With love to papa

A tribute to pa on his 54th birthday, all friends and family who wanna contribute most welcome.

I remember that ghastly January morning,
When I saw the pain in your eyes, like I had never seen before..
How wrongly I thought it was an unbearable ache cuz of the oozing blood..
Cuz I never cud have imagined that those were the silent “goodbyes’, you were biding from your painful eyes…

Oh daddy! it’s been almost 10 lonnng years,
they say times cures all the pain, but it still sooo hurts..
Yes we did learn move on, but it still aches for the missing soothing touch of yours,
Your ever so comforting shoulders,
the morning warm huggies and you tickling us with ur unshaven scraggy beard,
the sweet lullabies, even in the cold cold winter nights,
those ‘god bless you’ kisses.. and all the fun with your lovingly calling us names
We miss you when we achieve smthg cuz ur not there to share the joy..
We miss you when we loose cuz ur not there to ease the pain…

I work hard to connect with you and create a virtual bond..
But it doesn’t seem to be working.. Is my faith not strong?
I strive to be sm1 u cud be proud of to say own... Like I’ve been sooo proud to b a part of you,
only I don’t know if it matters to you anymore.. :-(

I know perhaps the others opinion shdn’t matter much,
but it touches my heart to see their eyes moisten still, when they speak of you with high regard and love..
On your birthday 09- it’s yet again us..
just left with your photos & the greetings from the people who care..
I just wanna tell you how much ‘we miss you’, please send me some sign that ur listening and that ur there
I can’t let this connection just slip away…

No this distance hasn’t weakened our bond, but yes I am saddened by you not playing along..
Ofcourse you left us with a lot of inspiration,
N you r still mentoring our path, with the way you set before us your life- a perfect example to follow
And this connection still stays…

A dedication by me to my father 11/09/09
PS: You are the most precious to me dear papa, love you lotsss… wish we were together to celebrate all your 45th to 54th birthdays and the more to come…



My Father :- composed by Shreya Gupta (august 2007)

Once after a long and weary day, I went to sleep tired and enervated
I had a dream, a long and a beautiful one,
In it I saw my father…
He was there, around me,
Watching me as the days passed and I was unaware of it
After a long and uncomfortable silence, he came to me and spoke..
He asked me why I was giving my worst in everything that I was doing
Why I was shunning my duties, why I was so drastic in my relationships,
Why my attitude towards work was so irresponsible..
For a moment I was stunned, stuck by the realization that the questions he had asked me were all justified,
I could not withstand the painful truth that lied in the reality of his questions..
But what could I possible say?
Perhaps, I was too demoralized by my continuous failures
Or was I unable to put in my best in the tasks that I excelled in earlier only because of petty things that troubled me as swords
For me it was merely like winning a battle but loosing the war..

In this state of mind, I choose to remain silent.
Understanding my unspoken thoughts my father spoke to me again..
Shreya, life wouldn't always give you what you want or what you expect out of it..
There are various phases of life, some are painful and some are filled with joy. Embrace both.
Difficult times come in everybody's life but what matters is how you take it or how you handle it.
These will teach you lessons which are thereby your experiences.
Learn from them and remember the lessons.
The wise learn from the others experiences, normal people learn from their own experiences and fools never learn.
Now it depends on you that under which you want to be categorized.
True happiness can only be endured after experiencing pain
Pain is God's test that you can not elude yourself from, you have to take it..

His essence comforted me and his words uplifted my dying moral,
As he seemed to be saying these words of wisdom to me,
I wondered if all these answers had been there around me for a very long time,
But only I wasn't able to see them..
It was as if a thirsty horse was on the river bank only it did not know that only water could quench his thirst!!!

de must haves & trends for 09

1. Cheap & Chic: With the word recession in the air, designers have gone economical too. Cheap chic is the mantra for the season. Clean cuts, flaunty fabrics and minimal detailing looks sexy yet is budgety.

2. Brighten it up with Color: The season is about resurgence of color. This spring make it up to the gloom of economic depression by draping yourself up in bit of color.Hot pink, yellow, florescent green, aqua and fuchsia are the colors of the season.

3.Pretty Prints: A pretty sundress with polka dots or a pretty ditsy print is almost a classic for spring summer, team it up with you stilettos.


