt a lot from people of different castes, communities and religions who are a part of this community. I never differentiated on the basis of caste, religion etc but I adapted myself to mingle with such people in last 6 months. And I can say it is a pleasure to know them and be with them.
People are ready to get married in different faiths and religions. But still some of them are not flexible enough to go beyond these boundaries on personal level. These boundaries are probably created by our older generations but it is a high time we break them.
A person is more defined by his own virtues and good deeds than his religion or caste.
There are examples of people of different religions helping each other in crisis even during communal riots. Those should be the highlights and examples for other people. Humanity is way above any religion. Helping an individual irrespective of his religion is something that should be praised here.
The question is when would the people grow up and stop being Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Jew or Christians? We are humans above all and everyone has all rights to live a life on their own terms.
So are you with me on this? What do you appreciate more. Humanity and acceptance or maintaining differences based on religion, caste and such things?

Marketing... An art of being an opportunist

The recent online sensation... Ola's this year April fool campaign catches everyone's attention. Though it is Ola's trend to launch a similar campaign every year, they are still able to create a curiosity in minds of Indian internet fraternity.. Ola got some sarcastic tweets and retweets but in my opinion the desired impact was achieved.

What is the success factor of online marketing campaigns? In my opinion, the campaign which correctly identifies the audience psychology and in turn catches the most attention is the most successful marketing campaign. This will in turn help in achieving better business eventually. So in short, the most viral marketing campaign is the most successful marketing campaign.
Psychology is taught as the basic subject in all the business schools. Studying the psychology of the audience minutely is the key to successful marketing.
In turn, effective communication leads to desired consumer behaviour. Ola's campaign was carefully designed after identifying Indian psychology. India lacks the proper and hygienic public washrooms. The main problem, even in urban india is a very poor infrastructure in this regard.
Ola identified this at the correct point of time. It is said that a problem or need creates the biggest business opportunity. Ola just tried to cash on the indian psychology of believing such things instantly. And I would say, it was a success. Apart from the intellectuals and industry experts, all the ordinary citizens of india believed in them.
The campaign created the required buzz. And the next step from Ola was to take correct advantage of this created buzz.
Ola launched, 'My ride, My cause' campaign through their app. They launched a crowd funding campaign to build 20000 toilets for the underprivileged in partnership with Gramalaya. The ola users would be able to participate in the campaign from April-October by donating Re 1/ride.

This social initiative will in turn catch the audience's attention again. I would definitely like to understand the brain behind this marketing campaign. A marketing genius.. what do you think?

References: https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/variety/how-olas-april-fools-prank-video-turned-real/article26704210.ece

Let her independence win over her insecurities

Today is women's day. It is being celebrated everywhere. I personally don't believe in celebration but I want to take this opportunity to express my thoughts regarding one issue.
Recently I have been interacting with many people because of my work and other reasons. I always make it a point to observe people and learn from them.
Few women I met were forced because of unavoidable circumstances to be financially independent. The need of the time taught them to be on their own, but the change I saw in them after this was remarkable. The transformation was really commendable.
I also met some women, who were balancing their career with their family life. They made some compromises in their career but still managed to be independent. Their efforts were an example for me..
On the other hand, I met few women in the same age group, trying to create an identity. The circumstances were favorable but their insecurities were speaking louder than their confidence.
Then the question came to my mind, what does independence really mean for a women? Is it doing everything on their own?
I am financially independent since I was 22 years old. Then I asked myself what drives me to work harder and remain financially independent for nearly 10 years after I first started working. Is it really money? The answer was different...
I had made plans for spending my first salary and I was really excited about it. I never wanted to miss this joy and excitement. I had bought small gifts for all my family members and friends. That joy was worth experiencing. I was confident after I started working that I am capable of helping anyone financially on my own. This confidence was a result of my independence. I would have never achieved it otherwise. I have always believed that one should create memories and experience everything to have an enriching life. My financial independence gave me an opportunity to experience these joys and moments. And I'm grateful for all these. I was able to keep my insecurities aside and enjoy my  independence. I was able to win over my insecurities with my independence.
I again thought of the women I met who were trying hard to deal with their insecurities. And just realised immediately that if supported and encouraged they will be able to easily win over their insecurities. If encouraged by the people around they will be definitely able to create these moments of joy and confidence for themselves. So would you encourage women around you to be independent and win over their insecurities?

Life is like a sofa

Since last few months, we have been furniture hunting.🤣. This statement is actually true. Since now my profession is content writing, I believe I can create content out of anything. So coming back to the point, we visited around 100 furniture shops, malls and explored the wide range options. We also explored few interior design startups for the interior work of our apartment. Now I can even judge the comfort of a sofa even after looking at it 🤣.
The main job of a content writer is to provide thoughtful insights to the readers. I've literally millions of insights for you which I've experienced through my furniture hunt.
Someone has said that all the experiences in life teach you something. This one improved my patience, improved my observation capacity and skill of speaking tactfully with the sales personnel. I would be generally very innocent and genuine while talking to the sales persons in the malls and shops. But now after four months of experience in this, I know how to ask them the correct information. It has improved my negotiation skills too. I can now easily pitch for them.🤣
Managing the finances is something we do in our daily life. But this activity taught me an effective financial management. I know my priorities now while spending.
I learned the art of sweet talking and even learnt how not to get fooled by the sweet talking.
The comfort always takes a top priority over looks for me. I will choose simple looking but comfortable and sturdy furniture always. The fancy things fail to attract me.
I also got a chance to have a better clarity of fianances of these furniture manufacturing units and showrooms. The furniture hunting also threw light on supply chain management systems of these furniture items. A jugad can easily reduce the supply chain costs and in turn benefit the customer.
In short the furniture hunting journey brought some different fun in our lives. This also created a new curiosity for knowing more about the details of this process.
Curiosity fuels knowledge. And passion to learn something from everything keeps your life interesting 😊

