A letter to my unborn child

Dear Son/Daughter,

As I write this you are still at least half a decade away from coming into this earth. By the time you make it here so much would have changed, and the experiences you will have will be vastly different and more amazing than I ever did when I was a kid.

But there is one thing which you will never ever be able to experience. And I feel sad for you that you can't. I felt it the first time at the age of 5. It has no name, but it does have certain specific characteristics. When it starts your heartbeat quickens, palms become sweaty, adrenaline rushes through your body, goosebumps everywhere, one of the purest highs you can get. You forget everything, work, play, school, tiffins, marks, the pretty classmate, mom, dad, everything. And you wait, without breathing. 

Suddenly you see him, walking out into the ground, bat tucked beneath his hand, helmet already on, staring into the sun; and the crowd starts to chant his name louder and louder. He walks up to the crease, adjusts his protective gear and you are almost hyper ventilating. A bowler runs in, like a lamb led to slaughter, bowls what he thinks is a good delivery. The ball is met with a bat that is straighter than any thing you will ever see, the ball running past the bowler down the ground, kissing the turf, bisecting the angle, over the boundary. And your heart erupts with joy, almost orgasmic joy. Every time you hear the crack is like best moment of your life. Imagine having every moment for hours as the best moment of your life.

And then suddenly he is gone. Your heart breaks like a dry piece of wood. You feel cheated, disheartened, dismayed, disillusioned. Your entire world crumbles around you in that very instant. Nothing seems worth living for, fighting for. As he walks back to the pavilion the entire nation rises as one, applause thundering, the crowd still chanting his name. He raises his bat slightly, acknowledging the crowd, neither subservient, nor over bearing.

Imagine if a person could give you all of life's emotions in the course of a single innings and then do it over and over again for over 20 years. You get to live your entire life all over again, every single time he walks out to bat.

My child, today I feel very profound sadness that you will never experience any of this. All you will have are videos on youtube, just shadows and mockeries of the originals. You will never believe why so many boys of my generation were named the same. You will never know how much my heart aches today, when he decided to quit. You will never know of the Desert Storm, or believe that 250 runs can be made without a single cover drive, that at 38, a man can score 200 runs in an ODI (heck! I don't even think you will know what ODIs are!). You will never know that a single upper cut over third man made an entire nation scream in joy. You will never know that with a bad bad bad back, 135 runs can be made against our bitter-most cricket enemies on minefield. You will never see the pure joy on his face of finally winning the world cup.

But one thing you, your kids, their kids and even their kids will surely know. Once upon a time, there was a God who walked amongst mortals, and his name was Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar.

Love,

Pa

Of Farewells and New Beginnings!

I am a sucker for this whole emotional-sentimental thing. I love to watch replays of hall of fame induction speeches, applause for a lifetime of work and effort. I always tear up when these guys (and gals) go through their life stories and reveal these little gems which shine like the brightest diamonds.

Today is my last day working out of the H.O. for the foreseeable future. I will move into the Gurgaon depot from next Monday, spending the current week in Mumbai for product training. I had never thought that this would be so difficult for me to think about. Although I am ridiculously happy and cant wait to be an ASM, I will really really miss working out of the H.O. There is this great feeling of emptiness that creeps in when I think of not being in the H.O. and seeing the guys I am used to seeing everyday.

I guess this is what is meant by institutionalization! My cubicle mates, the TT gang, Finance guys and the whole 4'o clock snack chat group will be sorely missed. I will miss talking to Rajeev and Sunder, gaining some seriously awesome insights into selling paints. I will most definitely miss talking to Boss regularly (sorry, even while typing I cant say Manish or Mr. Bhatia, he will always be boss!) and just jumping into a knowledge pool of how to run a business. I will miss calling up random people and talking like a sheik! Yeah! I did that a lot!

4 gals, Kavitha, Monica, Isha and Anshika gifted me a super sexy, kick-ass book on guitars as a farewell gift! I don't think I have been so touched by any other gift. Ever. It is going to help me get over this feeling of bereavement a lot. But mostly I am really happy that these guys are more friends and less colleagues! I think my Gallop answers will be quite different going forward about my working space.

And so I move on to a new role. I am, to paraphrase Russel Crowe from "A Beautiful Mind", terrified, mortified, petrified by it! But also excited, happy and full of adrenaline. And the best thing about all of this is that I know that so many people in the H.O. have got my back.

Adios 20th Floor, building no. 5, DLF Cyber Terraces, Gurgaon!

See you when the rain comes home!

Live regret free, at least Die trying......

Sometimes its difficult to think about a certain thing. I recently got the news today that 3 of my family elders had passed away in 48hrs. It kind of forced me to think about my own mortality. Not that its the first time I have done it. You often read that many people come face to face with their morality at a certain point in life, usually when someone close dies, and its usually when the person has reached middle age. Surprisingly, I have thought about my death from quite an early age. I am shit scared of death. Not the physical aspect of it, but just the fact after a point in time you will have no memories, no thoughts, no understanding. It is described as being a continuous dreamless sleep from which you cannot wake up. Many people find it soothing, I personally find it disturbing. I like living my life way too much to die. I sometimes think that I would be one of those who would struggle to let go of life till the very very end. I just hope my death is not drawn out and painful, and its easy on whomsoever has the misfortune to be besides me in that time.

I think I realize what everyone means when they say that life is way too short to waste it. I am 25 years old, I cannot even remember where these years have gone by. They will never come back. Do I have any regrets? Yes, a few, but I also have some really good memories and loads of stuff that I am proud of. I don't know how long or how the rest of my life is gonna be. It could be better or worse. But I would really really like to live it without any regrets. I think that is the main aim for most of us. If we can live our lives without regret, we will definitely end having a very happy life. In times of serious contemplation such as this, its easy to think about not living a life of regret. But what about every Monday morning when you head out to work, will you try and remember this philosophy and implement it? I think we use the cloak of our daily schedules to hide our fear of failure when we try and live without regrets. Should I ask that girl out that I really really like? No man, what if she says no? She won't even be my friend anymore. I think I should quit my job cause I really don't like it. Screw it man, it pays well, and I have a frigging loan to pay off. Fuck, that dude in office is pissing me off, I should go and give him a piece of my mind. Are you insane? He is close to your boss, your career is so fucked if you do something like that.

