How I found the work culture in Korea..

I was married after graduation in 2004. It was a new beginning of my life. It was the new beginning both personally and professionally

Too scared to explore, I ventured through my first job as a Junior Software Engineer in Korea. Being a fresher, and a foreigner, I had noway of getting a job in Korea except through recommendations. I was very lucky that my hubby had a very good Korean colleague for his Korean friend. And so, I was at work....

Well, All I know for a start was "Anyunghaseyo".. and Volla, they are impressed. The first and basic requirement if you have to feel comfortable at work in Korea is, to...
1)Learn Korean; at least the basics...

And secondly,
2)Go out for dinners with them whenever possible. This makes them very happy. And ultimately, you become a very valuable person in the team.

Being an Indian, be it a veggie or a non-veggie, It is really a very big issue for us to get adjusted to their way of food. Even if we get used to their food, veggies will still have issues as there are hardly any Korean menu's without at-least egg or fish sauce in it. Once I heard from an veggie Indian friend ,about how he hadn't known for a long time, that KIMCHI(Korean marinated pickles), had fish sauce in it.

One really great thing that I noticed in them at work is that, If they are struck with some bugs.. they do not get off their seats without solving it.. They have tremendous dedication in anything they do. Not just in IT jobs, be it any field of work. Their milestone of completion is perfection. Be it a simple manicure or a Software company management.

They believe that work is the first priority as this is what feeds them and their family. I have seen most of them even getting their towels and a pillow to have a nap in the office itself whenever they are to meet some deadlines.

Their work-life dining culture is special to0...

Some of their official dinners stretch for 2-4 hours .They first have dinner...and then move to some kind of a bar for their traditional drink called "SOJU", and finally go to NOREBANG"--singing room.These are the studio-like sound-proof rooms. where they enjoy singing karaokes. This part is real fun.

I really admire the way they are dedicated in any issues that arise during the development...

Their focus towards work is amazing..

At the end of the day, I realized something.. "Indians are extremely smart and capable of doing anything, but Lazy"..

"Koreans are Hard-working.. very hardworking to an extent that they can out-perform our intelligence"..

My article on India for a Korean Newspaper

My write-up for 'short article' in one of the newspapers :
http://www.skknews.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=7671

Namaste (This is what we say in India for ‘Hello’)!!I am a student here in SKKU. I always have this practice of introducing my country in my presentations. After one such of my presentations, one of the students came up to me and asked about India. She was trying to express her sympathy towards India, based on the emotional experience she had after watching “Slumdog Millionaire”.
Well, I think most of you today would have the same feeling about India in relation to this movie. What has been portrayed in this movie is just a very very minor part of India. Well, but the one thing about the slum-dwellers speaking English is absolutely true.


Few centuries ago, Gold and precious stones were sold on streets in India. But the British rule used the strategy of ‘divide and rule’ to destroy the unity and strength of India by explicitly displaying the religious separation among Indians. India has today fought through it all and is persisting as a country which would well be one of the competitive threats in every field to most countries in the world. Be it Information Technology, Nuclear energy, Economy, Space, Science, etc...

Well, however, these britishers atually did a big favour to us by helping us get internatonalised. India is one of the countries which can speak English just like another local Indian language.
India is separated into 25 states and 7 territories which create 16 major languages and 1,000 minor languages and dialects. Being the second populated country in the world, India definitely struggles to provide comfortable shelter for her citizens, but time will prove her ability. Other than just population being a concern, unlike other highly populated countries, India today also faces the diversity in her languages and culture. India is the largest democratic country in the world. This makes it all the more complicated to achieve her targets sooner. India is probably the only civilization in the world which shows a clear continuity of her several traditions from the times of her earliest known civilization. Even today several levels of social evolution coexist in India and her composite identity has won her the quote, ‘unity in diversity’.

Among the various topics I could talk about India today, I would rather focus on how closely related Indian culture is with the Korean Culture. When I first came to Korea, I realized the necessity of learning Korean to survive daily-life here in Korea. This dilemma introduced me to a highly capable and highly qualified Korean lady, for my Korean teacher. She would manage her daily house-wife life as a Mother of 2 kids along with teaching me Korean in the evening.

This reminded me of the similarity the Indian women shared with the Korean women. In India, Women are more towards home-keeping while the men work for their family. Well, I somehow noticed a similarity in Korea where the women would prefer to quit work and take care of the family once they have kids.

The common tradition in Korea is to respect parents and give them high priority. This again reminded me about the similarity the 2 nations shared. India is the biggest of the few countries that have the concept of joint family system and arranged marriage. The wife is bound to live with the husband's family. This might seem wierd to most other country people, but that’s the true color of India, where the women just readily bear anything to be with her loved one. And talking about arranged marriage, modern India would rather go for a love marriage while most part of India is still in the concept of arranged marriage. It’s where the parents chose the bride or groom for you. This also reflects as to how obediently the kids suppress their desires towards their parent’s choice and how much they trust on their parent's decision for their life. India and Korea also share similar religious background.

Looking more deeply in many other aspects, I conclude with my belief that India and Korea are closely inter-woven in culture and that we share a common bond :).

Writer,

A proud Indian in Korea

Let's Respect our country, else, no-one will:)

I had married the man of my dreams . Our honeymoon was a stay of 1.5 years abroad. I had enjoyed this city soo much and learnt soo much about hygiene and care for the environment which I only learnt in school which is never practiced in my country.

