Building a house? Not as easy as I thought!

We have decided to call Adelaide Home for the next 5 years. Once this decision was made, the first step was to buy a house. During weekends, we would check real estate web sites and visit open houses. So far, we have been to 30-odd open houses during the last few months, but nothing really caught our attention.

It was really difficult to find the right house we needed in the right location at the right price! Finally we decided to go the other way round and build a house. It is easier to find a location and the rest is in your hands. Building a house is a bit of hard work and time consuming but we thought "What the heck! Let's give it a go! ". At least you won’t be blaming someone else for something that is wrong in your house:)

Next, we identified an ideal block of land in a picturesque location. The process was really long winded since demand was high. As prices are rocketing, people are scurrying around to buy houses and land as quickly as they could. Since the area that we were eyeing was being landscaped by a developer with plans to have man made lakes, reservoirs and a playground around that area, it was even more difficult. We first had to register our interest with the developer. They then invited us to one of their land release events where we were given tokens with numbers.

Then they picked out random numbers from a box and people whose numbers were called could choose from the remaining available blocks. Luckily we got the block we wanted. It was a triumphant moment but a heart wrenching experience. Talk about a bizarre system... What demand and supply does to things around you!

The next step is to find a builder and we have been running around the last 2-3 weeks to find one. There are too many around and that makes it hard to pick.

Anyhow the ideal time frame is to get the house completed by Feb next year (2009). It is a bit too far fetched. There is a lot of work involved with long and hard weekends as well as weekdays in front of us. But it should be fun and I hope the end product comes out well.

When will I start my own Business!

Some days I get this crazy feeling that I should have my own business! I have no clue what it should be, but I just have ideas spinning in my head.


I have no reservations and am open to anything. The only condition is that I should be able to manage it! As simple as that :). Sometimes I think I should open my own coffee shop then other times I would think, maybe a restaurant. Or maybe some export business.


I see and read articles about people and my friends who have taken the plunge and it "looks" really inspiring and exciting. But, I kind of pull myself back and think, "Hey, you are not ready yet".


I got into this "My business" dream when I was working in Bangalore, India for Cisco. This was my first job fresh out of Engineering school. It was exciting and fun for a couple of years as I learned a lot while working there. But, after 2 years, I started feeling that my work was getting a bit monotonous. I wanted something more! I figured out that the only solution to the inevitable monotony and boredom was to ultimately be my own boss.

I had a close friend from Korea and we used to live in a "shared accommodation" apartment in Bangalore. One day we were having some mangoes and she said that they do not get Mangoes in Korea! Together, we said that we should export this stuff to Korea! The entrepreneurial bug had bitten her as well. We decided that we should do our MBA, gain experience and then get together after 7 or 8 years. So I packed my bags to Australia and she went back to Korea after studies. We are in touch with each other and are going through the motion! I guess when the right time and opportunity arises we will know.

In Australia, my husband and I, with a few other friends almost did get into the initial stages of starting up our own business. This was during our MBA days but we later realized that it is "safer" to first have a strong financial base and accumulate some solid assets before actually plunging into anything. I guess we are more risk averse than we thought!

So we are back into the workforce now. I am working for WC Penfold as the Marketing & Business Manager doing a combination of IT, Business Management and Marketing. So far, I am enjoying my job. I guess one day I will get bored and the "itch" will be unbearable and I will have to give it a go!

My Initiation into the World of Blogging

I never thought that Blogging is such a hard thing to do. Especially writing the first post! When I used to skim through multitude of blogs, I used to be a bit critical and mentally categorize each of the posts that I read.

After attempting to write just one post, I have experienced first hand the effort one has to undertake and the pain one has to go through to be creative. I guess experience teaches you a lot :).

All of this is new to me and it feels as though I am starting school at 30 but I want to experience first hand what others are gaining by writing blogs. The number of blogs seems to be increasing day by day so there must be something right about blogging!

My blog will be just a small drop in the ocean where I want to share my ideas and thoughts, my aspirations and anything under the sky that I find interesting. The sky is my Limit!