Mein erste Deutsch blog

Heute habe ich mit meinen neue Freunden getroffen. Seit Januar 2017 lerne ich Deutsch, weil ich sehr neugirig über Deutsch sprache in meiner kindheit war. Deutsch lernen ist Spaß für mich. Wir haben unseren Leben erfahrungen diskutiert. Ich habe es erkennt, dass eines gutes Leben gute Erfahrungen bedeutet.
Wir können viel von den Erfahrungen lernen. Das Leben macht Spaß, wenn wir viele neue Leute kennenlernen können. Das Leben ist nicht nur materialistisch dinge sondern auch die Erinnerungen in verschidenen Lebenszeiten.

The transition

When I thought of writing this post, I was myself rolling on the floor laughing. The transition I'm talking about is next to impossible. I am born and brought up in Pune (my heart still lies in Pune and frankly it pines for being in Pune). Now I'm talking about my transition from being a Puneite to a Banglorian.
I relocated to Bangalore in November 2016. It wasn't by choice but well,I was excited to be in a new place as I had never lived out of Pune. It was a peaceful place for me(away from some annoying people :-p ). Then began the exploration.
I would call this the most curious phase of my life. Me and my husband together have explored every possible suburb of this wonderful city. From smallest tea stalls to the wonderful gardens, we had fun exploring this metro. We have roamed around for house hunting, for finding new eatouts or just like that. It was a wonderful feeling to just roam around.
I would love to mention this, I fell in love with the lakes of Bangalore. Just the fact that they need more attention and care. The beautiful landscape they provide to this city is just too scenic and beautiful.  A lot is talked about the polluted lakes and bad drainage system of this city. But I would like to mention that we are the people who are responsible for this situation. We should act immediately otherwise this beautiful city would lose its charm.
Whenever I sit on a bench in lalbag or cubbon park , I feel very close to nature. I feel these gardens deserve better attention and treatment. They are like lungs of this beautiful metro and need clean air to breathe.  Whenever I roam in lanes of hsr, it reminds me of lanes in kothrud. The elegance of rajajinagar reminds me of kalyani nagar and koregaon park. IIsc reminds me of university of Pune. The only thing I miss here is tekdis (hills of Pune).
With a little time from our busy lives, we can certainly save this beautiful city from severe problems such as pollution and water scarcity. It needs our time and attention to make it more 'Livable'. We can make this silicon valley of india a better abode for everyone. We need to put in more efforts to make this transition happen ☺️

Making of 'our' home

It's been almost two years after our wedding and now we are far more comfortable with each other. People keep on asking "What do you enjoy doing together most?". I always try to think about the answer but I'm often confused about it..
But since last few days, I think I now know the answer. Since last one year or so we've been house hunting. When we started the process, we were not clear about our requirements. We just randomly went on a house hunting spree and were shocked with what we actually wanted and what we got to see. Slowly, we started to understand what exactly we want. Then we followed a particular procedure and started shortlisting the properties. After this, the process was pretty smooth. In the meantime, we changed the city(from our very own Pune to Bangalore) so it all had to be started from scratch again.
With new city came new people and new experiences. We were adjusting to the new life here and simultaneously the thought of having our own Abode was now going very strong in our mind. But then it was not so easy. We had to start again from scratch. From shortlisting the areas to deciding the budget everything was done again. With a metro like Bangalore we had to take risks and be flexible with our capabilities. This city is expensive in it's own ways. But then, we were determined. We started the house hunting spree again. We had brain storming sessions and overnight discussions. We divided the work and individually visited some properties. This was the best decision we made. We learnt so much when we went individually. We learnt to go into minute details and that helped a lot to make the final decision.
It was a warm February morning and we decided to visit some projects on haralur road together. We visited two projects with property consultants but then did not really like them. We felt something was missing. After two hours we were really hungry and told the consultant that we would have lunch and after that we would visit the next project. After having lunch we were following the property consultant and in the mean time we noticed a project, which we were looking forward to. We decided to visit that first. We went inside. The manager took us around. We visited the actual flat where we immediately thought that this is what we are looking for. Both of us had the same opinion and we went home thinking about it.
After the visit everything happened very fast. We visited the site again the other day and were completely convinced about what we were thinking. And then we made the decision, this is it. We gave them our consent. Everything else after that went on smooth. In a way it was beyond our imagination that we would take such a decision. It strengthened our belief in ourselves. It made us believe in what we really can do. It was the happiest moment of our married life. We were doing something awesome together. We were building our 'home' together.
My father always taught me to take calculated risks in life. Now my husband has given me the joy of building my own Abode in a metro like Bangalore. With all our hardwork of last few years we are able to buy a spacious two bedroom apartment in a good locality in Bangalore without anybody's help. I am very proud to say that we took our own time for it but we finally did it. We did it completely on our own.  And now we can proudly say,
"Welcome to Mr. and Mrs. Kane's home"(obviously after we get the possession). Thank you my dear husband for this awesome anniversary gift in advance and thank you for making me realise how beautiful is to do such things together 😊