We live in constant fear. I know, cause I am afraid like nobody's business. I sometimes try to overcome the fear, most of the times I fail. I think the day I will loose this fear, I will have such a happy and fulfilling life. And believe me when I say this, I try and try to do it. But I really can't do it. I don't know why. I have so many dilemmas in mind you will not guess. I somehow need to find the inner strength to do what will help me live regret free. I need to have the guts to go up to the woman I like and tell her so. I need to be able to work in a place that I like and do the work which I think I will be happy doing, not chase a career which means I end up doing a highly paid but UN-satisfying job. Most importantly I need to have the courage to pick up my life and move on even if I fail in all things I want to do.

Meanwhile I continue to contemplate my own death and the feeling of nothingness. As I write this I am scared as hell.

"Into the valley of death rode the six hundred..."

An Open Letter to Virat Kohli.

Dear Virat,

At the outset, please forgive any spelling/grammatical/any other errors that may creep in to this letter. My hands are trembling as I write this and my eyes are sore from rubbing in disbelief.

You know, about twenty years ago, in Perth, Australia, another Indian batting line-up had faced a great Aussie bowling attack and was folding up. A young man in his late-teens stood up and played an innings which defined the next two decades for Indian cricket fans. It gave us the belief that no matter how badly we have played, whether we have won or lost, we will always, always have a shining star to be proud of.

Today, at the fag end of another inglorious Aussie summer for Indian cricket, we have witnessed you play an innings which may come to redefine the next decade or two for us fans. But Indian cricket fans are skeptics first, admirers second. Hence we ponder, question and doubt. But today we also believe. We believe that you have what it takes to climb to the top of the mountain and stay there. We believe you will pour sweat, blood and tears into your practice and games. We believe that you will dive to get another run every time its needed. We believe that you will cart the world's foremost artisan of the yorker everywhere around the ground, everywhere around the world.

Virat, please, we are not a rational breed of humans. We will not forgive a single mistake and expect a miracle every time you go out to bat. We will forget that doing endorsements doesn't mean you are lazy about your game. We will be unreasonable like nobody's business. We will ridicule you, use #viratsucks till it trends on twitter, never give you even a moment's rest.
Please do not disappoint us. We want you to succeed, you have no idea how badly we want you to succeed. We want it this badly because none of us can even dream of putting in the work you do day in and day out for the love of the game.

But if you bear us through all of this, and play, just play like you did today, we will idolize you. We will worship your photos, build temples and shrines on random village roads. You will be a demigod for us. And then maybe after another momentous night 15 years later, another young Virat Kohli on national television will be proud to carry you on his shoulders because you carried the whole team for so long.

Virat, thank you for today.

We Believe.

- A crazy cricket fan

Sunshine of Happiness

Its kind of weird, the time at which I write my posts, now being 4:11 am on 05 July, 2010.

But it has been that kind of a day or rather night.

Long time ago, my mother had told me that if you can find happiness in other's joy, you will be happy more often than not. At point in my life when I am facing one of my lowest lows, it is on a dark and rainy night that I have found the glow of happiness within. It is after such a long time that I am truly happy from the inside. Superficial happiness is always transitory, true happiness one can bundle and take along in one's heart like a beacon of never ending light. And this light is the sunshine of happiness, eternal and supreme. And it is even more radiant for the fact that I am for not myself but someone else.

I had a good feeling about today.

It has been that kind of a day rather night :D

Cheers,

moksha

The Chennai Diaries: 21/04/2010

Hey!

Its 8:58 am on my laptop and I am at Mumbai's Chatrapati Shivaji Domestic Airport. After spending the past week and a half in Mumbai/Goa on what can be termed only as a paid vacation, its time to do some serious work and hence GCPL has packed me off to Chennai. Its one more of life's jokes that a person who would give his right arm to do this project from Mumbai needs to go to Chennai and work out the project in the south. Hence this series of posts will be labelled the Chennai Diaries, capturing the life and times of a GCPL summer intern in an unknown city.

The past few months can be termed as the months of discontentment. There was soo much internal negativity around everything I did or wanted to do, that I ended up doing quite a bit of crap in the first 3 months of the year. Not quite the way I would have wanted to start of the year! But things are slowly getting better, and I have had probably the best days of the entire year in the last week and a half. So when I was told that I needed to get to Chennai asap, I thought God's magnum rifle is out again. Going to Chennai means leaving a lot of things behind, friends, Mumbai, family, vada pav, but you always need to take the rough with the smooth. But I guess I am beginning to understand how chacha must have felt when he left for Hyderabad and also why the 'cutie pie' had such a radiant smile at the airport. I guess when you live with a bunch of people for 8 months straight 24X7 you get attached wether you like it or not, wether you want to or not. And this attachement is usually stronger towards people rather than the place itself. I mean if I had Sumeet, Maddy, Chacha, Bheem, Balls and the rest of the gang in Chennai, that would become heaven!

So Chennai it is. I have been to Chennai before but that was quite a while back somewhere abouts 2002, gosh thats already 8 years man! I hope that Chennai doesn't turn out to be as boring as people have told me. Language is a big barrier in that city I agree, but that does not mean non-Tamil speaking people don't survive in Chennai. I hope that I can get to know the city very well and explore it properly and have a good time. Prima facie it doesn't look like it, but still, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Work is going to be hectic but I guess I'll be learning a lot since my project involves a lot of field visits ans stuff. My guide is pretty awesome and pretty busy so its kinda hard both ways. Actually I am pretty sacred about my work. I guess its just the fact that I have never worked before, so these are like pre-game jitters and stuff. The FMCG industry is so varied and changes so fast that its quite scary to try and understand the industry as a whole in just about 2 months. I just hope that I don't end up maing a complete fool of myself out there. There are a lot of decisions to be made, right from wether FMCG is the right place for me to work to wether GCPL is worth the effort.

I think I am defined by the randomness of thoughts that prevade my mind at any given point of time. The key is to find the chain that links each of these thoughts together. It sometimes surprises even me as to how many different thoughts can co-exist in a human brain. So I struggle to find that calm, that lost island of equanimity within. Meanwhile, is it a sign from the Gods or fate's way of testing me further, I don't know but my flight just got delayed again!

