musings..conjectures..ravings..n what not!!

Indian Cricket in 2050

2007-04-11T23:50:00.000-07:00

The year is 2050 and many things have changed, mostly for the better, compared to 2007. Bangalore roads are not witnessing traffic jams any more. There are no power cuts in any Indian city any more. Munnabhai has just released its 25th sequel with Sanjay Dutt playing a role of a Messiah consecutively for the 20th time and cutting the villain Circuit to size..yes Munna and Circuit went different ways after the 5th sequel coz fan following of Circuit didn’t want him to toe Munna Bhai’s line any more..
But nothing has changed in Indian cricket. Megastar Sachin is now 80 years old and is still very much a leading member of team India. In spite of having all his records broken by people who have retired at less than half his age, Sachin continues to baffle us with his record creating spree. He was recently honoured by Maharaja Sourav Ganguly (still being sponsored by Pepsi using the ‘Bhool to nahin gaye’ campiagn’) on the eve of the last test win India had (in 2007 against South Africa) for his recent feats
1. 50 consecutive ducks in both forms of cricket
2. Playing consecutively for 5 years with hitting a 4 or a 6
3. Playing for 100 matches without ever having taken a double run (he is too old to run you see)
There was however this small matter of India losing its last match to Bermuda by a whopping 413 run margin. A section of the media and past players who had seen the glorious days of Indian Cricket in the 20th century on ESPN and Star Sports bemoaned the decline of Indian Cricket and held Sachin accountable for the same.
In spite of the gag order on players by Sahara BCCI, Sachin talked with this correspondent sponsored by Boost and gave his views on cricket and life in general. Having given his heart and soul for the country he claimed that its unfair to blame him and the entire team should be held responsible. In a heart rending statement, he asked this correspondent as to how he can make runs after having to give 10 ad shoots every day and running errands for his children and grand children. How can his detractors be so cruel and ask him to go back to domestic cricket at this age. How insensitive?
There is however a divided opinion on whether Sachin should be dropped or not. His fans claim that in recognition for the runs he scored in the last century he should be played in the team until he cant stand anymore. BCCI president and Union Govt Minister of Health for Old people Sri Someonekar agrees with this view and maintains that its in the interest of the Indian cricket and some relics should be preserved after all he is the only sports personality we have produced in the last 60 years.

Long time

2007-04-11T22:50:00.000-07:00

Back after a long hiatus and hopefully this time for good..recent events in my life can be enumerated below:

Passed out of IIM (and that too respectfully)
Got a few jobs..one of them at KPMG Middle East and South Asia
Selected the aforementioned job coz somehow peers had fed me info that we engineers can be considered good only if we are in our own domain ( like electrical guys in BHEL/Texas instruments/Samsung etc or like civil guys in Konkan railways/flyover making in somewhere-pur ) or if we do an MBA and get into the finance domain..if u talk well go into financial consultancy like KPMG, EnY, PwC and if you are not very extrovertish go into I banking and make a killing by misrepresenting numbers :) i know i have stereotyped people bigtime :)
Anyways having been fed all this info, I chose financial risk management role at KPMG
Moved to Sharjah where the regional office is current situated
Settling in the new environs and looking for a house (which is another story)
Not watching the world cup at all but avidly reading the WC jokes about India

Thats about it..hopefully wud be able to blog more frequently from now on..