4. Classy clutches: Clutches are the bags of the season. You don't have to go extravagant on the clutches they can very well be hip with a bit drapy look or in patent leather.

5. Faux skin or Animal print: Designers are flaunting crocodile-effect leggings to the fur-print silks all over the runways. Patent leather shoesand clutches are a rage this season.

6. Hot pants and boots: Boots, boots and boots are the hue and cry of the season, be it ankle length, calf high or over the knees. Goes well with hot pants.

7. Sheer is good: Hide some, show some makes you sensuous. Add a bit of sheer to your clothing and you are all set to sizzle in the heat.

8. Comfy tunics: Tunics are a carry over but the go less voluminous. Rather than empire line cuts more A-lines are popping up.

9. Dark straight leg jeans: Although these have been around from the last two seasons but as they go well with the voluminous tops these can not be overlooked.

10. Borrowed from boys: A pair of boyfriend jeans along with simple flats, give u lots of room to run around doing your chores and you can be cool and chilled out in the heat.

Srinivasan wudn't have to close out subhikha's operations had he been reading Godin fundas...

Top 10 Secrets of the Marketing Process

1. Don’t run out of money. It always takes longer and costs more than you expect to spread your idea. You can budget for it or you can fail. (Bingo! can't agree more..I guess this approach goes for the business as whole n for life as well n not jus the marketing process. No matter how tempted ur to expand don't forget to hold on to enuf liquid cash for the bad times when ur not making money but u've got ur FC's to deal w/. Classic example Subhiksha! ;-)

2. You won’t get it right the first time. Your campaign will need to be reinvented, adjusted or scrapped. Count on it. (U'll get tonnes of examples on this one.. jus browse)

3. Convenient choices are not often the best choices. Just because an agency, an asset or a bizdev deal are easy to do doesn’t mean that they are your best choice. (humm ya perhaps ..)

4. Irrational, strongly held beliefs of close advisors should be ignored. It doesn’t matter if they don’t like your logo. ( I read it as listen to ur instincts , they are the best guiding force.. it may have no basis but r more reliable :-)

5. If it makes you nervous, it’s probably a good idea. If you’re sure you’re right, you probably aren’t. ( something of a Murphy law.. but yea it works..mayb it's cuz when ur iffy ur xtra careful and alert..)

6. Focusing obsessively on one niche, one feature and one market is almost always a better idea than trying to satisfy everyone. (Now tht we all certainly know... one size cant fit it all, one dress cant b the perfect design for every1, one color is not the fav of every1.. so thr can never b one solution for everybody, nor can u give every1 thr custom solutions... so jus b specialist, its much easy..)

7. At some point, you’re either going to have to stick to your convictions or do what the market tells you. It’s hard to do both. (So r all these "mega trends" and all "market watch" a crap!?? I can say tht for fashion biz ya its smtimes true.. no matter hw much ur fashion forecasting or mayb ur just doing stuff from ur head abt wht u reallly feel .. if its good, it'll work!!!.. screw the trends..'u will become the trend' :-)

8. Compromise in marketing is almost always a bad idea. Extreme A could work. Extreme B could work. The average of A and B will almost never work.(.....)

9. Test, measure and optimize. Figure out what's working and do it more. (Is it ?? but it always reaches a saturation.. so u still need to keep diversifying n doing the next thing or add smthg new unto ur best thing in order tht ppl keep looking out for ur work/stuff ...tht's my opnion Mr Godin.. I m sure steve jobbs wud agree w/ me.. innovation is the key to optimization i feel)

10. Read and learn. There are a million clues, case studies, books and proven tactics out there. You can't profitably ignore them until you know them, and you don't have the time or the money to make the same mistake someone else made last week. It's cheaper and faster to read about it than it is to do it. (right so a good thing is u become a teacher .. gives u all the reasons n compulsions (hehe) to keep urself updated w/ all de crap happening aroun.. if nuthing u'll end up reading tonnes.. much more than u ever did in ur school days ;-)..but jus dont get too content w/ the easy life, being a teacher .. keep working on ur ambitions as well!)

source: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/10/top_10_secrets_.html

PS: comments on Godin's blog in italics in green (since i've my green thinking hat on!).