Languor

It is a strange phase of life to be in. Ever since I moved to Mumbai, I have been fortunate in getting to stay with family since Priya was also posted in the city. She has had a big influence in my life right from when we were kids and she used to somehow convince me to do all the right and wrong things exactly the way she wanted them to be done. I had branched out since then and throughout my stay in various hostels and cities and friend circles, developed my own quirks. As we started staying together (for the first time since we were kids) about 3 years ago, Priya must have found it difficult to reconcile to the changed persona of her brother...not that she didn't try...in fact, she would be at her wit's end trying to make me do things a particular way or stop me from doing them in another. At some occasions she succeeded, at others she failed...thankfully, the ones she succeeded in also included convincing me to purchase my flat which has been the most logical investment decision I have ever happened to make.

Now that Priya is married and I am staying alone (she stays just a couple of flats away but living separately all the same and it is quite different), things are slowly taking a turn. Most of the evenings she does drop in or I go to her place for dinner, but mostly it is "main aur meri tanhaai" that inhabit the flat that Priya had so painstakingly and lovingly helped build. Knowing her, I was sure that she would get over it and start to build her own home the way she wants and she has done exactly that. In the process however, I have remained constant...without change, stuck in some sort of a limbo.

I would so love to have my parents come and stay with me and not many months pass before I bring back this topic with them. However, it is not to be as of the moment and I understand their point of view. Getting uprooted from where you have spent so many years of your life and moving to a completely new place with more strangers than acquaintances is not really easy...getting into the perils of settling in a new work place has been stopping so many of us from resigning from our existing jobs...things are no different there. So I am alone in this big bad city and it sucks. As it is, I am not of the partying around town age (not that I ever was) and as such, the merits of living in a bachelor pad all alone in a city like Mumbai are lost on me. Friends are great, work is fine, movies, plays and musical concerts are aplenty but it is not the same...not at all.

The one solution that everyone (really everyone, right from uncle, aunts, and their fifth cousins) has been doling out in good measure is the "get married" one. I know it is about time and a lot of friends would be more than happy to tell me just how much about time it is...given that since last June, I am already in the fourth decade of my existence on earth :-). I also know that it may solve to a large extent, the situation that I find myself in. Not that getting married would have me hitting all the party spots in town but at least there will be company and who knows what we might make of it. Plus it's not as if you decide to go the marriage path one day and get married the next. There is a whole lot of process here too and I have no idea as to how long it may take. This process, too is so complicated and you never know how much of yourself to expose and how soon. Ideas of honesty and frankness appear good on paper but practical stuff may be completely different. You never know if and when you know enough about someone and you never know if and when you should let out enough of you for someone to know who you really are.

And thus I keep thinking...is marriage the only solution or one that is sustainable? I am not too sure considering there are things that need to really click even post marriage in order to build the same degree of closeness that one has with family. All of it will take time and will happen in due course, marriage, settling in...the works...but the question is whether till then or beyond then, it is going to be all morose and isolated or can I make it better? I am sure that there are ways of making it better, it is just that the effort required does not seem to be worth it. The languid inertia that I find myself in seems to be taking a lot of doing to be lifted up.

Right, so now that we have all of this sorted (or unsorted...depends on the way you look at it), let's move on to more interesting stuff. The World Cup is underway and despite a pretty lackluster first week, it is getting into the more interesting phase where the bigger teams clash with each other. Tickets have been impossible to get, TV coverage is not too bad and considering that the IPL follows, I think that the bug I have been talking about thus far is covered as of now. So cheers to India...de ghuma ke :-)

Update long due

It's been ages since I last wrote and this time, there are no excuses. I just did not feel like writing. Every time I came to see the blog, I felt like updating it but never managed to gather enough verve to actually sit and write something. Not that there was a dearth of things to write about...quite to the contrary, actually. Not only from a strict news point of you, but even from the emotions and sentiments ruling my life, there were so many things I should have recorded but I did not. Well, better late than never!