Mumbai Chronicles: Second weekend

2006-05-08T05:16:00.000-07:00

After staying in Bangalore for a couple of years and a year in Lucknow, those two months in kerela for my TCS training where we had ample encounters with huge water bodies seem like some distant (but good) memory..hence this time round I was suitably determined to make most of my stay in Mumbai. So when my good friend in Mumbai invited me over to juhu one evening to visit the chaupati there I jumped at the opportunity.. the joy was however shortlived..the beach was full of people and on top of that we were forewarned by my friend \ that we should not go into the water as many people come here early morning to finish their ablutions i.e. to relieve themselves.. so all we did was to walk on the sand cribbing about our college and making fun of each other’s internship..
That weekend however it was tough twiddling our thumbs in the hostel and we decided to make it to Alibaug atleast.. only me and another guy finally made it..rest of the gang decided to come by evening..we reached at 11am at the Gateway of India (dwarfed as it was by the sprawling Taj Mahal Hotel) and booked our catmaran tickets..we were already soaked to the skin with sweat and there was no reason for us not to buy AC tickets..after taking a few mandatory pictures from my brand new digicam (Canon A520) we boarded the catamaran and it was quickly on its way..Ok forget to mention Catmaran is a kind of boat that allows water to flow through it i.e. it is hollow in the middle and the two ends join only at the deck.
Sitting in the AC we realized that we missed the sea breeze which appeared all the more luring now and so off went out sipping our warmish seven ups and gazing with wonder at different ships passing us by.. finally after one hour and some pictures we reached mandwa gaon ( made famous by a well known amitabh bachhan movie) from where we boarded a bus which took us to alibaug in another 45 minutes..once we reached there we realized that the last catamaran went back at six and it was impossible to come back by then. Hence the first task for us was to get a hotel room for the night..alas our misfortune that we couldn’t find any place to stay..finally we got a place right in front of the beach but it was so dingy that I would refrain from saying any thing more about it except that it barely served our purpose and was reasonably cheap.
We were informed that we would be allowed the rooms only at 6 pm. The sea looked very inviting even in that heat so we just changed a bit and went to the beach. At 4 pm the sea was neither at high tide nor at low tide..so we were able to waddle in a lot of water and gain confidence..even though we had decided to return by 6 to get our room we decided to follow people more and more into deeper ocean until we realized that those people intend to keep walking in the water and reach a far off fort called fort Colaba. It took us some time to realize that we could actually walk the distance and we decided to go for it. It was a merry journey and once we reached the fort we had a great time. We got to the front part of the fort where the sea meets the fort but which was then tranquil and dry. All in all it seemed like some columbusian expedition. We returned back walking at the stroke of six thoroughly tired but the depressing nature of the room drove us back to the ocean.. again a few mandatory pics and oogling at babes and their antics.. none of our batch mates arrived (later we got to know that they had gone to another beach nearby). We had a silent dinner at a dingy south indian hotel.. one of the few things I have learnt from my stay in the south is that if one is not sure about what to eat then just order a meal..they cant screw up the meal more than what it is already.. My poor friend needed a drink but ended up vomiting it all out and that put paid to our hopes for the night and all we did for the rest of the evening was watch the high tide hitting the shores..finally at 12 when we had no recourse but to return back to our dingy room the owner was good enough to bestow us with a kachua chap which seemed very inadequate in protecting us from the fury of the sea mosquitoes.. the night was spent in agony trying to save our exposed skin and hoping for it to end as soon as possible..

With the first rays of light we packed our bags, looked at the inviting sea and then returned back to Mumbai in the afternoon.. we did swore that next time we do something of this kind we would plan everything and then slept heavily in our hostel rooms..

Mumbai Chronicles: First weekend

2006-05-03T23:54:00.000-07:00

Actually I came on a Sunday itself (9th April)… had no place to stay so called up a friend who was staying in the hostel that our famed campus had allotted for us (future CEOs they call us)… the hostel had the most pathetic rooms ever witnessed.. reminded me of those decrepit rooms shown in bengali movies (forget it if u haven’t seen them) and the toilets stank and the water had a bad taste that made one vomit..such was the first impression.. but then one cannot wish for a better location in the city..on one side you have churchgate station where every train starts empty and other side you have marine drive..a haven for love (read lusty) couples and a good place for single guys (or guys whose gals are in some other cities) to gawk..
Ok so now that I have given you a good background let me begin with the recital..actually nothing much infact.. we just decided that we could go to Gateway of India and see that place as it was close by.. frankly I was more enamored by the Taj Mahal hotel there which I believe has robbed the GOI of some of its glory… it was so crowded that I had to walk with my hand on my butt to check my purse at all times..we decided to take a trip on the streamer for half an hour .. I think those 30 minutes passed very quickly and it was a thoroughly joyous time…(we made exotic plans of booking a cruise and having a party on it for a few hours).. the next two hours were spent in idling about looking for suitable place to eat.. finally we went to Leopold which was pretty much a happening place.. (must visit for people who visit colaba) and ate keema at Bade Miya.. finally reached back at 11 but only after finishing the ritual of ogling at gals on marine drive..

Summer Internship

2006-05-03T23:53:00.000-07:00

Going through my internship I am not able to figure out how I should react or feel.
I am in Mumbai for the third time in my life but the earlier occasions were so short that they barely count. For guys like me who have big round eyes that can rotate at every possible angle Mumbai is a city full of good ‘sights’..(will recount some in a later blog) so Mumbai is heaven but then I am away from my gal (cant say whether its good or bad but atleast I could have gone to all the discs and pubs where stag entry is not allowed)

One thing I can say is that summer internship in ICICI Prudential is great. Maybe its coz my expectations were too low but then they treat us like royalty and we indulge ourselves fully… I got a live project in which I have to interact with the business process team (operations) and the IT team so as to evaluate a DSS system for the firm and draw out an implementation plan and ROI.. good for me as I feel if I had a chance of a PPO then this should be it ( but then not an ideal situation when everything depends on you and you cant blame fate or some one else)..
With a TBLA project on general insurance sector and now summer internship in life insurance, my baptism with insurance has come a full circle. I do have some notions about this sector in India.. As of now I don’t feel that my future lies in this sector but then one can never say… learning as much as possible and enjoying the experience is now the paramount objective..let God take care of the rest

P.S.
DSS: Decision support system
ROI: Return on investment
PPO: Pre placement offer
TBLA: Tata Business Leadership Awards

half manager!!

2006-05-03T23:49:00.000-07:00

just got to know this monday that our results have come..I have passed my first year and how....that is not forthcoming..grades will be known a few weeks later only..but anyway who cares.. if the going gets tough i can always harp on an IT job that will send me to europe and US on a regular basis..surely summer internship in a non IT company is an eye opener.. it makes one ponder as to what one wants..anyway had gone to goa last weekend which was quite eventful and will be described in a later blog..hopefully will be blogging regularly from now on..

