Its beyond the first half of 2026, and the year is racing to a close. It has been a happening year so far, and I believe there’s more to come.
Firstly, Jo graduated, and started working. The single biggest proud moment for a father I guess. Coming from a family where everyone holds everyone very close, I really wanted Jo to find her own place, and become independent. And I am glad to see part of that fulfilled. I wish her all the best and hope she has a wonderful career. What with the likes of AI and so much automation, the career graph for IT resources is not very clear. However, in the area of Fintech and banking, I don’t see the spread of AI that much, maybe because of the sensitivity of data and financial risk. She underwent training at her US office, and from the photos, everyone seems very studious and intelligent. She seems to be good at engineering code. Her thesis was on converting legacy software to new technologies, and her guide asked her and others to take steps to publish their thesis officially. I always tell her to build it as a product and then she can reach out to so many companies that still run legacy code.
Next change for Jo, is to find an apartment and move there. She needs to move out by August end, and now things have started becoming a bit hectic. She doesn’t have normal days to see the places. Possibly her friend will need to, and then they will finalize and move in. She’s graduating in Sep beginning, and so a UK trip beckons.
I am still struggling with my Dubai tenant. I filed a court case at rental dispute centre, but that got rejected because the documents were not in Arabic. Though they are in English and Arabic, seems that they need to be legally translated. It’s a pity that we need to go through such hassles, in order to find justice. I guess that’s life. Anyways, after the first rejection, I got hold of an Egyptian guy who knows how this works. He filed the case on my behalf, and asked me 4500 AED. I told him I will pay in stages, and let the case proceed. The case got rejected again! Because of some mismatch in name. Again, justice delayed = justice denied.
The weather is beautiful in Netherlands right now. Long summer days and temperatures soaring at 30 degrees. It’s nothing compared to what I was used to , growing up. I used to play cricket the whole day, at Medical College Cricket ground, when the sun was beating down on us. Thirty degrees is mild winter for me. But it’s important to use sunscreen, because the sun rays are very hot and can really burn the skin.
I took a short trip to Italy, Bergamo. Over the weekend. There it was 35 degrees and very similar to temperatures and weather at Trivandrum. I spent one day at Lake Iseo, which was beautiful, and has the largest natural island which is manmade I think. I loved Italian wine, and overall spent a nice one and a bit days there. Italian breakfast is coffee and croissant.
I am still chasing insurance for the fence that collapsed, things are very slow here. And I dont have much hopes that I will get the full amount, if I get it repaired. The owner of the adjoining house has many families staying there, I think he’s very money minded. However, here the municipality doesn’t give permission like that, and it seems several people have called him to complain. He’s Indian.
My other neighbour is also a Punjabi family, with an adorable daughter Ajooni. She spends quite a bit of time at our place, and is very bubbly and cheerful all the time. Beyond them, there are some more Indian families, I occasionally see them, but more hi/bye kind of relationship. I guess I am older , and they are all in their mid thirties.
Summer is the time to walk, and I daily cover 10K steps. When it’s winter, it will become difficult and so I am trying to build up as much savings as possible. Already, some days are a bit cold and windy, though overall it’s still warm. I hope fall season doesn’t come too quickly.
I still have 40 days of leave left. I don’t think we have leave encashment, so I will need to take the leaves. I am planning a trip to Australia this year. My classmates are going to Vietnam in October, and I think I will join them, and from there go to Australia. I keep thinking it’s kind of near, but it’s still some 8 or 10 hrs from Vietnam. Places like Sydney and a lot of other cities, are lined along the Eastern coast, with only Perth to the West, and lot of desert in between.
In between all this, I also want to visit my parents. It’s been a while, almost six months. By grace of God, they are doing ok, though I feel guilty that I am not a perfect son. My mother keeps telling me to move back to Trivandrum, but I don’t think I can do that. The best option would be, get semi-retired at some point God willing, and spend some time at home and some time abroad. But all in God’s hands. I would like to be close to Jo, but that also I am not sure.
I am watching Resident Alien in Netflix, and it’s something that I always was interested. This is the third season. It is more comedy than anything else, but I guess life is serious enough, and I don’t need to add more gloom to it.
