I learn to like the place I live in.
I have heard many Indians talk wistfully about how life is great back in India and how horrible Kuwait is. I wish they were at hand to listen to my good Kuwaiti friend Dr. Mansour. While travelling in his Ford Grand Marquis one day a few years ago, he was refering to the prevalent fad of bitching about Americans amongst Kuwaitis, "Rajan, we Kuwaitis got our country back because of Americans, we study in America, we drive American cars, use American goods, price our oil in US dollars and after all this we have the temerity to bitch about Americans"!!!
Touche.
There are two sides to any country - the good and the bad. If you look at only the bad side (as a good number of my Indian friends do) then you will have many things to crib about. But if you were to look out for positive things, then you will see the brighter side of life in Kuwait.
I am completing almost 10 years in Kuwait. I have had my ups and downs in the country. I take it in my stride. Kuwait taught an impatient man like me the value of patience. It taught me the value of perseverence, for without it one cannot hope to succeed. One has to plod countering heavy odds as things move at a relatively slow pace. The tenure in Kuwait helped me learn additional skills in my professional life. If someone had told me a decade back that my future is in Corporate Finance, I would have laughed at it as the biggest joke of the millenium. But 3 years with First Investment Company and the last 2 years with AES allowed me to add this powerful Brahmastra to my Quiver of Professional Arrows. Needless to say, the country also allowed me to have tax free income and a quality life style.
Learn to like the country you live in and learn to love the job you are in. Job satisfaction is a frame of mind. Show considerable passion in whatever you do. The perfection of the outcome is itself a reward.
But like everything else, this too must pass. Time to bid adieu to Kuwait. A decade is a long time in one's life. The law of diminishing marginal returns (not on the monetary front but on the professional development front) has started catching up with me in Kuwait.
Will I miss Kuwait? I might, till I settle down in the new place. For one can't live on nostalgia and a 'what might have been' feeling.
Life has to move on and it will.