Quizzes and paranoia

2005-12-16T03:06:00.001-08:00

Another quiz gone..this was of principal importance.. worth 10 marks and could make or break the grade..the topper is about 10 marks ahead of me and I shouldnt allow him anymore leeway if I intend to get an 8 and have a shy at 9.. .. hmm luckily we both made mistakes so the difference remains.. cant help kicking myself for losing such a golden opportunity.. the Prof is an ass hole..what more can I say.. gave two long questions and 20 minutes..plus he wants two page full of the process.. Christ!! .........over 9 steps to be explained before i actually calculate the answer, by the time i reached the main part i forgot what i intended to do with those 6-7 numbers... and when I took an extra sheet to answer all he can say is "no essays".. no wonder he is an asshole...
well I consider him one of the nicer ones around..though repeaters say that he was responsible for many of them repeating this year.. some profs are like.. "ok u guys are not listening to me..so I will take a quiz or a grand viva".. or "why dont u all guys divide urself in groups of 5 and give presentation on each chapter of teh book".. or "why doesnt the class come up with 1080 MCQs( multiple choice questions for the uninitiated) that comes to about 27 each from 10 chapters and then interact among urself to see that they are unique and then submit them to me..if I like them I would include them in the paper"..so sweet of him..the bloody asshole cant think of better ways to make us go in riddles verifying the 27 unique questions..
all this comes with the IIM tag i guess...but its upsetting sometimes to see guys who had come here with high hopes of doing well breaking up and compromising to become average students here..first their dream broke during summers and now all these painstaking "assignments" which piece by piece take away ur sanity... believe me even as small as 2 marks are very important... unless ofcourse u have done well in mid term..but in that case u need to protect ur lead..so still keep working hard...
got to go now..another class about to start because another sadist prof wants to see how our entrepreunerial venture is coming up..yes he made us start our own company with website et al... ours is a event managemnet firm..more about it later.. me following policy of ignoring profs.. hopefully they also ignore me and i get out of this stupid place with atleast all the things that I had when i first come here..

Fighting couples.. a sign of mature love?

2005-12-14T09:18:00.000-08:00

this is to all who are or were in love..
had gone to a marriage recently..met an old friend of mine.. was pretty smart looking in college but now he has become VERY fat and all rich looking if you know what i mean.. I asked him if all this came with the package.. he was pursuing dentistry at a reputed college in the city..having finished his MBBS and now he is doing his MS or soemthing like it.. i was surprised that even dentists could do surgery.. that was a wrong question to ask him coz he rambled on for an hour explaining what he would be doing..ofcourse this blog is not about those gory details..the mashed jaws and the cranial collapse wouldnt make happy reading at all...
well at this middle age we generally end up talking about future and marraige ( stupid subject) and which is waht we did..( gawd i really miss those days when we talked about cricket and movie stars and maybe even novels (with the academically inclined) whole day long...)
anyway here i was asking him about his love life..ofcourse he had one..she hasnt talked at home..he has..foolish guy..now he is trapped... the gal is from Goa..wow..thats one nice place..
then popped a question in my head and i blurted it..do u guys fight? and pronto .. obviously..all the time..sometimes very seriously.. ok i get it..smile and say..thats a sign of mature love..he was impressed and smiled and I was shocked..now when had i thot this over..Is it really true?
Married couples always fight..ofcourse there are some boring couples who dont but then do unmarried couples start fighting when their relationship matures a bit.. obviously its not a sign of boredom or breaking up...maybe its just one more stage in the relationship..
well before we move further, I must clarify that personally I think there is no such thing as fighting with gals.. what my gal thinks as fighting is what i call a healthy flow of ideas between people.
I would consider fighting as something that involves use of legs and arms freely and to good effect.. for gals i guess coming to pow wow would be too nasty.. anyway so maybe most guys have a similar view about fighting..maybe difference of opinion is not akin to fighting for guys but it is a serious fighting matter for gals.
so mature couples fight? ya they do..mainly because they have alreday told each other most of the things they had to say.. u have after all done only a fixed number of things in your life right..how much time can it take to describe all of it.. so then is fighting a means of communication when you have nothing to tell each other??....lots of questions..
will answer them later.. got to submit a few assignments tomorrow :(
anyway when we both left for our homes, both did agree that the dating days were the best.. you could simply go to some nice place like CCD or barista and have a nice time.. those were the good old days...

Poignant end..