Getting on to the news front first, I bought a house in Mumbai...that's right, a dwelling place in one of the most densely populated and costliest cities in the world. That is the good part. The bad part is that the house and associated liabilities have resulted in a fixed monthly expense of about Rs. 80,000 and that is without taking into account the other, relatively variable expenditure that one will have to make towards regular expenses like maid, electricity, cooking gas, car fuel, groceries, etc...most of which is being covered by Priya today but that will only last for that much more time.

The office, incidentally, has also shifted to Kalina, which is only 3 odd kilometers from my new home. What this means is that I have now got additional two hours of my life per day, all to myself. I have started utilizing these two additional hours properly. While the one in the morning goes into exercise (I have actually started running and to my utter surprise, I have managed notwithstanding my leg), the one in the evening goes to reading (one good habit that I had put on the back burner for a long time).

Amongst other news, my car has become a wreck and the driver is threatening to leave (not related to each other but still...). Now Sunil, the driver in question, has been serving our family for the last six years and since he belongs to the native place, the trust factor is pretty strong. From my side, I have tried to treat him well but the promise of Mumbai does not fail in getting anyone. Having spent his driving career in Jaipur and Delhi, Sunil has realized, having come to Mumbai, what the possibilities are...how endless they seem once you are free to pursue them...and free is what he wants to be.

Okay, now that we are done with news in its strictest sense, time to do the transition from news to its impact. The transition, of course, starts with more news and this one happens to be that I did not get any special treatment from my firm this year (and this includes bonus and salary hikes which I did not expect, as well as promotions and role definitions which I did). That's it...I have said it and I don't care who reads it.

Obviously, all the news has resulted in a combination of some extreme sentiments. There is, of course, happiness, joy, pride, and a sense of achievement on the family owning a house in Mumbai (celebrated in part via two housewarming parties, one for the college junta and another for the office people). At the same time, there is sadness, disappointment, disillusionment, and a resignation to fate that has resulted from news at work.

I have become so befuddled with all this that I don't know whether to be happy or sad nowadays. The end result is that I have become such an explosive mixture that at times, I hardly know what to expect from myself. A friend tells me that I am dead and have lost my sense of humor, another tells me that I am into some sort of depression, my sister has stopped talking to me since I flare up at her at the slightest of things, and I get tired of any conversation that lasts for more than a minute or two.

Not the boy next door

But you are the Grand fatherly voice of reason, they will listen to you. You just have to say it once.

What...fun event and take him along...umm, no yaar, not him. Somebody else who is more lively perhaps!

May be you just don't know when to have fun and when to be serious, and are taking even the fun instances seriously.

It is the songs that you listen to, all of them from a world that is past.

Look who's flirting, buddhe pe jawaani chaayi hai

Aap chal rahe hain...aap ke liye to yahi theek hai...aap kya karenge in sab cheezon ka...aap, aap, aap

All right, I am jaded, old, and without any spirits. I don't know how to be fun for myself or for others. I am the Big Daddy, the Grand Father who everybody looks up to but nobody looks at, as an equal with the same vulnerabilities and wishes as any other guy. All right, I am not the boy next door...the uncle next door, perhaps?

It's ok but why?

I wanted to go, too...I so badly did! (okay, you wanted to go, so what...did you tell anybody about it?)

Why didn't I go then? (they never even asked me)

They might have thought that if I were interested, I would contact them (why not, I love being the unwanted guest)

But...perhaps they did not have enough space (but didn't someone say they had space for one more person?)

They might not have found me online or on messenger (they had my phone number, na?)

Oh come on, the plan was made in such a jiffy...do you expect them to wait for eternity and call the entire batch up to ask them if they wanted to go? (hmm...that sounds reasonable. After all, I take so much time to get ready that they would have had to spend another day waiting for me to get up and going)

They might have thought that I will be busy with classes (yeah, considering the whole second year has no classes, that is a realistic probability)

They might have thought that I will be busy with Konnect or Backwaters (oh yes, I can not live without Konnect or Backwaters, they are my sweethearts you know!)

