The Year 2016 - for me

It has become a tradition for me, to start blogging each year with the happenings/learning of the previous year. So here it goes:

Lessons:

• Don't try to infer lessons from everything - time 'may' tell - just keep going!
• People keep repeating the same mistakes in different ways, because either they did not learn the right lessons or forgot them! 
• We might have given our best in difficult situations and even our efforts and rewards might be glaringly visible - but that does not mean that others are going to rate you high! - so just keep going! 

Work:

• A decade and a half got completed in my current workplace. 
• Happy to note that some of the ambitious research problems that we started to work decades ago, and left after 2-3 years of pursuing it, owing to the compulsions of the organization, were still remaining unsolved (meaning they were really challenging!), but seeing good traction in the respective domains. 
• Happy to envision and develop ICT-based social solutions, which did not materialize the way I wanted. But now seeing them created in a different way (much about it later).  
• Overtime owing to the need of the environment, I envisioned to build a portfolio of projects and services catering to the broad domain of Information Security which worked out fantastically within a short span of time. 
• The organization did not have a promotion policy for the last 5+ years. Fortunately close to the end of the year, a policy was introduced, of course with many complexities as usual, and I had to work on reports starting from 2007 to 2016! - an herculean task!
• We were able to know our individual annual ratings of the previous years, as the data was opened up - a nice thing to know, even if you do not like what you see!

• Saw myself working more on standards whether it is Digital Signatures, Internet Protocols, Cloud Security Audits etc... 
• Compiled and brought in more content to the Handbook on Digital Signatures and PKI
• Happy to initiate more activities to promote the development of Internet Protocols in India - one of the dreams visualized years ago.  
• Conducted training on Digital Signatures and PKI at various locations across the country, primarily for the local State Govt. officials. Had really tough time coordinating many of these programs and it was a good experience for me. 
• Happy to see the technical movie that I scripted on Digital Signatures going alive and receiving positive feedback on Youtube. 
• Successfully organized a National Conference on Digital Signatures and PKI exclusively catering to the Banking and Financial Sector at Mumbai.
• Participated in ICANN 57, Hyderabad and also presented the various approaches in DANE (TLSA) in DNSSEC workshop   

General:

• Wondering whether Mobile Handset manufacturers install something to make the phone/device work only for specific period of time! - Fed up with problems of MotoG 1st Gen . 
• Gave up the telephone landline connection in my native - while doing so remembered how much we had struggled (and waited patiently for years) to get it. Technology can bring in pleasant changes. 
• New age library - JustBooks - though not an active subscriber, continued to subscribe, and want them to survive! and ofcourse discover books through serendipity
• My contributions to Quora on the subject of Digital Signatures and PKI made me as one of the top viewed writer. 
• Invited lectures at couple of places made me to learn and develop an over-arching perspective.
• Places Traveled: This year was eventful and visited quite a lot of places and all of them are very memorable and each one has its own unique history. Tripura (Agartala),  Lakshadweep (Kavaratti), Tirupati, Nashik (Shirdi & Anjaneri), Jaipur, Rameshwaram, Ramnad - UttaraKosaMangai temple, Devipatnam - Navagrahas in sea, Tirupullani - Shri Adhi Jagannatha Swamy Temple, Tiruchendur, Panchalangkurichi, Sikkim (Gangtok, Nathula Pass), Mumbai, Bhubaneshwar (Lingaraj temple, Sanchi Stupa, Udayagiri), Puri, Konark Temple, Trichy (Erumbeswarar Temple), Raipur, Pyramid Valley in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata (Dakshineshwar temple), Madurai Meenakshi Temple 

Personal: 

• Got to see lord Venkateshwara (Tirumala) from close quarters, which I never expected. However my mind was restless, as my father was unwell. After finishing the darshan, I learnt that he was admitted to an Intensive Care Unit in Apollo hospital and I was deeply worried. But as a group we went to have darshan of Goddess Padmavathy and immediately started to Bangalore, and things turned fine after a day, and he got discharged the day after, and came to normalcy exactly after a month. - Don't know what to say, except that faith kept things moving. Again went for the usual darshan along with my family, a month later. 
• Later in September, my mother had developed a serious health issue - acute myocardial infraction - heart attack, and a cardiac stent was put up which later lead to several other complications  including kidney, and lungs at a much later stage. I somehow felt that the 'stent' - an external object is actually a slow killer, though it saved life at that moment. The heart attack was very much unexpected for us as her cholesterol levels were always pretty normal, no sugar, no BP etc...  I also realized that stent, cannot improve the functions of the heart and felt that her heart was not functioning up to the mark, which no one was willing to tell me ! (except time)