2005-12-14T09:02:00.000-08:00

hmmm... it was surprising that the selectors would dump a guy who made 79 runs and take a opener to replace him.. or was it the fact that three very important men who were selecting the team happened to be from the west zone that clicnched the affair.. Now with Kaif's improving performance even Laxman will be on his way out within a year.. but then all this is mere conjecture ... come to think of it, it almost seems that Dravid is enjoying this incident, terming it as a "happy problem".. he should remember the tough times he faced from the selectors and the fans when he used to play like manjrekar.. a strokeless wonder..those were the days of tendulkar and ganguly.. and what about tendulkar? Can we assure him a befitting farewell? He is not at his peak now and maybe he will never reach there again but then he is the best that india has produced and when he retires we should accord him respect and not treat him shabbily..
now back to Ganguly, I am sure people will be outraged and ofcourse they should be.. but then with the team of selectors that is currently there one can rest assured that even Ganguly knew that his days were numbered..This might not be the time to lament about wht he could have done in the next 2 years but to respect the person who has taken India to great heights. maybe after a few years when we see the records and an unbiased assessment is made we will find in Ganguly one of the best captains ever and one who built the team from stratch..someone who played with a passion and brought back the crowds who were suspicious of the team after the betting episode. He has done well..much more than the many who weild the microphones nowadays and I am sure that few years down the line he would return armed with a microphone and will have some nice things to talk about. I havent read any autobiographies of cricketers but his autobiography will surely be interesting..
Anyway India still seems a strong team.. some do detect a slight hint of arrogance in Dravid but he will do well if he can mask it coz good times dont last long..it lasted 5 years for Ganguly.. he would be lucky to get 3 years..

Fuck ho gaya.. :(

2005-12-13T01:09:00.000-08:00

hmmm... studying till 5 am also didnt help.. i studied all the topics and got totally confused.. shudnt blame myself a lot..the subject required me to study regularly.. it was a pity that i realised my mistake the moment i got out.. all these quizes are crap yaar.. 5-10 minutes to solve a problem is ridiculus.. its takes time to assimilate the problem..anyway another subject down the drain.. why does it happen to me.. :(

In the long run everybody is dead

2005-12-12T12:46:00.000-08:00

hmmm.. just as I was posting the last one, i realised what one of my friends was telling me.. he said that he is not getting success in what he is doing but does he really care about it and whether that little bit of success is actually going to count in the end..better be cool...
It suited him big time and set me thinking.. am i not cool??... surprisingly some things that bother most ppl dont bother me... like bad marks( got so used to it that a few marks less here and there wont matter i feel) but then somethings do bother me.. like sincere effort not paying off...( just to clarify.. marks are not a reflection of effort.. they are a reflection of smart study.. somehow I havent been abe to master it till now).. so I am not cool.. I am more of a passionate guy who is really charged about things he wants to do in life... thats what actually drives me to do things maybe.. if I am cool about something..that is because I dont care about it.. which is bad I guess...
to divert from the topic.. I need to slog it out tonight for a mana quiz.. If i dont get full marks I have a long haul ahead of me to salvage the remnants of my grade ( Gawd, I really wish I had intelligence.. would have screwed everybody out here)
My GF got me a sweater from Ireland, a shirt, some books,, dunno when she plans to send it over.. her heart will break it seems if they get lost..I guess she better keep it with herself.. her broken heart wud mean spending a few hundreds on the phone nursing it back ( anyway she wud call but then I am not such an ass hole that I would make her spend so much money rite GF?)
bye for now...
lots of things coming up..

Life is not bull crap...

2005-12-12T12:31:00.000-08:00

In retaliation to the last blog in which I was cribbing quite a bit about things not working out.. i must say that there have been lots of things that would have been worse and thankfully they are not... I have a ready supply of friends and surely they are of great help.. I have a gem of a gal friend..surely she eats my brains sometimes but then she is more than worth it..I am good physically, all bones in the right places and all vital parts working fine.. a great family which reminds me that I need to call them up...
then what else.. well i got into IIT and now into IIM..not many ppl can say that..people just see the results and they look way above average.. so maybe they perceive me differently than what i do myself..maybe i always look at myself at what i can be and what I currently am..because of which i am always dissatisfied..
went to a wedding yesterday.. kind of nice to be introduced as the guy studying at IIM... U generally become the center of attraction and have a steady gathering of young wannabes asking for guidance.. dunno if i handle all that stuff well... I am almost 24 now though I still think of myself as 17 odd.. guess all this is shown when i interact with ppl..no wonder I am so popular with females :P just kidding.. My interaction with females (even in IIMs ) is mainly through porn as is the wont of almost 80% of the junta here.. the remaining 20% junta are the ones busy making them :)..dont quote me on that one :)

Is Life Weird?

