Year 2005 : Smitten forever…!

It had almost been, a year being away from home and I had already made yet another painful transition from Secunderabad to Chennai, leaving behind a girl gang I had come to love in a matter of days of staying together. It was heart wrenching, settling farther away from home, paying for every single thing from drinking water to laundry ! But I soon started to find solace in a place where I never had to bathe with 'Hot' water, where I would wake up and go for a jog by the beach, return to do an intense ab workout, put on the Gayatri Mantra as I got ready for work, devotedly light up an essence stick and a diya to do my daily pooja as I soaked in the power of the hyms and was all recharged to take on the day in my stride !

I had come to love myself, to love the city and to B.L.A.Z.I.N.G.L.Y love my routine, which I thought, was the most balanced life I've ever lived ! I remember telling my mother, that I wouldn’t mind marrying a south Indian and settling down to retire by the beach side in Chennai.  She said it's not going to be long before you start to feel home sick - and like always, she was right !

Just as quickly as I had fallen in love with my new found freedom, it was time to un-settle myself, with the thought of getting married and it being arranged, just meant I was flying back home sooner ! I was leaving behind memories of half a year, of being surrounded by peers - almost all of the seniors in the integration practise had returned/were being posted abroad for long/short term stints working with onsite clients. Which also meant, I was surrounded by at least a dozen folks who were sitting on high net worth's just 2.5 or 3 years into their careers..!

I've never been happy being dumbfounded while others carried on with intellectual conversations. And when men make money, they talk a lot about where to put their pennies. If not participate/contribute to those conversations, I had to at the least, comprehend the jargon around stock market investing and the likes ! This was the anniversary year of me being a tax-paying citizen of my country. Introducing myself to investments was relatively easy - I just familiarised myself with the tax declaration form and had a long hard look at section 80C. I then started to research each instrument in my free time from PPF/VPF, NSC, ULIP, ELSS, Endowment plans to even Home Loans. A lot of websites came to my rescue - from moneycontrol to valueresearch, from personalfinance to msn money. My leisure reading on weekends was dedicated to picking up and reading magazines like Outlook Money (apart from the ones on GoodHomes and Good Housekeeping).

Working in Tidel park in Chennai, made it easier to gain access to a broker - Centrum Finance was located on  the 1st floor of the same building where I worked for a while. These guys were the first ones to help me with investing in tax savings mutual funds -a.k.a ELSS.

There were three close friends who critiqued my investing decisions at that point in time:

Seema : She believed that buying NSCs from a Chennai post office was a bad idea, since I may not be in Chennai when it matures - I was never going to return to the Teynampet Post Office to redeem the investment six years on.

Krunal : Who felt insurance and investment should be separate and I should instead, start to build up a decent equity portfolio. 

Santosh : Who felt a ULIP investment was expensive when compared with the total contribution vs. the administrative charges and future returns.

I have a lot to thank them for, for contributing to those views! But like always, I went ahead with my gut. 

It truly proved to be one landmark year mixed with lessons in investing to experiences of being Smitten - by someone Tall, Dark and Handsome. Literally my knight in shining armor, the one I had pictured in my mind as a young school girl, a gentleman who charmed me with his quiet demeanor, who sat in my room as a stranger and said "its ok if you can't think of anything to share, you can call me if you wish to speak.. once you are ok." - and I thought "Wow ! This has got to be Him !! Here is my Prince Charming! Finally !! 😃"  

Abhi and me courted each other for 9 long months before we tied the knot on December 25th and ended 2005 with eternal vows !

Yes, I digressed - it was supposed to be a post on my financial timeline, but 2005 was a landmark year, which can never be complete without the mention of a love story that began, the mention of "The" man who took my heart away and a year that taught me that everyone from my friends to my mother were indeed right !

A picture taken at Ravi n Rasika's wedding reception in January of 2008 !

Adding the 41st Rose to the Bouquet of Love...!

She was born to a Barrister Father and an Agriculturist Mother. A highly respected and cultured family of Akkalkot - the Bagul's. One amongst the four siblings, she was the eldest 'daughter' of the family who would go on to complete her graduation in Pune's Modern college with a Bachelor's in Arts.  

He was born in a village named Wade, that could not really boast of proper sanitation, healthcare, education or for that matter, even twenty-four hour electricity! In a joint family of three brothers of his father's generation and one amongst four sons and three daughters. Not to mention, this number would add up if he had not lost two of his siblings who failed to reach toddlerhood, owing to the absence of proper childcare facilities in the village. However, he would turn out to be so befitting to his family name "Maha-jan" - A Great Man !  

They both came from opposite directions of Maharashtra and rightfully owing to their upbringings - with completely opposing lifestyles. She came from a family who had domestic helps to even lay out her bedding each night and if the blanket was not laid out straight, she had a way to bring the roof down ! As a child, she once made a request for playing with rabbits and it was fulfilled ! One could easily believe she was born with a silver spoon in her mouth.