See you when the rain comes home!

cheers,

Omkar

In Retrospect...... :D

So it has ended..... officially the first year of my MBA @ MDI is over and done with.

The farewell party for the seniors is done and dusted with. When we come back next term on June the 14th we are going to be seniors. Thats pretty scary. Scary because according to me thats a big responsibility, especially in a course like MBA. I remember the Ecclesia we had in Mumbai last year. We met up with so many seniors and alumni. I got a lot of sound advice from most of the people I met there. I think the Buffet Dinner analogy was the best. :D

Past one year has been one of tremendous ups and downs. I have learnt many new lessons and re-learnt many of the old ones. I wanted to do a lot of things at MDI, some I could do, some I could not. The learning curve has been pretty steep for me. Slowly it has dawned on me that there are more thorns than roses in anybody's path.

But for me the past year is not characterized by the thorns but the roses that I have picked up. It is about the amazing set of friends I have made. It is about the awesome singing sessions on Gurukul steps. Its about dancing to Rang De Basanti at sunrise on Pammi's birthday. Its about Sumeet chasing me all over Kshitij for jumping on top of him. Its about Vindi's closed mouth. Its about Phillip mistaking the headlights of a truck for two bikes in a fog and trying to pass between them. Its about Sachin beating us at bowling and Suraj loosing his sleep over it. It is about Mohit going crazy with Imperium fund re-imbursment. Its about Shubhayan getting caught cheating in an exam. Its about Nitin getting drunk and showing me the middle finger. Its about Nadi shouting expletives at random rickshaw waalas at IFFCO chowk. Its about 'You say sssupp...... we say Bhabi!!'. Its about Priyata trying to speak proper Hindi. Its about Ritambara breaking her bed. Its about Ayushi topping Corporate Finance. Its about Dev becoming a hero. Its about Bala picking up luggage. Its about 'awww...' and 'there....there'. Its about JD staring. Its about Divya fretting about a 0.01 drop in her CG. Its about Puja and PUPI. Its about Anup and his PJs. Its about Maddy and dog imitations. Its about having crazy profs and talking about them. Its about all the photos and videos. Its about being the Kitty Party. Its about going to Ritambara's place in Manesar for awesome food. Its about presentations at 1:00 am. Its about Maddy's parents coming over for her birthday. Its about molesting Shrek in 207K. Its about 'Bazzinga'. Its about eating like hogs but never in the mess. Its about trying to get the first row in CF class. Its about sleeping through OM lectures. Its about Boom thinking the prof is a ghost. Its about arcus,jhaji and sharmaji. Its about scoring a C- in MICROECONOMICS and an A in MP-II. Its about the pain of loosing Kshitij but the balm of gaining a brilliant roomie. Its about flights and ETAs. Its about all the bowling binges. Its about badminton at 2 am. Its about winning medals in swimming. Its about fucking the Naagin. Its about Shefali and 'Kya hai?'. Its about Ronny and jute bags. Its about Riddhi and burkhas. Its about Placeeom vs. Exchange. Its about the night time walks. Its about having C-square meetings at 10:30 pm on gtalk. Its about the bench. Its about crushing disappointments. Its about learning that the person in front of you is not perfect yet loving him/her. Its about learning more about yourself than ever before. Its about forgiving and being forgived. Its about taking the rough with the smooth. Its about knowing that people have got your back. Its about finding love and hate both. Its about loving yourself and loving your life. Its about being human.

How will the second year be? Will the internship change us? Will we repeat everything we did last year or will our bhasad reach newer heights? Will we be able to do justice to ourselves? Will we learn even more? Will we struggle? Will we sail? Will we love? Will we hate? Will we grow up? Will the coming year be the most memorable of our lives?

You know what, I just cannot wait to find out. :)

See you when the rain comes home.

cheers,

Omkar

Unaswered Questions

In another 20 days or so, I end my first year at MDI.

I was talking to my father the other day and we were discussing how to evaluate the value that this one year has added to me. I think he made a very simple yet powerful observation. The value added is simply how different I am one year after joining MDI. Is there something within me that has changed and if yes then what?

So what has changed? I think a lot has changed. I have learnt many lessons here. Some good, some bad, some easy, some harsh. I think the biggest one has been the affirmation of the long standing cliché that the world is a bad bad place. But this post isn't about that. My biggest lesson is that I have begun to question my long standing basic beliefs on friendship and relationships. I am seeing people change in front of my eyes and I am powerless to do anything about it. Everything that I thought I could do is falling apart in front of my eyes, and I cannot control it. People I thought who I could trust and be really close to have decided (apparently) that I am just not good enough a friend for them, and they have moved on. Is it possible that people can just drop a friend for another?

But why me? I mean, if people have problems, why can't they just come up and sort it out face to face like adults. Why is it that there can never be any purity of relationship here? The only craving I have is for that sense of belonging, for my friends to be what they are supposed to be, my friends. Maybe I am over-possessive, but that is something I am consciously working upon. And frankly, it hurts to be re-placed. It does. Suddenly my friends are not happy when I am around, but the moment they are with others, they are cackling and full of life. I am suddenly getting tired of this place. I don't know whether I can survive another year here or no, like this. The two month break for my intern-ship is looking like manna sent from heaven.

Maybe its just me, my sense of stupidity and insecurity that is driving me crazy. But I am like that. I keep people very close to my heart. And the moment there is any strain to get away, it pulls on my heart and causes pain. And there are some pains which go beyond others. When the people closest to you move away, the pain is intolerable and irrefutable. You see, there is no place else I can go. My mistake is that I have put in too much into too few a people. I don't know what to do now. Its like I am marooned on an island and there is no sail in sight.

There are no answers, only questions............

cheers,

moksha

Finally

18:something IST on the 24th of February 2010.

200 not out

Imagine a standard ninth class 20 years from now. A teacher asks a student what is poetic justice. The student goes up to the board and writes 24/02/2010 200*. For that is what it is. A perfect 200*, not a run more, not a run less. If there was any remaining shred of doubt, it has surely been blown away. If anyone person could have broken this barrier it was him.