They might have forgotten that I exist (ah well...ummm...but they, of all people?)

They might have remembered what I am capable of, when unleashed (if it's that, which I think/hope/pray/wish it is not, well...I have nothing more to say about it)

There might be a substantial reason for it that I can not think of and anyway, why the hell did I expect anything from anyone? (I know but I feel so hurt...but then, this, too shall pass :-))

And yeah, I just remembered...didn't I say myself that I did not want to go to any more trips? (yes I did :-(( )

Why the long face?

I seriously need to see someone or do something about it. This is certainly not the first time that something like this is happening to me and if I don't do something about it, it is certainly not going to be the last. After some terrible days at the end of the last term, I had had a welcome break of three months in which my stay at home, the experiences in Kolkata and of course, the affection of my family had changed my outlook completely...or so I thought.

Today was the first party at campus and ever since the morning, I had the long face ready to greet it. What went wrong? Presumably nothing and yet the long face...the long face that makes people stay away, think twice before coming over. After all, no one wants to be spoken harshly to or be dismissed by a disinterested attitude. No one can understand why I am the life of the party one instant and an unsufferable bore the very next...and why should anyone make the effort to understand...when I can not understand it myself.

All this again brings me back to so many other things...who are my friends and who are the acquaintances, what do I expect of my friends and why do I expect anything at all? What am I cribbing for and why? What will I achieve by writing all this on the blog? Why am I changing my blog yet again from completely public (meant to be read by others) to something so personal (meant to act as a private outlet of feelings...a cleanser)? Why am I insecure (despite the apparent confidence that I so unabashedly display)? Why can't I pin point the reason for my problems? Why is the tension eating me up from the inside? Why is the positive accumulated over the last three months depleting so fast?

Why am I such a kid...such a loser?

It is in deed too much

This was probably one of the roughest and deepest of lean patches that I have gone through (just have a look at my photo on Aditya's blog to guess my state of affairs)...second only to the BIG one that had its effect this time around, too (as always)...but that is another story and a long one at that. If someone had told me a few days back (as people did) that things are bound to get better, I might not have believed them and just silently laughed them away. Given what else happened consecutively, I might have been right for all that the other person knew. Today, however, with most of the factors responsible for my dumping myself into the dumps (partially voluntarily and partially involuntarily) doing an about turn, I can only thank God for all the mercy that He has shown to me and my dear ones. I just hope that He forgives me for doubting Him when He was busy doing the best for me.

What I did learn from this patch was not how I can mitigate the effect of such patches on myself (I remain the binary one...she will at least smile if she reads this, I know). I learnt, however, that I have quite a lot of friends...quite a lot of people who stand by me...some say it in words, some say it with actions. I am sure that some of these people are reading this and for once (not once too often, I hope though), I want to use this blog as a communicating agent. I shall be doing you grave injustice if I name you or hint to your concern for me in any way, but all I want to say is that all of you know that I am talking about you and that I am really humbled by your care and concern for me and that I appreciate the whole of it and want to appreciate it by saying it loud and clear for each one of the small things that you people did...asking me about my problems...cheering me up even if you were down...trying to take me away from my little world of worries.

As for the other things, there have been quite a lot of them happening on campus. There are some things that I should not be talking about and some that I should be. I wonder how true can I be to this blog after this but any future posts on this blog concerning real people and places shall be as objective as possible...plain facts and no opinions. As for my take on things, it will be more introspective and more factual...so all those looking for masala can find alternative sources :-)

The other BIG thing that happened was that I got selected for the International Student Exchange Program of IIMK and I shall be going to ESCP-EAP, Paris for Term 5. It does sound like a big thing but given the number of applicants for it, it is not really an achievement but more of an opportunity. I am still wondering about the validity of my decision about the opportunity part, as well. As I had also mentioned in my Statement of Purpose submitted with the application, I do want to see how these people outside teach and conduct business, but all the same, I don't really know if it will be entirely possible to be done in a way that adds value to me as a person and as a professional. There are lateral placements to be considered, too that I will be missing...one of the reasons why not too many of our experience-rich batch applied for the program in the first place.

