* Jan, Feb 2009 - First 2 months of the year 2009 went as usual. During that time I was working in one of the offshore project in which I got struck for almost 2 yrs. There used to be times when I thought "Jeez when the hell I am going to get released from that project".
* Mar 2009 - Fortunately client have initialted talks to ramp down the team size of offshore support. I took that oppurtunity and expressed my concerns asking for release. My project lead also considered my concerns and she helped me to get release from that project. Another onsite team is looking for good DW resources, She did recommended my name since I was released from the project. I attended onsite interview and got confirmtation from offshore manager for my onsite trip.
* I traveled to US village (I mean a small city in US, dont want to mention the name) during the first weekend of March 2009, Mom and dad came from my hometown to airport for send off. For the first time in my live, I got to see snow. It is very exciting winter with couple of weekend snow storms. Subway is the only place where I spent my dollars for my food.
* I met the TCS guys who were staying in the same hotel. We had fun on the weekends and we used to cook together for dinner. After 2 weeks of grace period I shifted to single bed room Apartment with one North Indian who can speak tamil and one more south Indian who is from the silicon valley of India.
* I was assigned to 3 different projects becasue of billing issues (25% in one project, 35% in another and remaining in some another). I was working on 2 fixed bid projects and in one T&M Project. I believe FB projects were the ones causing billing issues.
* I got small exposure to Informatica, OBIEE (have only seen the environment and know how reports look like), Sybase.
* Till May 11th I have project allocation, after which my client deceided not to keep me in their project. Even though I got released from the project, I was working on one of the projects actively when I was in Bench. Because of my dedication to learning, I got a friend who is my client employee - Indian working as sybase DBA. We went to lunch to the Indian restaurant during our farewell.
* One more thing I cannot forget is the amount of fun we had there during B'day celebrations, team meets, team dinner/lunch etc. I went out for 3 or 4 movies and couple of parks in that particular city. Also I Got photos from all the places I visited. I lost my specs in movie theature while watching the movie "UP".
* Meanwhile I updated my resume with the latest project assignments and it was circulated between the project managers and Resource managers. Finally one day I got call regarding the another onsite project opening where I need to support the existing cognos environments and need to migrate Cognos 7 from Sun Solaris box to AIX (All these technical jargons are still confusing for me.. :-) he he he).
* I attended client interview during May 3rd week and I waited for 10 days to know the results. One good thing happened is my project manager is aware of my skills since he was in the client interview call as silent spectator. He gave some hope that I did attend the interview well.
* The new Client confirmed and signed SOW for 3 months. My manager helped me and he dropped me in another village in US for my new project. I have booked a hotel for 2 weeks (grace period allowed) hoping to find some Indian friends and room mates to share the apartment.
* In the new village, I started the new project assignment by receiving knowledge transition from one of my client who opted for VRS (Voluntary Retirement service) because of his health problems.
* Later on It was good experience and learning when I tried to migrate Cognos reports from Sun Solaris to AIX box in my new project. I also upgraded from Cognos 7.2 to Cognos 7.4. After completing the project I started supporting NA Cognos environments and an application. Still I am in the same project and in same place only, learning new skills from new issues faced everyday.
Hoping to concentrate more on the project and to improve my lerning experience this year.
Happy Learning! Thanks!
* Mar 2009 - Fortunately client have initialted talks to ramp down the team size of offshore support. I took that oppurtunity and expressed my concerns asking for release. My project lead also considered my concerns and she helped me to get release from that project. Another onsite team is looking for good DW resources, She did recommended my name since I was released from the project. I attended onsite interview and got confirmtation from offshore manager for my onsite trip.
* I traveled to US village (I mean a small city in US, dont want to mention the name) during the first weekend of March 2009, Mom and dad came from my hometown to airport for send off. For the first time in my live, I got to see snow. It is very exciting winter with couple of weekend snow storms. Subway is the only place where I spent my dollars for my food.
* I met the TCS guys who were staying in the same hotel. We had fun on the weekends and we used to cook together for dinner. After 2 weeks of grace period I shifted to single bed room Apartment with one North Indian who can speak tamil and one more south Indian who is from the silicon valley of India.
* I was assigned to 3 different projects becasue of billing issues (25% in one project, 35% in another and remaining in some another). I was working on 2 fixed bid projects and in one T&M Project. I believe FB projects were the ones causing billing issues.
* I got small exposure to Informatica, OBIEE (have only seen the environment and know how reports look like), Sybase.
* Till May 11th I have project allocation, after which my client deceided not to keep me in their project. Even though I got released from the project, I was working on one of the projects actively when I was in Bench. Because of my dedication to learning, I got a friend who is my client employee - Indian working as sybase DBA. We went to lunch to the Indian restaurant during our farewell.
* One more thing I cannot forget is the amount of fun we had there during B'day celebrations, team meets, team dinner/lunch etc. I went out for 3 or 4 movies and couple of parks in that particular city. Also I Got photos from all the places I visited. I lost my specs in movie theature while watching the movie "UP".
* Meanwhile I updated my resume with the latest project assignments and it was circulated between the project managers and Resource managers. Finally one day I got call regarding the another onsite project opening where I need to support the existing cognos environments and need to migrate Cognos 7 from Sun Solaris box to AIX (All these technical jargons are still confusing for me.. :-) he he he).
* I attended client interview during May 3rd week and I waited for 10 days to know the results. One good thing happened is my project manager is aware of my skills since he was in the client interview call as silent spectator. He gave some hope that I did attend the interview well.
* The new Client confirmed and signed SOW for 3 months. My manager helped me and he dropped me in another village in US for my new project. I have booked a hotel for 2 weeks (grace period allowed) hoping to find some Indian friends and room mates to share the apartment.
* In the new village, I started the new project assignment by receiving knowledge transition from one of my client who opted for VRS (Voluntary Retirement service) because of his health problems.
* Later on It was good experience and learning when I tried to migrate Cognos reports from Sun Solaris to AIX box in my new project. I also upgraded from Cognos 7.2 to Cognos 7.4. After completing the project I started supporting NA Cognos environments and an application. Still I am in the same project and in same place only, learning new skills from new issues faced everyday.
Hoping to concentrate more on the project and to improve my lerning experience this year.
Happy Learning! Thanks!