But you know what is the most enduring image from the game? 49th over, last ball. Dhoni whacks it down the ground and he scampers through for a single. A single on 199 not out? With six balls remaining in the innings and enough runs on the board? That's selflessness personified.

For his entire career he has carried us on his backs, all the billion plus of us. He has fallen, only rise greater and better. I cringe at the mere thought of the Indian batting line-up without his name. Somehow, everything remains possible when he is there.

Each stroke from his willow has conducted the symphony of the heavens themselves. And the music has lifted our hearts, brought back our smiles, even enabled us to feel pity for Warne in 1998.

For 20 years, over a sixth of humanity has united in prayer to a single God. And there have been aspersions cast over him from the sect of non-believers. They said he was old, he was feeble, he didn't have it in him any more. That he was not the best.

And each time the gong of his response has been singular. The sound of the ball hitting the middle of the bat, and racing past the fielders on its way. His mouth has been his bat and it has done quite a lot of talking.

But we Indians are not satisfied. I want India to win the world cup at the new Wankhede in Mumbai and for him to score a century. You see how even I write 'want' and not 'wish'?

Most people would think what now? What is left for him? Rest assured, this 200 is special but it is neither his motivation nor his inspiration. They both still remain the Re. 1 coins that coach Archrekar put on his stumps at the Shivaji Park nets some 22 years ago.

Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar - 200 not out. FINALLY

The Roller-coaster

Wow! The last 1 week has been one helluva a ride!

I guess you do get a different perspective when you have seen the highest of the emotional highs and the lowest of emotional lows.....

I think not getting into PLACECOM hurt more than loosing the Gen-Sec election, and I really don't understand why. I guess it was probably my last chance to be able to make a really meaningful contribution to MDI, or maybe it was not. It just hurt real bad.

I sometimes wonder, whether it is right to be so emotionally attached to the people who are close to you. I think I get hurt way too easily on some fronts and then start to make doomsday prophecies about them. It is what Sumeet refers to as La-La land! :) I think I need to start becoming impersonal about certain issues in life and start giving time. But then that is just not me. I will go full out for any person who is dear to me. The crux of the problem does not lie there. It lies in the fact that I begin to expect from others as well. I never expect that I get the same as I give, but the fact that small things seem insignificant to others seems to gall me. A phone call, enquiring about dinner, these things matter a lot to me but not to others.

I am slowly getting used to the fact that most of the world will not care two hoots about you. I think it is the search for that portion of the world that truly cares about you which is important. You may flit like a bee from one flower to another but when you are in real need, there is only one beehive to which you will return. The question is you may care for someone but that person may not care for you. Then what do you do? Do you still push, still care, still put effort or do you simply stop because that person will not respond.

This is an intensely personal choice and there is not right or wrong way. Personally I have chosen the tough way and decided to plough on, irrespective of how the other person feels or responds. I know I am going to feel cheated, humiliated, angry, frustrated. But I know that if I stop doing it, then I will feel even worse than this. Only through the paths of fire are the men of steel created. Maybe this is my path of fire, this is where God will test me. In the end, I might not even get what I wanted. But yet I shall move alone. I may not be the first choice, but I definitely will be the last option.

The best part of this whole week was the discovery that I am not alone. Finding someone who is having the same struggles as you does not necessarily lighten the load of the fight but it does give you a semblance of hope that what you do is not madness, and your beliefs are shared by others too. It is only in cauldron of brotherhood that the stew of hope is brewed. I thank God for showing me that I am not alone.

I am leaving for Mumbai on Thursday evening. And I am pissed that I cannot be totally happy about it too. But as I write these words, it dawns upon me that most of the things in life that trouble us are beyond our control. Maybe the three days I am not at college will spark something new. Maybe there will be a small feeling of missing me somewhere. Maybe I will get a half minute phone call. Maybe my basketball match scores will become important.

Maybe it won't happen.

But I still struggle and live in hope.

cheers,

moksha

For Kiddo :)

Seema left for Shanghai today morning 8 am IST.

It seems just yesterday that we were in class at SFIT, practising for the volleyball finals, cheering and jeering each other and she flat out beating me in every exam we took :)

Time does fly really really fast. And you really should not have any regrets because that will really not matter whatsoever. The point I am trying to make here is that whatever time you have spend it wisely. In just another blink of your eyes you will be in your cocoon of routine and then all you have left is memories of times spent with friends in college.

If you have some friends make sure that you gather enough memories about them to last a lifetime, for sometimes that's all you will be left with. Take time out to make sure that there are moments that you will cherish forever, 10 years down the line you should be able to make each and every moment come alive again. The moments could be the most profound and also the most mundane, it doesn't matter. Each is precious and preserve it well. Spend time with each other, all the grades, marks and other issues become in-germane down the line. And do not hold back, its probably the worst thing you can do, for it leaves scope for regret. Have faith in your friendship and trust in your friends, it'll never let you down. And remember, true friends are always there.....

Seema once gave me some of the best advice I have ever had in my life, she said that if I wanted to learn the guitar I needed to fall in love with it. Thanks kiddo! Never got round to saying that. I hope you have a brilliant time in Shanghai and learn some Mandarin too :)

cheers,

moksha

Time to get lil serious

The great thing about being at MDI is that you can have so many seemingly random discussions which actually lead you to start thinking and changing yourself.

I was sitting at Nescafe with Shrek, Shef, Mitthu and Anup doing bakar, when Anup showed us the presentation that he will be giving for a really prestigious competition. Shrek had just returned from IIM A after reaching the finals of a case study competition. He mentioned that how intensely competitive IIM A was and how great the experience was. He also exhorted me to start participating seriously in the good competitions and not give up any chance that came my way.

That led me thinking very seriously about my commitment to the competitions that I had taken a part in. I guess I never ever took them even a bit seriously. Most of the time I would not even send in an entry after registering for the event. I really need to change this and start participating sincerely. I guess what we can do and think on our own is going to give us a real education. It will not be the textbooks we read or the papers we write. I guess its time to really start thinking about the cases that come up and not just writing faff because I have to. And the prizes are not the primary motivation, I really need to start thinking that is all. My brain is like deep frozen right now.