And then of course, there is our annual festival Backwaters, which for all the worthless contribution that I might be capable of, is likely to suffer for want of one member. We are planning something really good this time and I just hope that I shall be able to be a part of it in some way or the other.

I know all that but...

It has been days since I ceased to be myself and God only knows how many more days it is going to continue thus. Minutes, hours, and days pass by me as I remain standing, immobilized, disinterested and contemplative. I even got to use the "Thinking Point" on campus which I used to mock at for its absolute uselessness. For a change, I do not want to write about what is causing all this and despite this being one space where I have shared my deepest griefs and the most happening joys, this one time I simply can't...is it too personal...it may be but that's not the reason...I am simply tired of the things occupying my mind, soul and body and do not want the blog to suffer, too and give me something to remember these days by, in the future.

Anyways, it has been too much of cribbing...in fact, this blog is fast becoming a crib-log which I don't want it to become...it should be just a rendition of my life and experiences...probably it is just that...I am again deviating....so back to what happened last night. I called up one of my friends who is going to get married next month to congratulate her and put up an excuse for not turning up for her wedding. From one thing to another, I inadvertently shared a part of my mood (must have spoken something rude...I don't even know but the friend that she is, she caught up with it) with her and that was enough for her to try and cheer me up for the next half an hour and this is what she tried (of all things :-)) :

I think that you need a steady relationship
Yeah, I thought so, too till I heard that you are getting married to someone else
You know what, you are not a girlfriend material at all
You mean a boyfriend material
Both actually
urr...umm...come again

And then she explained what she meant by someone who is a girlfriend material
...must not be a diehard romantic (which is what she says I am)
...must not be possessive at all or conversely, must be acutely possessive (I fluctuate between the two, she says)
...must be consistent in his mannerisms towards the girl (As per her experience, I greet her one day and wax eloquent about her new ear rings and the other day, don't even look at her)

...must take the upper hand by wit or force or both (I am too gentle with girls, she says...oh yeah)
...must not use sarcasm-heavy humor with girls (which is what I invariably do)
...must do so many other things that I don't and must not do so many things that I do
...must not expect the girl to be constant in her behavior (I don't like girls getting their fancies, you know...that is what she says)

I had almost started to enjoy it when she dropped the bombshell as she explained why I am not a boyfriend material. The reasons, apart from a repeat of some of the ones above were:
...a hairline that has seen its better days
...greying hair brushed up with mehendi giving a technicolor look
...avuncular looks combined with quite a few extra pounds
...too sensitive and emotional to be relied upon by girls who want to have fun
...shy away from staring at the girl and look at her qualities instead, thus hurting her vanity (...oof, let the feminists hear of it, I say)
...try to be too helpful, burdening the girl with guilt and leave her wondering about the intentions
...too volatile with the mood swings to be of any use at all (I agree to this one wholeheartedly)

She said so many other things in that half an hour but I am not able to recollect all of them...tried to write whatever I could recall...but at the end of it, I was a bit more cheerful and actually able to get a good night's sleep after a long long time. I know that you are not reading this and perhaps shall never read it but all the same, thank you so much for being there for me...and of course, for giving me gyan on what a duffer I am... :-))

I want to crib

The Harry Potter DVD I got from the DVD rental shop downhill does not work

I have been kicked out of the college basketball team

I have missed the deadline for submitting the scholarship form

I lost the trials for the college Chess team

My legs hurt after the basketball practice of yesterday and more than that, my ego hurts after the realisation of how unfit I have become

I am not looking forward to the weekend party when the IIMB people come in and am actually losing all enthu for parties

I screwed up the quiz in UD's Financial Management class today

I have not been able to update my blog as regularly as I want to...have not been feeling like writing

My ICICI Bank ATM still doesn't work and I am under the debt of so many people

I have been thinking a lot about her nowadays

Getting out of the dumps...