2005-12-12T12:16:00.000-08:00

Dont know if i have to pay for this blogging time by sleeping a couple of hours less tonight or rather morning.. havent really thought it over but i do think life is weird.. let me disect myself first.. i am studying here at IIM and slogging it out with the outside world thinking that I am so lucky..but is that really so.. Has God really been fair? I mean i really worked hard for that IIT..and throughly deserved it..but then isnt it unfair that he didnt reward me any further.. so much so that i came out of that institute with a blank head and a degree to boot.. well not exactly a blank head.. i still had ambition and hope that maybe i was cut out for better things.. ( I should say that being in teh company of some really intelligent ppl at IIT helped.. makes u think that anything is possible).. well gave cat..God blessed me with good luck again.. i must say that seeing all teh hard working guys here.. i think my getting thru IIM L was a fluke.. but then many times i have not got well deserved successes so better grab whatever i can get.. but now this.. GOd has put me in this institute and taken away all my luck.. provided me ample opportunities to succeed but never allowed me to win... this has been going on for almost 4-5 months.. my gut feeling says that success is just round the corner but then this period is hard... knocks on ur psyche every few days in the form of bad marks and results of various events I participate is reinforcing the fact that actually God might have wanted to punish me rather than reward me..he did the same by putting me into IIT.. he gave me opportunities and I tried.. but couldnt get anything..where does that leave me? a very bad feeling in the heart...maybe ..just maybe i could have been at the very top of this world, had a few things turned out a little differently.. dunno if I should ask life for any more favours..U never know what kind of challenges i might get in future.. of course me not scared of challenges.. I revel in them...its the continuous failures thats worrying me.. I have suddenly not become useless.. atleast at par with the guys here.. com'n I am sure I can do better than these guys here and i am trying also.. its just that things have not been working according to my plans for a long long time.. glad that I am an eternal optimist.. God will surely relent :)

final exam for the first term !!!

2005-09-22T17:02:00.000-07:00

Gosh..its 5:40 am.. had two exams yesterday....left almost half the course but didnt dare to skip my sleep that time round and here i am waking up all night for the last term paper.... but then this is QAM with all its linear programming.. so wierd that by the time i finish the question I forget what i wanted to do..
even before the term i knew I had to focus on this subject having done really pathetically compared to my batchmates.... so as a penance while my friends are sleeping all over campus I am slogging it out and calling up my groggy batchmates to solve some pertinent doubts..cant blame them when they scream that they are sleeping!!!!!!
anyway paper ends at 12 and then for atleast 8 days I wont have to bother about the curriculum..dont know if people will be looking forward to coming back for another gruelling schedule next term.. I for sure wont be but the such is life..one compromises the most for things one hates the most..

food poisoning

2005-09-08T02:17:00.000-07:00

last two days were holidays and that was not a good enough reason to enjoy. almost 100 ppl were down with food poisoning. there was some food in the mess which resulted in such a disastrous situation. however kudos to the student council and the students of IIM L who volunteered and got the situation under control.. great effort that needs to be applauded. Now that classes have started again, it remains to be seen when the sick guys will be able to recuperate fully. The quizzes and exams have been postponed so as to facilitate their speedy recovery. hope there is fair play..

IIML Odyssey

2005-09-08T02:01:00.000-07:00

Long time no see!! this is what blogger told me when i logged in today.. and gosh its almost two months since i came here... this is what the IIM L system does to u.. lose out on the few merries that life gives...
lots of exams, quizzes and presentations later i feel exhausted. the remunerations that I get in the form of marks is in little concurrance with the hard effort put in. competition is tough and people say that when it comes to the grades even a 0.25 difference will matter. well as of now i am getting marks in the average to below average range and with just 10 days to go for the end term exam, there is little to be done that can suddenly stanch the free flow of marks.
all that can be done is keep the belief that things will work out..
atleast the big picture shud be kept in mind..
signing off on an optimistic note

fear!!

2005-07-07T05:35:00.000-07:00

My classes for the first three days of week start at 8:30 am. This means that even after negotiating with the watch and pushing it to the very extremes also, I have to get up by 7:30 am. The professor who takes the first class ( or rather cless as he pronounces it) might be a good man at heart but he seems a strict diciplinarian. If it is 8:30 then one cant enter the class after that and the attendance is gonefor the day. Believe me attendance is a big issue here. Not only u lose all that is taught in class if the attendance is less that 80% u have to repeat the whole year. Apart from this all professors expect the guys to read not only all that he has taught but also the things he will teach in the current class. If he asks u a question and u dont answer or give a educated guess regarding what the appropriate answer would be, there is a huge chance that u might be thrown out of class without attendance. The significance of the attendance cannot be undermined at this place.
Now where does this place me. I have three clocks including the cell phone all set at different times so as to coax and cajole me out of my drowsiness. However the fear of missing a lecture has till now disturbed my sleep much before the actual time to wake up and even though i sleep till the last possible nanosecond, I have to stop having this fear of getting up late and missing the lectures.
This fear psychosis might be due to a pretty bad incident in my college life when during my third year, a professor had scheduled his test early morning ( early morning bole to 8:30 am). As usual I had studying till late nite understanding most of the things and then I woke up at 8:50 am. I couldnt believe that I am missing a test and this is to say a lot coz i have never missing any god damn test in my whole life. I had to run helter skelter to reach the department and somehow did whatever possible in twenty minutes. The prof was good enuf to allow me in. Anyone just had to take a look at me to know what the situation was.I cant blame my friends or neighbours coz they did say they knocked the door heavily and thought i had woken up. The fact that I did pathetically due to lack of time is not that important coz doing well in tests was insignificant but that incident changed me and after that I have never been the same.
Guess until I get into the routine of waking up early on my own till then i would keep having these weird nightmares of missing classes :-(

