The immortals of Meluha

I never claim "reading books" to be one of my hobbies. Its not that I don't read books. I do read but not every other book I lay my hands on. For me the cover page is very important if I have to pick up a book for myself or if someone suggests and gives me a good feedback then I definitely read that.
As I said I never used to say "reading books" as my hobby, but at one instance I did that and thats when I repented :)


This was during my final year at IIT Madras and our campus placements started then, as usual the largest IT company in India visited our campus to be the first one to go. Those days we never used to work much on our CVs nor on preparation for interview[none of my friends did]. I borrowed a tie from one person a belt from some other and got my CV printed on a piece of paper and went to the interview. That was the first  interview in my life. I never did a mock interview also before that [none of my friends did :P]. I was totally cool [ chatting,laughing out loud with friends] till I entered the interview room, but as I was going inside my heart beat was at triple the normal rate. That's when I could feel the chillness all throughout my body.

There were 3 people on panel. A middle aged man[guess a tamilian], an old man[dont remem how he looked] and a lady[she was for sure a northie]. Then the regular tell about u etc, somehow I mugged up that part and blurted out the same.so managed that part....and as it went on..they asked me techie questions..to which I could answer comfortably [not that was an expert..but yea managed even that]..

then suddenly the lady interrupted and asked me" So Mr. Unknown.. what are your hobbies?"

I went blank for a while...[firstly it was the lady asking, and secondly it was sudden shift from techy to personal questions]
So I said "Ma'm.. my hobbies are...[thinking for a while].. reading books, watching movies [ ok now I remembered my actual hobbies] playing carrom, football, hockey, computer games ...again interrupted by the lady..[now I understood she should be some HR]

HR-"Wow! thats interesting, you read books..so what books have you read?"

Realization

And we took 2 years for that!!










@Virgin Stores, Villagio, Doha

My dream is to fly over the rainbow, so high

I like this song . You may find the original one here. Yves La Rock

When I was a kid, like most of us, I used to look high up in the sky at aeroplanes and wonder when I would get to fly in a plane and when I would get to travel to other countries.

Used to dream of flying in plane, served unlimited chocolates by hot air-hostesses, flanked by clouds on both the sides of the plane, look down at houses and lilliputs through the window......

Little did I know that air travel is not all hassle free thing.

As of today I can say I am a frequent flier, but not of any particular airline.

 

Just for the numbers sake, I took around 60 flights so far starting from the first one in 2003( Anil,Meghamsh,Anurag,Keerthi & Bhargav should remember this for pushing me into the plane as I was sick then). And I've seen about 6% of the globe and been to around 18 countries.

Now coming to the interesting part, some of the incidents I faced. I can bet I've experienced all types of issues with air travel except to the fatal ones (touchwood)!. Some are to be blamed on me also.

Flight delay and wait at airports.

Itinerary:- Hyderabad->Chennai->Muscat->Riyadh.

This was in the year 2006 when I was going to Saudi for my onsite project at Riyadh. A direct flight generally takes 4hrs(Emirates). But the great TCS booked me this long itinerary just to show off their loyalty towards Gulf Air(cheap flight). My luggage was a huge suitcase, 1 backpack and a laptop bag. This was my first time going out of the country and was going alone as the other person who was supposed to travel with me dropped out at the last moment. And that too it was to gulf land so there were butterflies in my stomach. Took a Kingfisher airline at Hyderabad Begumpet airport to Chennai and reached at around 8pm. My next flight was at 4am. I sat there in airport watching at people moving in and out, for me every minute was like an hour. That was one of the most boring moments in my life. I sat till around 10pm cursing TCS everynow and then, then comes the nature call.. I had to relieve myself urgently..had this whole luggage in front of me and cant leave it also...kept holding it for long time and when I realised I cannot any more I took the trolley kept my luggage on it and pushed it till the toilet, then I discover the toilet is so narrow cant take the trolley inside.. I looked around desperately..at one moment I thought I will leave it there..but somehow dint, I thought of asking someone to watch my luggage and was looking for reliable people around....then suddenly I spotted a cloak room far outside the airport..phew~..I went out showed the security the eticket.. dumped my luggage in the cloak room..kept my lappy with me..obviously...felt relieved....thanked GOD for saving me :)..the flight was delayed by 3hrs..it took off at 7am..was awake all the time..after reaching Muscat again there was delay with the next flight..around 6hrs. Finally when I reached Riyadh..I realised it took me 30hrs to reach that place.

Note:- Never ever board a Gulf Air flight. It's worse than a red bus(literally). All kind of mass and cheap people board the flight. By cheap I dont mean the people are poor. They behave insanely. Trying to touch the airhostess, throw the food stuff down, keep the used plates along the passage,fight with airhostess for an extra drink..etc..

