About

Who am I?

Name : Roshan Gopal Krishnan Menon

Born : August 2nd, 1976

Place : Kuwait City, Kuwait

Nationality : Indian

Nicknames : Count Roshculla, FCRosh

Hometown : Thrikkakara – a suburb of Cochin, Kerala, India

Residing : Kacheripady (Cochin), Kerala , India

I’m going to try to do this stage wise, so bear with me (last updated 09/08/2009).

1 to 11 (Kuwait):

I was born in Kuwait City, Kuwait on August 2nd 1976 during the early hours. I’m the second child of my parents, Gopal Krishnan and Rema Devi, the elder one being my sister Sherine (born 1970). My father was working for the National Bank of Kuwait and he would work for them for 29 years and would make it as a branch manager. My mother was / is a homemaker. I grew up in our tiny 2 bedroom (barely) apartment in a building which had 18 other families living in it. I had a wonderful childhood with lots of friends and plenty of activities to do. We spent the evenings watching cartoons & American tv series like Battlestar Galactica, The A-Team, Knight Rider & Star Trek. I did well in school and I had a lot of fun.

11-15 (pre-teen, teenage, growing up):

We moved back to India in 1987 and quickly settled in a big house in the then dead quite suburb of Thrikkakara. The house had been built in 1985 and spent 2 years waiting for us. I joined Hill Valley High School, which was quite near my house. It would define me for the rest of my life and will continue to do so until I die. We had some great teachers and the world’s worst lady principle. She was pure evil man! I made a lot of friends but unfortunately I don’t have any contact with any of them now. I also became an atheist at the age of 13! I would have my first crush (my physics teacher Maggie) & second crush (a girl 2 years older called Sofia). In the 9th grade I found out that a quite & sweet Muslim girl had a big crush on me. And then I made my first girlfriend (sort off) an Anglo-Indian called Michelle. No one can accuse me of being a non-secularist! I went for any race or religion! I was also a school leader (one of 4) in my final year. The day after just completing our 10th year final exam, I sat in my room and sang to rock anthems, happy that school was over, but deep in my heart I knew that things would never be this good ever. Can you say Wonder Years?

16-23 (The end of innocence):

Yeah! With the onset of gunge, I set out to college (pre-degree) in Kalamaserry and looking back it was all down hill from there. I made the wrong choices and I made the wrong friends. Let’s just say that my education would stall. I moved to Bangalore at the age of 19 for a year to join a polytechnic but dropped out after a year. I also got my first real love at the age of 17 (after 18 months of wooing her) and had a physical relationship with her. I thought that this was it! Turns out that it wasn’t. 3.5 tumultuous years together and it fell apart. I was devastated but looking back, I’m glad that it didn’t work out, for several reasons. I joined NIIT and had a great 2+ years in that institute. During this time I also worked part time, marketing modems and also with my dad in his business. It was going down and there was nothing that we could do. Money, which was never a problem now suddenly become one. I drifted for a while and then managed an internet cafe and then dropped that to join an e-commerce course for a year.

24-32 (tough times, finding my career and establishing myself):

After the course ended I tried looking for a job but wasn’t finding luck. Then I answered an ad for marketing internet concepts and did that for 3 months. It was pretty lame and I got bored off it soon. A month or so later, I was thinking, I’m almost 26 and no steady job, what do I do? Then I was told by some relatives of a BPO starting up in Calicut and that I should apply for it. I did and I joined up 4 days before my 26th birthday. 8 months later the company went bust and we didn’t get paid for more than 2 months. I almost ran away to Goa since I didn’t want to come back home. I didn’t and 2 weeks after I came home, I got a job in AspinWall – another BPO an hour away from Thrikkakara. It was great for 7 months until I got fed up of the lying and the sales pressure but I made two great friends who are my best friends now. I then moved to join up the customer care of a local cell phone service provider. I became a supervisor in 10 months and 5 months later a Call Center Mentor. My contract ran out after 2 years and they made me join up their service partner in Thoppumpady where I became a trainer. I so enjoyed the training aspect but not the pay and I left them to join my current company. I joined as a trainer and 16 months later, I was promoted to the Training Team lead which I have been doing from July. As of January 1st, I am due for a good pay hike (finally) and I can’t wait.

33 – (the present):

I’m currently an Assistant Manager but still struggling financially as the company has deferred due hikes in salary due to the recession. Meanwhile, more work keeps piling up & pressure keeps mounting.

Oh and along the way, this lonely atheist has had his heart broken a few times and is still waiting for that special woman to take a chance on him. I hope this bio serves it’s purpose and you got to know a lot about me.

The Blog: Just to help you understand the reasons for the font colours – all movies & tv series will be in red, all songs & albums in orange, all book titles in olive, all links in bold maroon & if I have a picture of a person in a post, I’ll mention his/her name in teal (unless it’s obvious that the picture & post is about the same person).

I did a check on my name in Wikipedia and this is what they threw me :

About The Name Of The Blog:The domain name that I chose for my blog is Awake & Dreaming. I started using this name for my blog site that I used in Blogger from 2005 and continued with that name ever since. I used to call it Roshan’s Blog-o-matic but changed it to this as I found it a hell of a lot more appropriate. When people ask me why I chose this name, I am usually not quite so forthcoming. If you google for Awake & Dreaming you will find it is several things, like:-

But how I got the name was by the song Awake & Dreaming by Finger 11, which I love so much and plus I thought it would be a cool name and perfectly describes my character. It’s sad & beautiful at the same time.

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