4 days into IIM L

2005-07-07T05:25:00.000-07:00

I havent got a comp yet coz i spent an unusual amount of time in deliberating about what to get. finally i have decided. The school is not wifi enabled and I would like a equipment i am already pretty comfy with so desktop suits me best. I would be getting the comp by tuesday I guess. Its pouring assignments now that 4 days have passed. I still believe that its not justified to study till 5 am every day in the library. Guess some ppl have their motives skewed.
I can say that the place sucks coz the freshers here do spoil the party by continuously mugging up things that are just supposed to be analysed. I guess one need not learn the mathematics on how the histograms and statistical analysis came into play but these guys really think about putting in those three hours for every hour of lecture. I can only hope that three months down the line many ppl would be discouraged from really putting so much effort into such things. Its tough to keep 'enjoying' when u know that all the other guys seem to be building ur coffin. The place isnt spilling over with intelligent paranoids ( Thank god for that).
Quite a few guys are spending their time trying to get friendly with the female population. I did have a charmed life in bangalore but since coming back to lucknow I seem to have lost the touch. I rather prefer the relaxed company of guys nowadays. C2D ( refer five point someone) might come into the picture in a months time.
Focussed thinking does have its advantages. Actually I wanted to do some career prep after reaching here. First things first is that I decided to not try for lateral placements at all. I would focus purely on financial consulting. I wouldnt stick my neck out and say what sub division in this field. In all likely hood it might be something to do with the share market and stuff.

Committees here are pretty important and help the guys here to understand the nuances of managment much more clearly than one can ever imagine understanding from the book. I have thought about joining one. Initially it was placecom( placement committee), then manfest ( management festival) and now it is industrial interaction cell (the existance of a pretty damsel belonging to the senior batch in the committee is an added incentive). I believe I have a natural aptitude towards marketing but the job profile doesnt suit my interest. Maybe I can put some marketing also in the job profile I would finally want to get into.Rite now its fun dividing the time between playing either pool or table tennis or badminton. the latter takes a heavy toll as my fitness is not up to the mark.

Got to go now. This was written in a hurry. Next time maybe I might put some more humour quotient into it. nowadays the only humour I can generate is by making so called sexist remarks and commenting on the female anatomy. In IIM L I guess the first thing that happens to u is that the feeling of being harried keep lurking in some corners of ur brain all the time.

IIML

2005-06-28T09:22:00.000-07:00

This is my second day in IIML. I had prepared for Cat for well over 4-5 months and then wrecked my head during the interview periods and now that i am finally at L i feel no particular emotion. infact i have this gnawing feeling that maybe i havent thot this over particularly well. i had quite a settled life in bangalore and things were not going all that bad. true that i had lost interest in the job but that could have been solved by switching jobs. anyway my policy of no regrets still holds. it seems that a lot of slogging is in store.
the campus is beautiful. its big ( no swimming pool) and all the sports facilities are there. my hostel is thankfully the best hostel in the campus. some hostel rooms in other hostels are really bad. it surely feels much better to be in the hostel room. however the action is all outside. the table tennis room, the pool room are all close by.
The guys here ( havent interacted with gals yet) seem ok and well grounded. However this is the period when ppl try to impress each other showing their best side. The worst thing abt coming to a new place is having to make new frnds. Its difficult to start from zero all the time even though i love getting to know new ppl and going places.
The mess is the best place according to me. Lunch and dinner are palatable and with the snacks provided in the evenings it seems a pretty neat arrangement. Havent checked out the canteen as yet but since it opens all nite I dont think it will be long before i try that out too.
The seniors here do talk abt sincerity in acads. Now that comes naturally to me but then in management so many other things also come into the equation. I would like to join either placecom or Manfest. Ppl say that even though joining the committee is worth the trouble it takes a heavy toll on academics. Now if academics are bad then things wont look rosy to me. Rite now it seems that i will have an enviable task of doing well in acads as well as doing justice to the committee i join. lets see what the future has in store.

last week in office

2005-05-27T05:22:00.000-07:00

yippeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...
last friday in office..i will have to come for some formalities on monday and tuesday but i have completed my work and will be just coming to chat, blog and for full time aish..looking forward to IIM Lucknow fresher's party on saturday and then watching Bunty and babli...
anyway last one year in tavant was fruitful in ways and in some ways hectic.. i couldnt go onsite because of CAT and my own inability to match up with my peers in office. but then finally i was able to realise my dream of studying at IIM. so it was overall a good year:-)
now lets see how much IIM L has to offer..