I also hope that I can form a stable team to take part in these competitions. I guess that is very necessary because it helps build great rapport and the team develops a working style of its own. The two people that I team up with right now, Maddy and Philter are amongst the best on campus and I really hope that we can win some really good competitions.

I guess I really need to start preparing for a year and a half down the line from now onwards itself or else I am pretty much screwed.

cheers

moksha

The MDI Story continues......

Wassupp people,

With CAT servers failing everywhere, I think its my moral duty to tell all the guys and gals taking CAT this year how it actually is in a top-notch B-school.

I joined MDI in June 2009 and now its December 2009. 6 months is more than enough to decipher the mystery of a b-school. But first some definitions:

1. FAFF: anything which has nothing to do whatsoever you want to talk/write about but you talk/write about it anyway because you don't know the actual stuff. This definition may vary from person to person.

2. RAFF: acronym for Random Arbit Faff !!! ;)

3. NPA: Non-performing asset. Someone who does nothing whatsoever for you group projects/presentations except taking the marks (and sometimes credit too!)

4. Ghissu: That person who wishes to be buried with their books and will probably learn how to have sex from them.

Now that the basics of a b-school are given, let us proceed to the details.

TERM-I

Firstly, the guys from a Commerce background are Gods and the engineering/science grads are relative idiots. Please accept that. Only then can you have enough gumption to ask their help in MANAC-I and MICROECONOMICS. And if you don't then you will probably end up like me. MANAC - I a B and MICROECONOMICS a C-.

The only place where engineering grads may have a slight advantage is Stats, but B-school stats are nothing like engineering stats. You will probably scratch all your dandruff off solving even one question (although that more credit to Prof. Joydip's papers). HBO and MP-I are the two subjects that you can (rather have to) faff your way through. Also you can afford to be a NPA if you are lucky enough to have a commerce grad in your project group. The best subject is OCPS where you just have give speeches and learn how to use Powerpoint to make presentations and answer std. VII english papers all over again. But the subject that takes the cake is LAB, where you are required to know stuff like the entire Indian Contract Law of some year and the Indian Companies Act 1956 and stuff like that (SFITians can equate it to IEM :P).

Term-I is the time when the toppers will be seen. Most of them will be ghissus but there will be one or two genuinely nice ones (eg: Priyata Modi, Calcutta University, Eco topper). You will also see the really intelligent people who will also do reasonably well (eg: Sumeet Mitra, SPCE, 74%) and then the people who are intelligent but lazy (yours truly) and the really really lazy ones! You will also find a completely different species called the PLACECOMERS (eg: Suraj Nambiar, Nadi and Divya), next post for them.

Term-I is also when you'll make all your friends. And trust me these will be friends for life, it cannot be any other way. Finally, please do not screw up your CG like me (5.43). Its hell trying to make it up later. Minimum 6. My reasons including a grade dock for bunking too much and not being able to attend term presentations due to being sick.

SUMMERS:

According to me summers are the greatest levellers. They really give an ego boost to people like me who get placed on slot zero and a battering to the true ghissus. But this is more of a biased statement. I got just one shortlist on day zero, which I converted! I didn't get shortlists from any of the dream companies of mine :( So the point is be prepared. You will NOT get shortlists. Convert what you get. But there are instances of people getting amazingly high number of shortlists and not converting a single one (one had about 30 shorlists!!!) So it works either way. What do companies look for? Doesn't matter! You need to be confident and more importantly lucky. A close friend of mine was rejected in the final round of each company she was shortlisted (including the top 3 marketing firms on campus) and then finally made it through the last company of the day zero.

Please be clear as to what kind of job you want to do in the future. 3 months is enough for you to know that. If you are still confused, you are fucked! Royally! Aniruddha Ghoshal wanted to do Ops so he applied only to ops profiles and finally got through an Ops profile. That's clarity of thought. Now he is off to Europe for an exchange tour in term V.

Btw, Godrej Sara Lee picked me up for summers.

About me:

Well I am a idiot as of now, with a CG of 5.43 (m screwed) and nothing else. Though I have a really good summers ahead. Hoping to turn things around in Term-II (doesn't look like it with a 14/60 in my MACROECONOMICS mid-term). Hopefully, I'll become better as time progresses.

Best of luck to all my friends taking the CAT,

cheers,

Moksha

Notes:

MANAC- Management Accounting

HBO - Human Behaviour in Organizations

MP - Market Planning

STM- Statistics for Management

OCPS - Oral Communication and Presentation Skills

LAB - Legal Aspects of Business

Winters and Extra Classes amongst other things

I write this post from the most amazingly comfortable position of having my feet in a warm blanket and right after a dinner of palak paneer and chicken! So please pardon me if you find this post incomplete..... it means that I slept off.

The winters have finally begun, average temperatures hovering around 13 C. It is quite an experience for someone who hasn't been in a winter before (I have, since I spent 7 years in Delhi). There are quite a few people on campus who are having a fit trying to stay warm. And speaking of fits, my class is about to have one as we have class everyday at 8:30 am. And that means getting up at the God foresaken hour of 8:00 am and seeing your roomies sleeping in a foetal position under their blankets. Then comes the struggle of finding your slippers because invariably someone comes and takes them while you were sleeping and putting them away somewhere you just cannot fathom. Following that you struggle to touch the tap to get water to brush your teeth and once the water flows out you jump up a mile because the water is friggin' cold! You have barely brushed and its already 8:25.

So you rush out of the washroom, take your bag and run....... only to reach the class at 8:32 am (kindly remember the class is supposed to start at 8:30 am). Now here comes the twist in the tale. If the class is a MPI (Marketing Planning and Implementation) class then out Prof locks the door at 8:30 sharp and we loose attendance! So you wake up at 8 am and dont even get attendance. Life is so fair! On top of that we have had a MPI class almost every day (we are supposed to have only 2 lectures per subject every week). And we get a new case for every class, a negative marking quiz which is quite unfathomable!!!!

If that is not enough I have an extra MPI class tomorrow morning AGAIN at 8:30 am and I have no clue as to whether I will make it or not. And if I dont then I will have missed 4, which means an automatic grade dock for MPI at the end of the semester!!!! So I cannot say I haven't had uneventful term so far. Did my first MR project at Illumina, opened for Indian Ocean \m/ and have not been attending half my classes.