A funny thing happened. I had got a quote from one guy from the internet, for repairing the fence. The quote was quite high. It took me almost two weeks of chasing him to get the quote. Now as i said earlier, it’s with the insurance company. There were some other small works at home, and I searched for a handyman, and found a company. He came today morning, and it turned out that it’s the same guy. Though, it was a different company. I think something shady. He was also taken aback. Since it was almost three weeks since he last visited, before giving the quote, he also forgot that it was the same house. Anyway, he took a look and said he will get back via message.
My garden is lush green now, with lot of plants, mostly weeds. However, even the weeds are beautiful. Actually, the birds fly all around, dropping the pollen, and even flowers come up, though we didn’t plant them. Lavenders and tulips all went away, and I have roses, and desert lily and some other wild flowers giving a bit of color to the garden. The front of the house is relatively bare, with two corners having plants, but rest is just tiled floor.
Having spent a lot of time in Middle East, and now quite a bit of time in Europe, it’s very striking to me, how technology orientation differs between the two regions. In reality, there is a huge quality gap between the work I have seen there, and the work I see here. Of course I know India is the bedrock of outsourcing, but sometimes I have felt quantity wins over quality. Maybe it’s a strategy of the big companies as well, to put a seed team of high quality people, and once the account stabilizes, move them out and bring in newbies. This of course affects quality. But more than these , I believe the technical education is so much stronger in Europe. It helps deliver engineers, who can hit the ground running, and contribute from Day-1. In India, thousands of engineers graduate yearly, and they come through a curriculum that again is not so focused on best practices. Only with experience, the quality goes up for our kind. This is just my perception, could be wrong as well. I genuinely feel that a lot of Indian companies, if they were European, would have maybe half the number of people, and still produce the same quality output.
Similarly, as we go up the corporate ladder, the expectations differ. In Middle East, the workforce is bigger, maybe because it’s more affordable. So lot of focus is on people management. Here it’s very different and more individualistic. In my team, I just give the objective, and they are very clear how to achieve it. Very rarely, I need to get involved in the how. To be honest, this is one of the reasons why it’s easy to let go of top management here, because there isn’t that kind of dependency. But this system enables people to be independent, and build a strong foundation for the organisation. Managers and leaders are expected to focus more on regular feedback, helping the team member achieve their task, and making them feel confident.
I have seen workplaces where the manager is the king, and all others have to pay lip service. I have seen politics where people turn against each other, and more than quality of work and merit, it’s other considerations that come in to play. I am happy to be away from all that, and I believe the last 3 years have been the best years of my life, from the perspective of measuring myself, challenging the odds, and reaching a place where I can now look forward to the next five years. My European experience hopefully will help me in the next phase of my career.
Its been a while since I visited Dubai, and because of the war, travel is kind of blocked from here. Recently, as in yesterday, a friend of mine responded to me on facebook, to a message I had sent him 5 yrs ago :-D. But very coincidentally, he’s now in Riyadh, family in London, and he’s working for the same group that owns my customer. We got to talking on what’sapp, and must have exchanged information for one hour. His daughter is finishing medicine from Imperial college UK, which is one of the very best, and his son is finishing Philosophy from Oxford. He was very artistic, and I remember him drawing lots. Felt really happy talking to him. I miss my Dubai group as well, though I know they won’t miss me. People in Dubai have their own lives, and there are so many people around. Here, there are only a handful. From my old friend list, very few people remain. Some stopped the moment I left Dubai, some stopped because of misunderstandings, some never stopped, and are still with me. I have seen that some people find it very easy to move from one friendship to another. I find it very difficult, I cannot let go so easily. Each friendship is an investment for me, and if it breaks, it really pains me.
Now that Jo’s settling in, I need to figure out my life plans as well. By end of this year, I want to have a clear path forward. There are some other targets as well, but I will hold on to them for now. I want to get a bit more spiritual, and understand the true meaning of a lot of things in life. This is how all people are, when they become older, and I guess I am no exception. I am happy to get more white hair, and think more deeper, and get used to the changes to my body and mind. I believe that’s also a phase of life, that’s interesting.
Some words came to my mind, thinking about lost friendship. But it seemed a bit too intimate to make public. Hence will remain in my notes.