I would always think, "Why isn't my country soo neat? Why do we have soo much garbage in our lakes and roads?".
After our honeymoon-time; we came down to India. After-all, whatever I say, I belong to my country. As I was walking from the bus-stop towards my office, I was preparing mentally for the meeting I was to directly attend in my office. I knew I had hurried and had not had my breakfast. I quickly picked a menthos and started to unpack it. I was puzzled at the next thing I did. I had thrown the wrapper right over where I had unwrapped. Oops!. What the hell?

Thinkin back at my life abroad, I took soo much care to look around for a dustbin and put it out there. But what did I just do? When it comes to our country, I suppose I should have been even more concerned about being respectful. But well, I thought to myself..."c'mon, Its not my fault.. where will I anyway find a dustbin in India?? so be it where I threw".

After the meeting, I decided to have a cup of coffee with my colleagues on the terrace where we had our cafeteria. I noticed a lady cleaning up the tables which was littered with food crumbs. I again got reminded about the cleanliness I loved so much when I was abroad... Again, the thought of the Government being responsible struck my mind. "There are no dustbins".. this kept echoing in my mind. But wait, Was there no place abroad which didn't have dustbins? I remembered my first movie with Hubby abroad. He bought some burgers and coke to munch our movie in the theatre. There were no dustbins inside the theater. Well, I had kept the garbage aside and had neatly dropped them into a bin when I came out of the theater.

Hmmm... So, Its not the government anyways. I too had my share of responsibility. I can also try my best to not little my country. I know I can never change a country.. But I can feed these thoughts to all my friends and family.. My children, etc.. Very few would listen and follow; But that would still give me a pride of doing my little part in being good to my country.

I discussed these thoughts with my hubby.. ;)

Maybe there are many little things that we could really do to help our country reign over other countries..

Lets see what all can be done:

• Try max to not litter the roads or parks that we visit. To make use of the bins whenever they are available.
• Maintain a small garden away from the sight of your visitors; where you could drop your veggies waste, which would in turn serve a manure for your gardening..
• To avoid scribbling on walls of public toilets.
• To pay taxes on time and without fraud.
• To ask for receipts for everything that we purchase.
• To educate our children, to do our little part for our country
  

actually trying to follow at least one of these would surely do some good to our country. Maybe not instantly, but in time..

Let's do somethin .. Let's start from us...

:)

Lessons I learnt - II - Why say, “ Isn’t there someone who is concerned?” Why aren’t you???

Why say, “ Isn’t there someone who is concerned?; Why aren’t you???




The Title, always takes me to an incident that I witnessed during my trip back with my husband and baby from my Native place.




It was a pleasant day and we had stopped for breakfast in one of those roadside hotels. We were enjoying the trip as my parents along with my brother had joined us for the trip. As we entered the hotel, there was this dark lean guy who pushed through people entering the hotel. I turned around to give him a dirty stare as he pushed me as well. I was shocked to see his Blood-stained face. His shirt was red with blood.




What am I to do?? People in the hotel were tensed at this sight… There were 2 men in a bike who had followed him. They were armed with wooden rods. I wondered if this was some kind of a movie shooting … I had never come across such an incident in my life.




As was expected, they were beating him and not one soul who bothered on this. They rather pushed this poor guy out of the hotel..Probably those guys were some known gundas in the locality.

My brother and husband were furious at the sight.


Though the thought wandered as to y no-one is upto the rescue of the guy, I was also worried if my husband or brother would involve to stop them.

See, Now thats what most of us would do.right??? Hmmm.

I was quite ashamed at myself thinking about this.. But then realised that If You are to do good to the soceity, you better be alone.. else you might hurt your loves ones too...

Hat's off to all those Heros!!!!

What's the most prestigious quality ? - Humility(Lessons I learnt - I)

As a 2-yr old baby girl, I was thin, wide-eyed and sooo loved by all in the family for the way I used to talk and dance.. I loved to dance right from childhood.

My life as a child was sooooo beautiful.

I realized that everyone around me loved being with me. You could call this fame...

But as we know, everythin has a turning point.. I had mine too..

I was admitted to Mount carmel college. The only reason of why I even studied during my 10th was to get some good percentage so that I could get into this college.

My mom is more than a friend to me. She supports me in all my decisions. I always wonder If I could ever so trust my kids too? Well, later about my mom..


And so, I scrapped through and got an 82% in 10th(Thank you Jesus!) and got into Mounts; My dream.

I enjoy dressing well... In fact, I enjoyed it soo much that I used to design and stitch my own clothes. So, Me n mom , we got into a deal.

Mom told me that I had 2 options while getting into a college. Apart from studying well, She knew that I also loved being in the limelight. So, she sensibly offered me an advice. She said, If I am to enjoy my clothing, then Its best to get into Mounts which is all girls; In which case, I would not feel conscious about my clothing. And If I was ready to give up on that, then I could continue own the limelight in Christs college with my dance.

At that point, I didn't realize that my mom was actually insecure about me being in wrong paths. She probably felt that It was always safe to be stylish, well dressed and happy rather than allow me to study with boys and bring troubles home.. hihihihi.


Anyways, I finally chose Mounts. That was my journey from School to college. But whats waiting for me in Mounts? Was it what I expected??? Am I still gonna be in the limelight?? NO.. I was not.

It was here, that I realized that all the hails I was feeling about myself in my heart was not even 1/4th of the talents the girls in this campus had. Being the best in Dance in all the groups I had been soo far, I still had to struggle to even join a dance team in the college. But I somehow gave a good performance and managed to get into the Western dance association of my college the next year. 

This was probably my first lesson as a teenager.


"Never boast or have an attitude even if all the people around you set you for an example, coz you never know, You may actually be nowhere in the next crowd you are to dwell"