Tirupati

2005-05-24T01:35:00.000-07:00

A trip to tirupati is always considered to be a milestone in a life of every hindu devotee and since i felt i should bethankful for all that God has bestowed me with, I promply booked my tickets and went over to Tirupati a week back courtesy Tirupati-Tirumala travels or should I thank APSRTC i am not sure about that. I suppose there is no need to thank anyone since i paid a lot of money but then on hind sight the journey was pretty smooth and hassle free which is to say a lot coz most of my sojourns have been quite a pain most of the time.
It was a friday and the bus was at seven at a place far away from my home so had to scamper back home and pack things up by 6 and reach the bus stop. The bus as is the wont of all its caste and creed turned up late and the time was well spent in looking at the empty race course nearby and wondering as to how it would be when in use. Any how when the bus did arrive, it was not surprising to find that the TV was chanting holy shlokas praising Lord Balaji to the skies for the entire duration of the journey. God has his own ways of making people listen to good things and in my case I was able to hear some shlokas ( without understanding them of course) over the radio city I was hooked onto using my cell phone. So much for wishing for a sound sleep. I did sleep off later only to woken up immediately at 3 am. We had reached a hotel or ashram or whatever u call it but it was a monolithlic hotel with lots of rooms and we were informed that we should take a bath and come back in an hour. we duly did that but then there are always some ppl who get a manic pleasure in being late for everything so we started late and reached the hill top at about 5 am. Even then it was not really shocking to find that almost 500 ppl were already standing before us and waiting for their chance. However we were able to do the darshan and stuff by 7:30 am. It was a bit of a let down that we were able to just get a sneek peek at the deity for whom we had come so far. The ppl who were monitoring devotee movements were pushing the devotees quite roughly that helped in making the system effective ( as there was little or no clogging) however i wouldnt give them much marks for maintaining aesthetics.
However it was a moving experiance to witness so many ppl having so much faith in that place and faith is what accords a place its religious importance and lends spiritual value.
Anyway we were back in the bus by 8 am and came back to the monolithlic whatever i mentioned before and had our breakfast. even at 8-9 am the weather was becoming humid and the heat reaching intolerable levels so I guess it must be requiring more that simply religious fanatism to go there late in the afternoon. We had to go to some other temple made in honour of Lord Balaji's consort. I skipped going to the temple and prayed from outside and went window shopping instead. Even as i was raring to get a sound sleep on the way back they started showing the movie 'dhoom' at such high decibels that the options of doing anything other than watching the movie were next to nill. however the movie was worth watching more than once and so the time seemed well spent. Needless to mention that the coach was an AC coach and hence it was much easier to relax inside.We reached back at 4pm and thankfully without sun burns.:)
This was one trip I was waiting for quite some time and I think I was lucky to go there. I didnt find any particular reason why this temple was so different from myriads of other temples we see all over the country but then its all a matter of faith.

movies :-)

2005-05-17T06:55:00.000-07:00

I am watching lots of movies nowadays..saw kingdom of heaven a week back. Nice movie and well made. That is the only factor that distinguished it from troy.. ( Troy relied heavily on achillis and hector for the success of the movie. though i was pretty impressed with the role played by hector) KOH has a good story and Orlando Bloom looks gullible enuf to endear the audience towards him. However the movie misses a charater like russel crowe who took gladiator to great heights. hence i will be surprised if KOH gets any oscars for acting.The actress who played Isabel was beautiful but wooden and in one scene she did get out some guffaws from the audience when she asked bloom whether he didnt know the reason why she was in his room late at night when she was honourable married to another guy:-)
The king of jerusalem played by Norton and Salah-ud-din played by some one else were roles well etched out and scott gave these characters a lot of respect. Infact the best lines in the movie were given to the king of jerusalem. If he had lived he wud have changed history from what I heard of him.
I also saw Cleopatra that weekend making it a weekend of period movies for me. Cleopatra was a good infact great classic..the chemistry between liz taylor and richard burton was sizzling and timothy dalton also played the part of caesar really well.words fail me when i try to talk abt liz taylor's performance as the protagonist. this is a film worth watching just for her..She is a woman with all her failings and reminds one of Scarlett O'hara in gone with the wind. An irrepresible woman she wanted everything in life and died a sad woman.
another thing i noticed about the movie was that caesar was shown as a great king and general and a person capable of decision making and leading his men to victory while marc antony( the right hand man of caesar) was a capable general who was good at leading an army but not good at decision making. He had to be told by Cleopatra what should be done and not using his brains whether it was right or wrong. he later proved to be a simpleton and forced into a battle with Rome unwillingly.He gives a lot of food for thought for wannabe managers. Every person is capable of some tasks and does them well. however if he is good at one thing he might not be equally good at all things. An efficient person may not be an equally good at innovativeness. For a manager it is imperative to find out what are the things he is good at and try them only. Its not that he shouldnt try his hand at other skills but if it hurts the organisation then he should refrain. while delegating work to others he shud find out what the person is good at instead of assigning tasks in an arbit manner and thus decreasing efficiency. enuf funde for today:-)
I watched the matrix series again to try to interpret what the movie is trying to portray. Somehow watching the movies one feels that it is sending out a message about karma and the purpose of life and the need of "choice" which distinguishes us from robots.
well more on that later:-)