Also suddenly I have started developing a feeling that I just might sign out of placements next year and do something on my own..... Lets see how that goes.......

Till the next time you read my blog,

cheers

moksha

PS: I still pray for all the troubles to be over for all my friends!!!!

The MDI Saga begins.....

Its like one of those Star Wars movie's beginnings, Long Long Ago in a Galaxy...... or something to that effect. I mean I feel like writing in that frame of thought but what the hell, I'll just be my usual self.

So here I am, @ MDI Gurgaon one of the premier colleges.... ooops B-Schools in India right now. And frankly, I am loving every moment of it. This despite the fact that some things will never ever change including the fact that I slept through my Micro-economics class yesterday (1.5 hrs to be precise). So what is it that makes MDI tick? Well as we managers would say (lolzzz I know!), MDI has many core competencies. I guess I have fallen in love with the red brick campus here. There are very few campuses in India that are completely red brick ones. At 40 acres, MDI isn't exactly gigantic but its quite big. The best part is that it is very well maintained, it has to be the cleanest campus in India. There is a football ground WITH GRASS :) and a six hole golf-course to boot. Its really so green here, you have to see it to beliveve it.

The mess food is, well frankly its quite good and by far the best mess food you'll get at any management campus across India. Also there is Sharmaji's if you need garam garam Aloo or Gobi Paranthas, Samosas and Ice-cream. But the crowning glory is the all night canteen called Arcus. It starts around 6 pm and shuts shop at 6 am. And it spoils you for choice, all kinds of rolls you want, all types of kulchas and curries, soft drinks, sutta, everything. I have eaten chole kulcha at 4:30 am at Arcus and nothing tastes better after a good game of volleyball! Sports, name it and you have it, including a full fledged gym and yoga centre.

As far as the acads go, initially it is quite hectic and you require a lot of effort to pull through your induction week. But after a week, 4 hours of sleep becomes a luxury. Not that there's so much studies to do but there's too much stuff to do here. As an example, today, i'll go to my basement and Jam @ about 10:00pm and then go play badminton @ 12:30 am. Go to arcus after that, have something to eat, come back to the room do time pass, study a bit and go to bed by 3:30 - 4:00 am. I have a lecture @ 10:15 am tomorrow so I can lie in.

The profs here are killer! We have a marketing prof who has actually handled the recent South African Presidential elections. He is also one of the highest paid consultants in India. Our stats prof is an ISI, Kolkatta graduate and he is mad as a coot, but also a genius! His style of teaching is kickass! The thing is that all profs here are PhDs so they are basically knowledgable and very experienced. One prof teaches all management concepts by writing poems on the board. There is a huge amount of flexibility, students can change the syllabus if they wish to. Students can give bad feedback about a prof and he/she will be removed after the mid-term exams.

As far as what I have been upto, well I drank so much on freshers, I passed out after puking a bucketfull! Have been thoroughly enjoying, making loads of new friends, sleeping in class, reading chapters before going for a lecture, discussing cases till dawn, eating north-indian food, starting a small band as well! So you see, life is quite eventful as of now.

Before I sign off, few notices

@Raj: congrats for your selection dude, but wish you were here

@Chillar: Stick to it brother, I know some shit in life is hard!! and soon you'll be getting the first tapes from Gurgaon

@Opium: fuckah, if you ever read this please courier me GUNDA and SHAPATH man! please!

@Everyone in Francis who thought my jokes sucked: This one is from Shubhayan my roomie, from BITS Pilani

There are n people standing in a queue, the first waits for a minute and tells a story, the second for 2 mins and the nth person for n minutes! Now all the stories are different but to a person listening to them they all sound same why??

Answer: Since the stories are not continuous, they cannot be differentiated!!! :P

PS: If you need more, call me.

PPS: My new no should be out in a day or two... watch out for it.

ciao guys, me off to have chicken curry in the mess..... yummy!

cheers,

moksha

The Top 10 series....

Okay, this is something different. I got sick of writing routine posts so what I am gonna do now is put up lists of the top 10 in different spheres, with a little bit of info about each. So to start off, what could be better than the Top 10 Cricket Stadia in the world. Okay a note: The list is purely my opinion and if anyone feels differently please feel free to comment. Without any further ado.......

10.) The Gaddafi Stadium - Lahore, Pakistan

As of today, this is probably best known for the recent terror attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team. Built in 1959, it was originally called the Lahore Stadium and then renamed to the Gaddafi in 1974 in honour of Libyan President Colonel Gaddafi.Three hat-tricks have been taken at the stadium, by Peter Petherick of New Zealand against Pakistan, October 9, 1976, Wasim Akram of Pakistan against Sri Lanka, March 6, 1999 and Mohammad Sami of Pakistan against Sri Lanka, March 8, 2002.

9.) Super Sports park - Centurion, South Africa

 

This stadium hosted its first match on 16 November 1995 and its my favourite ground in South Africa, not in the least because the Mumbai Indians franchise is thinking of setting up shop here. It was remaned from Centurion Park when the television channel SuperSports brought shares in it. 

8.) The WACA - Perth, Australia

The ground with the most feared pitch, the Western Australian Cricket Association ground at Perth is one of the most famous cricket grounds in the world.  The first Test match was played at the ground in 1970. Throughout its history, the ground has also been used for a range of activities other than cricket, including Australian rules football, Soccer, Rugby League, International Rules, athletic carnivals and music concerts. The ground has seen many spectacular performances including Matthew Hayden's 380 against Zimbabwe and Glenn McGrath's 8-34 against Pakistan. On January 12, 2005, the WACA hosted Australia's first Twenty20 match, played between the Western Warriors and the Victorian Bushrangers.

7.) Kensington Oval(The Mecca) -  Bridgetown, Barbados

 

Boasting a 120 year old history, 'The Mecca' has been the home to two of the greatest West Indian bowlers, Malcom Marshall and Joel Garner. Cricket at the Oval began in 1882 when the Pickwick Cricket Club assumed ownership of the ground. The first international match held was in 1895 when Slade Lucas' side visited the island. The first Test match was held in January 1930, when the West Indies and England played to a draw. Since the genesis there have been a total of 43 Test matches played on the Kensington Oval grounds, 21 of those matches won by the West Indian cricket team.

6.) Queen's park oval - Port of Spain ,Trinidad and Tobago

Queen's Park Oval, in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, is currently the largest capacity cricket ground in the West Indies and has hosted more Test matches than any other ground in the Caribbean. It also hosted a number of matches in the 2007 Cricket World Cup. It is privately owned by the Queen's Park Cricket Club and has seating for about 25,000. The Trinidad and Tobago cricket team play most of their home matches at the ground. The cricket field has also been used to host several domestic and international football matches. But this is not what it is actually very much famous for. The Queen's park Oval plays home to the second-greatest Batsman of the Modern era (this argument will crop up in later posts too!), the King himself, Brian Charles Lara.

5.) Old Trafford - Manchester, England

The Old Trafford Cricket Ground, usually known as simply Old Trafford, is a cricket ground situated on Talbot Road in Old Trafford, an area of Stretford in Greater Manchester, England that has been the home of Manchester Cricket Club since 1856 and of the Lancashire County Cricket Club since it was founded in 1864. International Test matches have been played there since 1884. This stadium will always remain steeped in cricket folklore, be it for Jim Laker's astonishing 19-90, or Sachin Tendulkar's first test 100 or for Shane Warne's 'Ball of the Century' to Mike Gatting.  

4.) Sydney Cricket Ground - Sydney , Australia

The Sydney Cricket Ground, simply called the SCG  is a sports stadium in Sydney. It is used for Test cricket, One Day International cricket, some rugby league and rugby union matches, and is the home ground for the New South Wales Blues cricket team and the Sydney Swans of the Australian Football League. It is owned and operated by the SCG Trust that also manages the Sydney Football Stadium located next door. Why have I put it up so high in the list? well the answer is 231.33, that figure being Sachin Tendulkar's average here, giving it the moniker of SCG - Sachin's Cricket Ground.

3.) Lord's - London, England

Lord's Cricket Ground (generally known as Lord's) is a cricket venue in St John's Wood, London. Named after its founder, Thomas Lord, it is owned by Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and is the home of Middlesex County Cricket Club, the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), the European Cricket Council (ECC); and until August 2005, the International Cricket Council (ICC). This is the home of cricket. The place where all traditions and memories of cricket are preserved. Where the white 'pukka' sahib can wear his white flannels and play the gentleman's game. 

2.) Eden Gardens - Kolkatta, India

I thought of putting up a pic like the ones before but then decided that for the Eden Gardens, its the crowd that really makes it so special. The present Eden Gardens Cricket Club came in existence some time in the year 1864. It has been called the Lord's of Asia.The stadium is the one of the largest cricketing facilities in the world, along with the MCG.The first Test match was played in January 1934. Since then the ground has hosted 35 Test matches, more than any other venue in India, the last match to date being India vs Pakistan on 30 November 2007, where the match was a draw on a flat pitch.

Having a capacity of 90,000 its the biggest cricket stadium and more often that not it is full to the brim. The crowd at Eden Gardens is probably the most provocative in the entire world, often being harsh on the home team itself. One remembers Vinod Kambli crying during the 1996 World Cup semi-final when crowd trouble did not allow the match to continue. Reason? India were 108-8 and the crowd had had enough. It is also the site of one of the greatest turnarounds in Test cricket history, when Laxman's 281 and Harbhajan's 8 wickets beat Australia after we were following on.

1.) The Wankhede Stadium - Mumbai, India

The Wankhede (*sighs*)......  This ground was built after disputes between the Cricket Club of India which own the Brabourne Stadium, and the Mumbai Cricket Association over the allocation of tickets for cricket matches. This became severe after the Test between India and England in 1973. At the initiative of S. K. Wankhede, a politician and the secretary of the Mumbai Cricket Association, MCA built the new stadium in South Mumbai near the Churchgate station. It was built in six months and opened in time for the final Test between India and the West Indies in 1975. Since then the Wankhade stadium has taken over from Brabourne Stadium as the main cricketing venue in the city. The stadium has a capacity of 40,000 and is always in contention to host an international match in India.

Many people consider this to be a small ground and capacity wise it is. But take this for some history. It is the home of some the greatest players ever to play the game including Ravi Shastri, Dilip Vengsarkar, Sunil Gavaskar, Vinod Kambli, Snajay Manjarekar and Sachin Tendulkar. It is the home of the 39 time Ranji Champions and the home ground of Mumbai Indians. The stadium has been witness to great innings like Gavaskar's 205 against the Windies and Kallicharran's 187 in the same game in the 1978-79 series and all round heroics like Ian Botham's century and thirteen wickets in the Jubilee Test in 1980. which England won by ten wickets. The highest score by an Indian at Wankhede remains Vinod Kambli's 224 against England in 1992-93 in only his third Test. Incidentally Ravi Shastri's six sixes in an over off Baroda's Tilak Raj en route to the fastest double-hundred in first-class cricket was on this ground in 1984-85.

And to say nothing of the intangible factors. If you have not sat in the Sachind Tendulkar pavilion and chanted "Sachin.... Sachin...." or booed any poor opposition fielder on the fence near you with the choiciest of swear words, you have not witnessed live cricket. The stadium embraces you and hence Shaun Pollock becomes Polly Kaka, a moniker given to the lgendary Polly Umrigar. That is the magic of the Wankhede.

Hope you guys liked the post.... stay tuned for the next one......

cheers! :D

Hawa ki Kokh mein

I wrote this poem quite some while ago. Its in hindi but since I could not get the font on blogger, I've put it up in english........

Hum hasaane ke liye aaye the, Hum hasaakar chal diye

Aap dekhne ke liye aaye the, Aap dekhkar chal diye

Aapne hume yaad rakha, Isliye hum shukraguzaar hein

Hum hawa ki kokh mein sokar aaye the

Hum usi ki kokh mein sokar chal diye.

Hamari hasi ne aapko khushi di, Is khushi ne hame hasi di

Yehi tammana thi ki thoda aapka dukh lele,

Pehle dil ne aapki aur ishaara kiya tha, 

Ab hum kisi doosri aur chal diye!

