Chinese have a way of celebrating their new year. Fifteen long days of multiple celebrations and a long break from work! Apart from Mainland China, Chinese New Year is also celebrated in Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Philippines, Vietnam and also in Chinatowns elsewhere.
Dragon and Lion dances are common during Chinese New Year. It is believed that the loud beats of the drum and the deafening sounds together with the face of the dragon or Lion dancing aggressively can evict bad or evil spirits. Lion dances are popular for opening of businesses too in few of these countries.
So no wonder when we went for our Regional Meeting in Singapore on the first day of business after the Chinese New Year celebrations, we were in for some interesting festivities. This year is the
Year of Water Dragon. We did witness a Lion Dance during the official Chinese New Year Lunch at Singapore. The lunch was a long multi course meal beginning with step-by-step preparation of some kind of salad on each table with noodles, fish etc. and when it was all ready, tossing it up in air (presumably for good luck and/or to ward off bad spirits).
Wish we too could celebrate Indian New year with such gusto. But then we have so many different regional new years and not necessarily aligned with each other and each with its own unique custom!
This time, for a change, our meeting was not in the town side but was at Santosa Island. Since I had been to Santosa few times so that in itself was not an added attraction. But the place helped in the sense that we had great team building exercise for half-a-day by an out-sourced firm ‘Focus Adventures’. It was pleasant surprise to me in a way since the Indian franchise of this firm is run by my close friend Arun Rao, who left his high-profile senior manager’s job in HP to pursue his heart’s call of a Training Start-Up. Our experience with ‘Focus Adventure’ was good fun and was enriching as well.
With affordability increasing by leaps and bounds the Indian middleclass is all over the globe as tourists. Most with kids usually prefer south-east Asia which is suitably well outside India (foreign!) and the airfares are almost like domestic fares. In many cases the packages are even more attractive than what Indian destinations could offer! No wonder Santosa Island is always up there in the list. In a recent newspaper article Mike Barclay, CEO of Santosa Development Corporation, shared that Indian tourist make over 16% of their guests and remain the number one source country for Sentosa. No wonder wherever you go in Santosa, sari clad ladies with white fragrant flowers in their hair is not an unusual sight (
I guess most North Indians have got into their pair of Jeans by now!).
The Hotel where we stayed was next to the famous “Mer-Lion” statue. It looks fabulous in night with different color lights falling on it. Most would know that the name “Singapore” is of Sanskrit origin meaning “City of Lions”. I guess at some point of time this would have been a dense forest with lots of Lions!
The week prior to this meeting, we had our 2012 “Sales Kick off Meet” at Kathmandu.
I was visiting Kathmandu almost after a decade. Landing there and journeying to the Hotel from airport, I was disappointed to see the state of affairs. It looked cramped, dusty and almost in ruins. Kathmandu evoked some sort of awe a decade back (as a destination). Since then either India has moved a long way ahead or Kathmandu has lagged many steps behind. A mix of both I guess. Those days the cars there used to look impressive. Now Maruti’s cars seemed the most prevalent ones (including Maruti 800!). India has moved so much ahead.
No visit to Kathmandu is complete without visiting the Pashupatinath Temple.
It is of course one of the most significant Hindu temples of Lord Shiva in the world, located on the banks of the Bagmati River in the eastern part of Kathmandu. The temple served as the seat of the national deity, Lord Pashupatinath. It is listed in UNESCO World Heritage Sites list. My Grandmother (Nani), who has come to live with us, said that it is believed that whoever visits Pashupatinath (The Lord of Animals) is spared entering Animal Species in their next birth!
Hindus alone are allowed to enter the temple premises. Similar is the case with another beautiful temple in Kathmandu – The Taleju Temple which is in the beautiful Royal city of Bhaktapur in Kathmandu.
I feel sad with this restrictive policy. Felt bad even when I visited the Puri Temple many years ago – similar “rule”.
High time we realize that god is ONE. Temples, Churches, Mosques, Synagogues etc. are just places designed to provide an environment for peace, reflection and detachment where one can delve deeper in his “self” and move closer to the Supreme ONE. Anyone and everyone seeking spiritual dimension should be allowed in these abodes, without any discrimination of cast, color and creed.The Sales Meeting was typical of its type – high on adrenaline! Weaving together Team Building, Action Plans and Awards/Rewards.
The new HR manager who comes from Pepsi made some interesting changes to the Award Night to make it an evening to remember. Among several other things – he released a Bollywood poster for each of us. The one which I got was -