Konica, are you still sileeping???
K naat, can you do this problem???
Aubheejeeet, haaaain, please tell the solution to the class, why are you shy???

All of us love him, all of us hate him. He is simple and cunning, absent-minded and a genius, stubborn and flexible, short-sighted and penetrative...he is Prof Gopal Chowdhry, easily one of the best brains in the institute, and easily one of the most hilarious teachers on campus.

After an entire half of the term, it was finally my turn today to be subjected to the oh-so-critical examination by Prof Gopal Chowdhry in the well of the class. Our group was the first and I was the first in the group (the second chosen one being Pavithra), on whom the lightning fell. And lightning it was, what with me not having read up anything at all about the case that was going to be discussed.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the first question he asked was put to me. The question was simple for a lot of people, he just wanted to know what the case was all about...but before you pass your judgement, try to be in the well answering questions when your answers are different from those Prof Chowdhry has in his own, well-hidden :-) answer sheet...or better still, try telling the facts about a five sentence case, even the first of which you have not read. People of my group who worked for the case, if you are reading this, I want to say to you that I am extremely sorry for being such a fool...honestly, I had thought the class to be at 2:30 and had left everything for the last moment, as I always do...I know that some of you might feel that I let their hard work down but believe me, this will not happen again...do I see some eyebrows going up??? Yeah, Ok, but the least I can do is try :-)

Hmm...while on the topic of the first question, as a part of my answer, I started reading from the slide that others in the group had prepared. All was going hunky-dory till I reached the point where I used one jargon (how could I resist that, the damn words were staring me right in the face!!!) and said that the sampling used was convenience sampling...haa haa, that did raise our beloved Prof's eyebrows and we had a full blown debate over the damn thing for about ten minutes which gave me enough time to go over not just the case, but our observations about the case, too. In the end, we actually managed to get a decent 4 out of 5 for the case...ok...ok, I know it's one mark less than the marks that two other groups got...please don't kill me for that, I have already promised...ah well, said...that I will do better the next time (not that he will call me again, but still, just in case...)

This entire episode actually turned out to be pretty good for my mood...somehow, I have been in the dumps for the past few days. I even missed the party on campus (first party I missed for a long long time...and that too, despite being one of the hosts) and spent the whole time sleeping in my room (a case of cough and cold alongwith a history of 3-4 nights with nominal sleep hours, did not help either). More than anything else, somehow, there has been a thought creeping in to my mind slowly but surely...too surely for my liking.

Why have I started feeling that I am becoming a major turn off for so many people? Out of such a large number of people that I have met in nearly two months here, I know very few people who would suffer me for a good amount of time. For most of the others, my company might be a necessary evil that they may endure for some time, but given a choice, they will definitely prefer to turn away from me and all that is mine.

I am not sure if what I am thinking is right and hence can not really analyse the reasons for that. However, still thinking...can't help it actually...is it the way I talk, do I appear to be a snob...is it, what I consider self-confidence, coming across as arrogance...is it, what I consider not being ridiculous, being seen as being excessively reserved...is my not raising my eyes and slapping the backs of everyone else, being understood to be my lack of willingness to mingle, my being distant???

How does it matter, some will say...yeah right, it does not matter...but is that the reason you write pages on the topic, speak hours on how you are different? If it is not important, what is the need to give the excuse...what is the need to justify your being different...isn't there something lacking that you seek to fill up through your silly statements like 'I am not like the others...I don't follow the herd mentality...I don't need a group to survive'?

On my part, I think that I can not make this mistake. I am pretty sure that on reflection, I will find...rather, I have found...that I do get into the dumps whenever these kind of things start getting in to my head...but then again, thank you, God that you made it possible for me to come out of those blues without much effort, and more than that, thank you God for making a Prof Gopal Chowdhry for actually putting that effort on my behalf and making me smile...