Jaane kis nukkad, kis gali mein phir mulakaat hogi

Shaayad us waqt hum thoda has denge, thoda ro denge

Jo hume pehchaan jaye, bas wohi ek muskaan kaafi hogi

Hum hawa ki kokh mein sokar aaye the

hum toh bas usi ki kokh mein sokar chal diye

Time for some new Gyaan, trash talk and blah-blahs

Wassupp everyone???

The Gyaan Man is back! Welcome to another post full of crap and bull****!!!

Its almost 8 months since I last posted (really???), so I guess I need to talk upfront about what exactly has been happening in that time. Apart from the world getting depressed economicaly, Ponzi and FD scams here and there, Mumbai being attacked(again!), etc. etc., I CLEARED THE CAT. Yes, you got that right, THE CAT. I scored a whopping 99.40%tile and got calls from IIM A and IIM C for the GD/PI rounds. Cool huh? I guess most you of must have read my earlier blogs (actually rants) about the CAT and moi. So it feels good to have overcome that particular monster. Since I have been mired in all that preperation, I really couldn't write a proper blog! (you guys can stop sniggering and start reading now!)

So, here I am, trying my best to get into either IIM A or IIM C. Hopefully I'll get both calls. Atleast that's what I aim for you see. 

Also in the last 8 months, I have started guitar lessons. Now I am no Hendrix, but yes I can play Floyd's "wish you were here". And I am getting better.  So life's been jogging along pretty nicely. Apart from the 12th fret F-chord positions, I can pretty much hold my own. lolzzzzz! I have also started playing badminton regularly you see. I really need to loose weight, not that I am exactly obese, but yet, I need to look human. :D
I guess this post was more of an ice-breaker. I need to give a definite direction to this blog, write about something substantial. But you know me, I'll probably give someone a sound dressing-down in my next post. And since old habits are hard to go by:

"Knowledge and timber shouldn't be much used till they are seasoned." -  Oliver Wendell Holmes

cheers, 

moksha

PS: I know the quote doesn't have any relation to the post, but I really liked it and since its my blog........

Independence Day.......really???

To all my fellow Indians, a very very Happy 61st Independence Day.
So guys what did you guys to for 15th August this year? I know, I know, it was a holiday, a 3-day weekend, so it was time to chill out, have a good lie-in and then just relax, right?
Its 61 years since we awoke to "life and freedom" in order to maintain our tryst with destiny. much has surely changed since then, except for one singular feature, that being the hoisting of the Tiranga, in offices, residential societies, where-not. My building had that function too.
The scheduled time was set for 10:00 AM, and the flag hoisting was to be followed by a cultural programme and "light" snacks. I make it a point to attend the flag hoisting ceremony every year, so I went down at about five minutes to 10 and big surprise, there were about only 50-odd of us gathered for the event. Now my building has 10 blocks, around 700 flats in total. Considering an average of 4 persons per flat, there are around 2800-3000 people in my building. This means that only 50/2800 i.e 1.78% of the residents thought it was important it was necessary for them to come down for the flag hoisting ceremony. Now I am not a big statistician, but I do know that the subject is based on the fact that you take a small sample, analyze it and expect it to represent the larger whole. If we apply this principle to my case, give a additional +/- 5% for errors, the result is pretty, well, shameful!
In a country of over 1.1 Billion people, only 2-7% people come out to salute the National flag?
OK, maybe that sounds a little far-fetched, but the point at issue is not my statistical analysis, it is the FACT that most of us really don't think it is important enough to get up early, have a bath and come down to salute our National flag, on our Independence day. And this fact is not limited to our National holidays. Consider an everyday scenario, you are going to watch a movie in a theater, where it is mandatory for the owners to have a rendition of the National Anthem. Tell me, truthfully, how many of you sing the National Anthem the way it is supposed to be? FLASHBACK, std VII, Civics class, the paragraph stating the way the national Anthem is supposed to be said - "The body should be erect, hands at the sides, without any movement, the National Anthem should be sung in aloud and clear voice, clearly reflecting your pride in it". I do not think that any of you ever think about these things whenever you go to watch a movie. Did you guys know that it is violation of law, not to sing the national Anthem in such a manner? Also that the National Anthem should be sung for exactly 52 seconds? If you are in class, and an NCC parade outside starts the National Anthem, would you in the middle of the class stand up and recite the Anthem? Think about it.Coming back to my local issue, what really hurt was the fact that the moment the flag hoisting was over and the snacks were announced, the number of people seemed to treble! So their patriotism was only restricted to their gastric calls?
Every Independence day we read innumerable articles about how India has progressed, how the Nation is an emerging superpower, blah blah blah.... There are so many feature films storied around the Patriotism theme. In this moolah of patriotism, have the normal citizens of the country lost the true sense of national fervor? Everyone need not be an Indian army jawan in order to show his/her patriotism. Like charity, patriotism too begins at home. The small things that I mentioned above go along way in showing how proud we are of our country. Cynics might argue that just by saluting the flag and singing the national Anthem doesn't prove thats you are a true patriot. Bingo! You do NOT have to prove your patriotism to anyone, it is for yourself to realize why you love and respect your country. There are many reasons why, here's probably the most mundane of them - Imagine if you were living behind the Iron Curtain in USSR and on a National Holiday, you never got up and saluted the flag, do you realize what would have happened? The KGB would have branded you an American spy and probably jailed you. You live in a country which gives you the freedom, if I may use the word, to NOT show your love and pride in it!
You know what I really hope for? The next time that old uncle who raised the tiranga in my building yesterday, raises it again, there should not be that look of suffering in his eyes when he realizes that today's generation doesn't seem to care about all the sacrifices that our forefathers made so that today we could sleep peacefully in our beds.
I think its time to end my post here, I take your leave with a sonnet that is as true as it was when written.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;

Where knowledge is free;

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow
domestic walls;

Where words come out from the depth of truth;

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the
dreary desert sand of dead habit;

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought
and action;

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

-Rabindranath Tagore

cheers,

JAI HIND!

moksha

PS: for all those doubting Thomases out there, I do observe the rules while singing the National Anthem and yes, once during an IMS lecture at RUIA college, I did get up midway and sing the National Anthem when the NCC band played it under our window.
PPS: This is not an idle boast, I am proud that I could muster up enough courage to do it.