Vikrama Dhiman's Blog

Its been a while since I wrote something, on this space in particular. I have been super busy helping build the best way to learn online as well as helping Scrum India community take shape via meetups at NCR/ Delhi and Bangalore. A quick summary of what happened in last 6 months:

April: Nothing really happened in April other than a quick one-day visit to the inTuit campus in Bangalore to meet and train some of their team members in Scrum.

May: May saw yet another visit to Bangalore for the first Scrum India Meetup at Bangalore. The meetup was hosted by SAP Labs and was a great success with over 50 Scrum enthusiasts turning up on a Saturday. Om Band of SAP really helped us organize the event successfully.

June: A long pending Mumbai visit finally happened. It was fun and nostalgic to visit Directi office again. And, needless to say it is always a pleasure to meet the oBox team! Everyone, Reinwald, Kirit, Gunjan, Anooj, Dushy, Rajeev are rockstar professionals :) June also saw the second NCR Scrum India meetup. The meetup was hosted by Xebia and was a smash success. We have almost 40 participants and I made some new friends. Abhay from Xebia - bow to you buddy!

July: This was a difficult month. The co-founder and COO of author Gen, Harbir Khurana, passed away after a sudden heart attack. He was 37. He was the main reason why I joined author Gen back the second time. Every day I see his empty cabin and feel an emptiness that will take a long time to fill. A quick trip to Hyderabad also happened. It was amazing to see the growth of the city - it keeps getting better.

August: Yet another Bangalore visit. Fourth this year. This time on the request of Mercedez Benz software development team to help them with their Scrum pilot. We also had the second Bangalore Scrum India meetup at Aricent campus on Outer Ring Road. It was fun to see Pratitha and her team organize this meetup for the Scrum community. The end of August was testing again. Father of one of my closest friends passed away. I pray for the departed soul and my friend's family every day. Sometimes, I wish I had spent more time with uncle while he was with us.

September: Hopefully, this space would be alive a bit more. 

October 28, 2010. The day I left Mumbai. Rather, the day my body left Mumbai.

I had been to Mumbai once before, while in transit to Bangalore. In 2009. Exactly for 2 hours. I remember the walk over a slightly hilly slope from one terminal to another. However, my first real visit was in September 2009. This was when Directi invited me for an interview. I landed in the evening. I still remember the excitement of landing in the City of Dreams. I stayed at a hotel in Andheri West. There was nothing spectacular about the hotel. However, I looked forward to my day at Directi. It was a long day and it went well. It must have, because I got the offer to join Directi. That visit lasted 1 day. I left the same day as my interview. I was at Andheri for the most part of that visit. It looked like a village. It was too early to make any judgement however. And then, I landed the night of November 15, 2009 at Mumbai. I did not know for how long I would be there. All I knew at that time was that I was leaving behind a lot from my past. I wanted to look forward to the future. Like many others who had done that before, when they set their first foot in the City of Dreams, I looked ahead!

One year later. October 28, 2010. I left Mumbai.

During my stay at Mumbai I hated, got awed and got puzzled by Mumbai. Till my last day. There is so much that is not going right about Mumbai. So much, that can be better. So much, to improve. And yet, there is that something that cities with better infrastructure lack. It is that indomnitable spirit. It is hard to quantify. It is probably the mixing of classes and masses, the glorious extremes in almost everything, the close contact of people, the don't mess with me/ don't bother me attitude, too busy to notice anything schedules, the sea, the conservative and modern hues or something else. Probably, it is the unburdening of your past, uncertainity of your future and consuming nature of your present. Or, it is the fact that I worked with a really great company with excellent people. Whatever it is, it had a profound impact. When I had first landed in Mumbai, I always wanted all doors and windows to open so that I can run away. When I left Mumbai, I wanted all these doors and windows to be closed, so that I could just stay back.

Incomplete. This post is. My feelings are. This experience is.

Thanks to the @jaaogre group for the opportunity to be a part of the Tweetup at Zenzi Mills, Lower Parel last Saturday.

This article, by the Jaagore team, on the Jaagore Tweetup pretty much captures the schedule and minutes well. The article by @arcoploc was also nicely written. Here is the link: http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report_get-set-tweet-for-a-social-cause_1430178

The dead tree format coverage is always special, especially if you are covered. So, here it is me, DNA, Sunday, August 28, 2010: