The qualities I have learned from Pramod

Today, I thought I will document the good thoughts I got about Pramod instead of telling him...

Back in 1997, when Pramod came to see me in Hyderabad, I was a young Ph.D student. All that I had was a CSIR(NET) fellowship as my achievement. Although, I was in a "good" lab, but my mentors were not good. On the contrary, Pramod(just 3 and half years older to me), had achieved quite a lot for his age then. He had qualified a all India competition to get into Banking jobs and after working there for 4 years, he joined a foreign bank, when we met. He was almost self made, financed his studies by himself from 7th standard(when he was merely 11 years old). He comes from a remote village from Orissa where he had seen struggle for survival. His grand father who adopted him went throrgh tough financial hardship, so he had to start financing his own studies at the tender age of 11.
Then, while talking to him, I was feeling that he has done quite a lot and I am not sure where I will be in 4 years time!! Then during our conversation he suddenly said, I appeared for CSIR/UGC(NET) and did not qualify it. After hearing that, I felt great and much more comfortable - not to mention, I felt like an achiever. Then he also appreciated about my younger brother qualifying for officers exams in Indian air force which he himself could not. That made me still happier and a slight feeling of superiority passed through me!! I thought to myslef; well we are too good for you. He also said qualifying bank PO is not a big deal, anyone can do it.It is just like game of tic tac toe. Put the circles at the right place and there you go. At that moment I also thought that wow, I can do what you have done, but you could not do what we did!!
Then after few months we got married, and I eventually completed my Ph.D. In Mumbai, I did not find a suitable job immediately, so I thought what the heck let me go for bank PO exams. After all it is like a game. But I never qualified it! Well, then I realized, how humble he was when he said that anyone can qualify bank PO exams.
The other things I have learnt from him is; he is a thorough professional. He never neglects his office work at any cost, very hard working. So, this is my lesson number 2 in life.Lesson 3 that surpasses all others is; when he was working for Infosys, and posted in US; there used to a be a technical project manager Mr. X. Mr. X did not want Pramod onsite, and was always recommending clients to terminate his contract. But somehow, the clients allowed him to stay albeit the contract used to get renewed every week. That was extremely stressful to both of us. Now, normally a person in Pramod's situation would really get angry and bad mouth Mr.X. But, I am surprised, when he showers his praise for X. He says X is a thorough and professional manager, very good at his job. Whatever he was doing was part of his job to get maximum productivity in the team. I am just speechless, I can't sit but appreciate this person from a small village having so much wisdom. I am just trying to learn and learning slowly..
May be you would have guessed by now - who Pramod is? Yes, he is my husband!!