He toiled each month to make ends meet, living as a Bachelor's student of Science of Ferguson College in Pune. Making the transition from Wade to Pune in the late sixties / early seventies was almost synonymous to travelling to a foreign country in today's day and age ! The biggest difference probably being, the absence of capital, owing to so many children to be fed in the same family. 

To add to the ordeal, coming from a village which attached greater importance to holding a plough than holding a book in your hands, made it difficult for one to even dream of completing one's graduation, let alone pursuing his dream of medical studies - which to date, remains one of the most expensive educational investments ! After being digressed, he would still go on to complete his BSc, LLB, MLS - making the most of the situations at hand.. ! 

Their coming together, was like trying to bind the two ends of a rope - one could only imagine the immense transformation each had to go through, in the other's company. As tradition, culture, the patriarchal and socio-economic nature of the joint family in which she was wedded, would have it, the change 'She' underwent, was of greater enormity in comparison to 'His' ! Both of them had been extremely graceful in handling this transition - an important milestone in any marriage. 

41 years ago, they were married with an understanding that a "husband and wife" have the power to move mountains, if they join hands keeping in mind the same vision and zeal to pursue their dreams.

Today, they've become a living example of how one man's dream and his wife's love to see them through those dreams, can bring about a greater sense of equality in the entire joint family.. !! 

Yes, here is a couple, whose true purpose in life was to will-fully make immense scarifies, not just for their parents or children, not just for a generation prior and a generation after, but for the entire joint family. Because they understood, that the true meaning of a life well lived, is not in accumulating wealth, or indulging in needless materialistic pleasures, but it is in ensuring that the ones you call your extended family, are able to boast of a better quality of life - due to better education, better careers, better family relationships and better health. 

She was the 1st and only ever woman of her generation in the entire Mahajan family, to thoughtfully balance her further education, family relationships, kids, home and a fulfilling career! No one could relate to her tribulations - and neither would she ever try to explain or even seek empathy. But she was the true torch bearer of bringing about a change in mindsets, in ensuring that the next generation of 'daughter's' in the 'Mahajan' family, got an education that was great enough to see them employed and financially independent ! 

He was the 1st and most definitely, the only ever man, to have toiled to get even his cousin's children settled in fulfilling lives in Pune. He firmly believed, that a family with economic and educational disparity, is not a happy family. "Always take people along with You!" are his writings in Golden letters, that even I, will live by ! 

Together, they've re-written the norms of a contemporary fairytale "...and everyone lived, Happily Ever After... !!" 

A fairytale that 'We', as their children, loved to witness and take immense pride in ...! 

To Our Dearest Aai and Daddy - Wishing You a very very Happy Anniversary and an Eternally Healthy, Happy and a Prosperous Life ahead.. ! 

(P.S. Your children had better plans, but the lockdown allow's Us to wish you only with words today - We love you so very much ! )

Missing You Both Dearly, 

-Aarohi, Anant, Abhi, Avani and Sayli ! :) 

The Lock Down Stories - May You Meditate on Some Knowledge !

Spiritually, April is meant to be a month of balanced equilibrium. It's a time of growth and moving forward in new and positive ways. With psychic energy in abundance, it is the ideal month to start meditating, for the purpose of healthier living and raising consciousness. 

This WhatsApp forward, which has come to me way too many times, from way too many sources, in the last couple of days, has made me want to see myself as not lacking, but fostering discipline more than ever before ! 

And it helps even more, when You have a husband who lives that, days over months, over years !! The latest addition to his routine over the past more than a month has been meditation. 

In the tremendous exchange of banter that goes on, on our 'F.R.I.E.N.D.S' groups, Abhi, very graciously, pointed us to the list of free courses on Harvard (/ edX). His recommendation comes just in time, when I've failed to tick the box against 'Knowledge'. 

So as a 1st step, I've gone ahead and identified the courses that have caught my fancy ! These are very reflective of my love for writing / speaking, my interest to arrange tangible things in a way that they tell a story, my willingness to gain philosophical insights from the history of Hinduism and Christianity, to understand how digital technologies allow us to visualise ancient monuments in new ways - in this case, the Egyptian Pyramids of Giza ! And finally, how social problems in emerging economies can have entrepreneurial solutions - this choice of mine is more influenced by the scale and magnanimity of tackling Covid-19 ! 

• Rhetoric: The Art of Persuasive Writing and Public Speaking 

• Tangible Things

• Hinduism Through Its Scriptures

• Christianity Through Its Scriptures

• Pyramids of Giza: Ancient Egyptian Art and Archaeology

• Entrepreneurship in Emerging Economies 

There is of course an innumerable variety of courses online, something for each one, from humanities to technology, from health to healing. Happy e-Learning ! 

In the quest for more Knowledge...

this is Sayli signing off.. ! :)