Am I really a misfit?

I don't know if I am right but it sure feels like I am a misfit here. I do not know if it is a common feeling that has come into many of my other batch mates also, but as far as I am concerned, the 'resort' is fast becoming too much for me. IIMK has turned out to be a place where people seem to be trying hard to prove a point to themselves and to the others as well. They seem to be saying at the top of their voices that they are the best and that is why they are here and as such, they do not need any one else or any thing else for continuing their success story.

Things took a turn for the better, however, as we had our first informal meet with the seniors of our hostel (G) on Friday night. This was something that should have happened much earlier but for some reason or the other, seniors were busy giving us thinking material before they let their hair down. And let the hair down they did, as we all had a great time just sitting around, chatting and feasting on some snacks and cold drinks (I saw a Vodka bottle just before the party but some how, as the number of juniors started increasing, that bottle went out of the window somewhere). All of us juniors had to give their introduction which was intercepted by some funny (and sometimes, droll) bantering by the seniors (even the juniors joined in a little later).

The theme of the party turned out to be something that I have been hearing more and more about ever since I landed at Calicut. This city is supposed to have a gay culture and all male students are repeatedly being advised by the seniors not to venture out on the beaches alone in the nights. This fact (or alleged fact, if you want to call it that) was at the top of the jokes and the humour that was going around the hostel meet.

Saturday evening was spent at the Kappad beach and that was when I had just had some bad news from home. The news is too private, even for this blog and therefore, I will skip that part. The only thing that I can mention is that I was not at all in a good mood when Ravi and Abhijit dragged me half-asleep to the beach. Added to the thoughts that kept going home every now and then, I had to face the camaraderie that already exists between the people who came here earlier on the 2nd of this month for their preparatory course.

I don't have anything against them or their camaraderie but it is really difficult to break the ice if you are not really an extrovert and if you are an outsider in a group that is already in some stage of formation. All this combined in to some thing which always comes up on me whenever I am in this kind of a situation. I made myself unavailable. I know that by being aloof for the whole time, I have already isolated myself from the group of about fifteen people that went to the beach and may even have angered some. The worst thing is that I know that I am not even going to spare the effort to make things right. I know I can do it if I try but somehow, after the experience of the training years at Infosys, that effort is not really forthcoming.

Another thing that happened in the past two days was the Budget analysis on Friday night (just before the hostel party). It was done by a chartered accountant (I am not able to recollect his name) from Chennai who writes regularly for The Hindu and Business Line. I went there, expecting a brief yet exhaustive analysis of the chief features of the budget. I had read up a little about the budget on the net and knew about the basic features but wanted some clarifications on many of them. I was not expecting the speaker to drive home the point in a way that I would really be able to understand clearly but all the same, I expected some idea to dawn on me. I, and I am sure that many others, too, were pleasantly surprised.

The presenter used a unique style to present the budget to the lay person. Speaking at the Indian Institute of Management, he was still very precise in his use of words that could be understood even by the lay person who does not have any knowledge of finance or commerce. The only problem was that he had little knowledge about any thing else other than the part of the budget dealing with Direct Taxes, or at least that is what he claimed. He dealt with the amendments to the Direct Taxes that were made in this budget and the way he did it, full of anecdotes and an excellent sense of humour, was extremely interesting and a refreshing start to the proceedings at IIMK.

The good things at IIMK continued the next day with the first case study for the batch. All groups of 5-6 were to prepare the presentations on a case that appeared in the Harvard Review. The class which was to be an introduction to the case study approach, was conducted by Saji, one of the better known and more admired Professors on campus. I must say that he was really good. The presentation that my group had made, did not deal with the case at all. The way Prof. Saji explained it made us all appear to be fools. I hope that I am able to see problems in this way soon.

Sunday was totally free and although almost half of our batch went to Mahe beach today, I thought it better to stay back. Yesterday's experiences notwithstanding, I was also feeling sleepy and dead tired. The good part is that I was able to continue with my jogging and gym on the third consecutive day and if this becomes a habit, nothing like it for my currently unfit, flabby body.

