Tough Times never last, tough people do!

Khudi ko kar buland itna, ki har tabeer se pehle,
khuda khud tujhse poochche, bata bande teri raja kya hai.
(Strengthen yourself so much that whenever God writes your future (fate), he asks you for your desires)

Year 2001, I was posted in Chennai, working as Manager with an IT company. I was looking after the financial matters of the company's Asia-pac business. We were just blessed with a baby boy and celebrating the arriaval of the new born. Everything seemed to be fine, rather great and we were sort of living the great Indian dream. Had a nice paying, 9-6 job. Used to generally reach home by 6.30 and have evening tea with my wife. And lots of time to spend with my 1 month old son.

One day, after returning from work, I was having my evening tea as usual. And the door bell rang. My neighbours son was in panic and asked me if I had watched 'the' news on TV. I had no idea what he was talking about. He rushed downstairs (as we were on first floor) to inform other neighbours in the building/street to switch on their TVs. Seemed as if he was entrusted with a very important job. God knows, whether by his father or by the almighty.

I hurried to switch on the TV and damn! The cable was not working. I called up my cable guy and he fixed the problem, remotely, though don't know how. I had always paid my cable bill on time !!

Once I switched to the news channel, we notice smoke, panic, people running around, US police. Yes, you guessed it right. It was 9/11. And it changed everything. At least for me and my family, temporarily.

We lost much of our business in the Asia-pac region, trying hard to retain customers and business. Hence, there was not much work for me to do. And after 2 months, the inevitable happened. I was called in by my boss and given 2 choices, either move to USA or part ways. Given that I would have to stay for about 6 months alone before my family could join in, it was a tough decision. Having only 3 months old baby, I could not leave my family dependent on my relatives. Hence, I made the choice, part ways. For about a month, I kept looking for jobs, business options, part time, full time, and what not. Being low on cash, I decided to return to Delhi in Dec 2001.

After coming back to Delhi, I started initially to look for a job and learnt that not only asking a higher salary, but even demanding a lower salary is a problem. I then landed with a job at about half the salary with a small company in tourism industry. Everything seemed bad or rather worst. Things were not going my way. And I sometimes, would regret my choice.

BUT, thank god, I was strong mentally and emotionally. I don't know who gave or where I got this book "Tough Times Never Last, Tough People do" around the same time. God may not give you what you want, but he gives you what you need. MUST READ.

Today, when I see in retrospect, I believe I made the right choice. In fact, eventually, no matter how many adversities you see, in future you only smile at your past!!