perceived lack of application skills

2005-05-04T07:52:00.000-07:00

Today sitting on my luxurious chair in my office I ruminated over what I had discussed with a colleague at work place couple of days back regarding his lack of thinking poweress or more specifically his lackof application as I put it. Sometimes u look at others and u feel hey this person is so intelligent, so smart so much everything that I wud like to be and how come God forgot me so blatantly when he was pushing me down on mother earth and into india along with 50 other morons at the same minute as me. ( At that time we had 51 kids facing the brave new world every minute:-) ). The more I think about it the more I feel its a maliase affecting quite a few ppl including me.
India, where childhood consists of consistantly doing well in exams (that would give u sufficient lee way to do things u want to do) is not forgiving to seemingly ordinary ppl. Clearing board exams with 90 + percentage, then going to IIT for ur engineering degree, working in a top notch IT company( under extreme duress at times not only because of work but also coz of some un - understanding manager) why shud such a person feel that he has lack of application skills and that he is no good.. maybe its because no matter how much u achieve there is always some one doing better than u and when one is given a disposition of trying to do better than everybody, one easily falls prey to the despondency of being so inadequate to such a task.
A mom or a dad would be pleased with such a son ( worth his weight in gold.. with both IIT and IIM in the kitty. he is worth much in the marriage market :-)).. a Gal frnd might be adoring u for all that u are..( though that doesnt usually stop the fights for all the stupid reasons in world right from not having the right expression in the face at the right time to why our budget is not doing more to save money for females). It doesnt really help to see ur once thin flat tummy finally showing signs being well fed and protruding from all sides while the rest of the body remains constant..( reminds one of the skinny african guys who have a protruding tummy). This seems to be the bane for most guys working in the software industry.
So now here I am with a protruding tummy( I think the culprits are those butter laden naans I had with alarming regularityin the past few months ) and a weird sort of feeling that even though I am now among the best in the country, I havent ever done "exceedingly" well. Maybe its just a feeling that you get when u see someone doing better than you in some specific domains which reminds us of our failures in them though maybe overall u might be a better person.
In my colleague's case, the problem was pretty specific, "perceived lack of application skills".. there are things u are understood to know, understood to be applied by any tom, dick or harry, no one needs to tell u that but still sometimes u end up dismayed to find that u cannot apply it ur self unless somebody tells u how it can be done. If the problem assigned to u at work is something that has not been implemented before u feel all giddy at the thought of prospective timelines and feel like putting off every good thing in life until u finish that job. No, its not that u are not able to achieve ur target, its the feeling that it would have been done by others so easily then why did u have to make such an effort to do a similar thing. Is it just plain vanilla inferiority complex or is it the fact that nobody acknowledges the excellence that u obviously possess that helped u to perform a task that u perceived was easy but was actually pretty tough.
If that is the case then something is wrong in the system which doesnt adequately acknowledge all the ppl who are part of the team and who have in their own small or big way contributed to the success ( and hence leading to ppl feeling worthless or less confident about their skills) or maybe perception management is faulty by the person concerned. In this era of competition, one needs to let ppl know how good he is or how much work he is doing. However if he perceives that his original issue of application skills are pertinent and that now he is no longer the guy who can keep up to the scorching pace that others have set him up for then what can he do..should he look for a respite from job, take a break and try to analyse himself and come back strongly after recuperating or if he finds he is not interested in the job he is in, he shud try to take proper measures to get the job he likes and where his application skills, which seem so persistantly absent in his current job, are utilised in full measure.
Seems a simple solution but difficult to execute

My first post

2005-04-28T02:58:00.000-07:00

this is my first post and i must say that i like this idea of blogging after reading some really stupendous post by others here..
as of now i am just another bored software engineer working in a IT firm in bangalore. Bored in the sense that today I have no work so much so that i am posting on a blog..
having worked in the IT industry for a couple of years now, apart from a bit of moolah that i get to pocket every month, i had some really interesting experiances and something that i would have reminiscenses about for quite some time.
Some intro abt me:
I am from lucknow and studied there itself..lady luck smiled and gave me a much coveted engineering rank is the prestigious IITJEE and Roorkee entrance exam. I continued my studies at Roorkee. Somehow stumbling past four years and scrambling past the finish line with a degree and a job in TCS ( so much for coming out with flying colors)..
did my training in trivandrum.. (a really great place with good memories).. i came to bangalore where i am stationed for almost two years now..meanwhile i got bored in TCS in may 2004 ( easy living also has its own draw backs) i switched to another software company, tavant technologies in bangalore.. now work was hectic but i wanted more.. ( greedy me:-) )..
gave cat this year...got calls from all the IIMs and converted IIM L ... good enough for me so finally after being out of my home city for almost 6 years here I come back to my home city for most probably the two best years of my life ( and surely the most hectic period also)..
that enuf of an intro..
By the way, before coming to bangalore i belonged to the "niche batch of virgin guys" who never interacted with gals but blore has been pretty kind to me where i have had gal friends most of teh time apart from female colleagues willing to talk to me also:-)
i will be posting some interesting experiances later..
as of now me taking a break..
i hope the boring part about me is over..

rupak