I went to the city in the evening with Abhijit on my bike. The city is decent enough and the markets, though closed, looked promising. We had some snacks at a place called Al-Bake near the Baby Hospital circle. We even went to the Crown theatre and watched the evening show of "Walking Tall". This movie stars The Rock and there is nothing to write about it except the fact that it seemed to be inspired from Mithunda flicks of today. The movie had nothing but guns and more guns. Rock plays a character who comes back to his hometown to find that it is infested by drug trafficking and gambling. He makes it his duty to cleanse the city and that is what he does...end of story...end of movie.

Last but not the least, if the readers of this blog (are there any???) are wondering about the length of this post or about why I did not post yesterday, the reason is that the computer center at IIMK was down for maintenance and it is only now that the machines are up and running after some two days of maintenance work.

The people who went to Mahe beach are not back yet and I guess that they must be having a good time. I don't know what is happening but what I do know is that if it goes on like this, I for one, am sure going to be an unknown quantity in the batch of 2006 at IIMK.

Some more disillusionment

Life here at IIMK continues to amaze and disappoint me. Is there absolutely no difference between the first year of an undergraduate degree college and that of a professional institution like IIM giving an MBA degree? The immaturity is the same, the shouting is the same, the utter lack of mutual understanding and respect is the same, so how the hell can this be called a premier institution of higher learning? I know that what I am writing may be called frustration and initial blues of some first timer but a first timer, I certainly am not. I have been a part of the hostel life on two previous occassions and I could understand the way things were at both the places, that is in my higher secondary school and in the engineering college. However, I completely fail to understand that in a batch of supposedly high work experience graduates, how can people still stand on a podium and shout down on others as if they are holding some political position and gracing the others with their views/words?

I can fully understand and appreciate the kind of work they are doing to strike deals with dealers for utilities like mobile connection and laptops/desktops but are we really so immature as to gather in the middle of the night in the Open Air Theatre and get up on a podium and shout like kids? Do we really need to carry forward the meaning of enthusiasm in such a childish and negative manner? Is it fair for people who are graduates with a good two years of average work experience to fight over petty things like who is going to talk about what and take credit of what? Even in the college, by the time we were in our second year, all this was passe and a strict no-no.

We knew that each one of us had a mind of his own and respected them for it. There was hardly a need to ask people if they are following what is being said (apropos yesterday) at the podium by the self-appointed leaders. I know it sounds like I am cribbing because I was not one of the people shouting from the top of the podium, that I was not one of the so called leaders but honestly speaking (whether anyone believes it or not), I don't care two hoots about these things now. Having come across so many people and so much at school and college and even at office, I don't think that I need to prove anything to myself (Even at the risk of sounding immodest, I think I have already got over the need of proving anything to others).

The surprising attitude boils down to another aspect, too and that is the sex divide that exists in this campus. It looks so funny when you see people divided across two different domains because of their sex alone. It was much better in the software field from where most of our batch has come. At least I did not feel guilty and self conscious while speaking to a girl. In fact when I finally met Divya (from the senior batch) today in the mess, I could hardly speak a word apart from introducing myself and turning aside (might even have appeared rude to her). I have never been an extrovert but at the same time, I am usually not at a loss for words either.

It seems strange, therefore, when I am tongue tied and almost embarassed when there is any need (why is there a need to find a need???) to talk to the opposite sex in this campus. I can not say that it is something that is a personal problem. It is not something that has been an issue with me ever in my life. I have studied in co-education schools and college and have had quite a bit of interaction with girls. I know that there is always going to be that bunch of guys who will be at the beck and call and carry out the smallest whims of their friends. But isn't the situation supposed to be different in a place like IIM where girls as well as guys know what they are going to do with their lives and are mature enough to realize that demand supply laws do not essentially have to work in emotional life?

Today was another round of orientation programmes at IIMK. I have been put into Section A which is supposed to be the more comfortable one because Dr Suma Damodaran is not going to be teaching our section this terrm and that is supposedly a reason to celebrate. The library at IIMK seems to be well equipped (at least from what I could pick up from the post lunch, half-asleep session today) and I am looking forward to check out their fiction stack. As of now, some of the guys from our batch are planning to pick up our bikes (me inclusive) and go for an outing, perhaps a movie or to some natural bonanza nearby...so more cribbing later...

Maa, I look so good, na?

When I was in school, they told me that I resemble Ajay Jadeja. I remember gloating on it because Jadeja was very popular among girls and if I did resemble him, I should be popular too...or so I thought. Unless the girls harbored secret feelings for me, I never got even the slightest hint of my popularity. At that time, I did not understand the reason for this distinction between Jadeja and me, I mean, both of us having the same (almost similar) face and all that. I knew the reason when I went to college and they compared me to Bhim Rao Ambedkar. In fact, for one whole month, they changed my nickname from Sheru to Bheema, as if that was going to make any difference.

To say the truth, I did get a little bogged down when they compared me to the father of the constitution (such great responsibility and all). Adding to this, the Varanasi water and climate cost me quite a lot of hair and my already prominent forehead became all the more shiny and glorious. That was when I left college to join Infosys and they welcomed me to the corporate world by saying that I resemble Mukesh Ambani (why not Anil, pray?). And thus I lived for one and a half years after joining Infosys, in the shadows of the great industrialist until one fine day. This fine day, we were having a project party and one girl (imagine, a girl!!!) from our project said that another friend of hers (also a girl :-)) had told her (why???) that I resemble Calvin. This one, dear friends, is the latest and is also one of the reasons for naming this site Mode C. For the information of all those zealous souls who are going to take this opportunity to study my picture and post comments about how it resembles someone, I have now decided not to take any more resemblances seriously. Unless there is a solid proof (pixel to pixel mapping, for instance), I am going to be Calvin (I really like his style, you know).

Going back to some facts, last night's experience was one that I would not forget easily. It was only yesterday when I was laughing about the incident at Prithesh's house in Gurgaon and joking with him about the seniors being blown over and here I was, being almost blown over myself the last night. I had decided to have dinner at office and was staying back for some time. I also needed to scan some photographs and talk to Abhijeet. The long and short of it is that I was in office at about 8:30 in the evening, talking to Abhijeet on the phone in the adjacent cubicle, when I saw Bijon talking to someone on my phone. He was indicating to me that the call was for me. I asked him to say that I was not there and he did that. I peacefully finished talking to Abhijeet in another 15 minutes and was about to leave office when Bijon dropped the bomb. He said that there was some Severity One issue with my project. I thought that he was joking and started laughing. The laugh, however, turned into a whimper (I could hardly hear myself) when he told me that the person on line was some Powell (some Powell??? that guy is the project manager at Microsoft, primary client contact for my project).

With the client calling offshore, it had to be a serious issue and when I checked my mail, I knew just how serious it was. It appeared that he had sent a mail yesterday morning at 5 regarding some severity one issue that he wanted fixed and which was actually stopping the site from launch. The mail was not copied to my Infosys Id and somehow, I missed it on my Microsoft Id. Nobody else was in today, Sankar and Sathish being on leave and Gomathi having just arrived in India. It also appeared that when he did not find any replies to his mail when he came in to office on his morning (after the working hours at offshore), he got really pissed off and sent a strongly worded mail and copied it to almost everyone at Infosys who is even remotely related to the Microsoft account (and that included a lot of senior people). I even got calls from the account manager in US on the issue. It took me 3 hours of conference calls with locations in Chennai and US to finally solve the issue and soothe the ruffled feathers. I am expecting a follow-up today and a big blood bath with some sacrificial goats (hope I am not one of them :( )

The latest mail on the fresher alumni meet says that *quote Dress Code is casual bordering on formal *unquote. Now what the hell am I supposed to make of that??