Sleeping in airport

Itinerary:- Kolkata->Hyderabad

This was in the year 2008 when I was in my first year in IIM Calcutta, I was coming home to Hyderabad. I booked the Kingfisher flight which was at morning 6:50am. The airport is 50kms away from the campus, so we generally leave around 4am by taxi. Since I was traveling alone I dint want to take chance so I kept awake the whole night, at around 3 am called the taxiwalla, and reached the airport around 5am. Got my boarding pass and the security check was also done. The area near the gate was crowded with people waiting to board. I saw there was still 1hr time for boarding. I somehow managed to get a seat. Was looking at the clock..and in no time I was in dreams..I heard an announcement that the flight was delayed by 15mins. To this day also am not sure if it was in my dream or in real. So then I thought, ok I can sleep for some more time.....

After a long time...I woke up from my deep sleep and it was the pin drop silence which disturbed me..... There was no one around me...Then I remembered that I had a flight to take. I dint find the kingfisher flight in the charts also...ran to one kingfisher crew asked him about the flight. That man said the flight already left and I could see the frustration in his face, he yelled at me asking where I was all the time when the announcements were going on. I said "I was sleeping here(pointing at the seat)" and asked them how could they miss me. Then there was another crew member with a sorry face. I asked them, "now what? Can I get another flight immediately?"...At that moment..there was one girl(Kingfisher crew) standing at that gate.. shouting at me to run fast.. I ran fast towards the gate..then she told me get into the bus immediately..she ticked on my boarding pass..and I jumped into the bus..It dropped me next to the Kingfisher flight and left..... I was a like lilliput standing all alone next to this giant airbus plane.... Then after 5mins arrived the stairs, the captain opened the door for me. It was one embarrassing moment for me. I just avoided everyone staring at me.....could see some awkward faces...and murmurs..aaah wwoo...I just sat at my seat..slept till the breakfast arrived..and in no time we reached hyderabad..and even till then..I couldn't believe that I actually managed to take the flight.

Ok the story is not yet over...

About me

As an attempt to get off the writer's block I post this blog with all the testimonials some of the dear ones have written to me. My sincere suggestion to the readers, please read the disclaimer towards end of the post
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A naughty boy.Always cheerful and lively in demeanour,he brings life in to the gatherings. keep that smile always and let surroundings be well lit always!.
-Gali Sreedhar
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He is one of the best guys I’ve come across during my stay here……He is quite hardworking and sincere…..He is also a good sportsman……He would always be there when you would need his help……He is also very intelligent and also very humble…..Thus, he is a friend you would not want to miss
-Sarkar Raja Shantiranjan
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I hated him for his attitude initially… took me a while to break the ice!! but liked him more and more as I got to know him better. One person, whom I think I can confide in… anything!! A real nice guy... stands by his word …come what may … analyses ppl in the very first meet… thought I was head strong :x … I tried to understand the depth of his looks ... but failed miserably... Not to forget … Obsessed with his photographs… U will find him in every other photograph … I wud rather call him Mr. Photo :P One of the three kumars …like musketeers..hehehehh.. one of my very gud friends on campus… Wish u a gr8 future ahead!
-Amara Geeta Madhuri
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I am extremely thankful to you and I really salute your honesty.In my opinion you are true example of honesty in otherwise selfish and greedy world. I will meet you some time in next few days. Once again thank you very much.
-Prof.Sanjeeth Singh :)
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On my Birthday
Happy birthday To a gréât finance student and an expert on Monte Carlo option pricing !
-Prof.Tarek Amyuni
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our man AKA GULT superstar of Joka, you are one of the best brains around but rather a better friend. You are Smart and great at making people comfortable with you. I am sure everyone of us will remember you for your incessant smiling face and awesome hockey skills.. Keep Smiling.. Hope the best for your future!! Best of luck!!
-Prerak Vohra
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Me and he went on many tours on exchange program and hence share some wonderful memories togather. Did I mentioned that hee taught me the greatest art of all, cooking. We have been to some really mindblowing places ;). Although he is 4 years elder to me, he always tried to be a good friend and advisor. Always helps a person in need and is always responsible about his career and his relations. And the first one to get the job in my fren's circle. Hope you will be happy forever.
-Sai Venkatesh
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The OGIEC is actually kind of an introvert who likes to keep matters to himself and shares information only with people he wants to and when he wants to. :) An enterprising athlete - good at long distance running, hockey and football and my mentor at sports in IIMC. His last minute injury almost forced him to opt out of STEP but I am glad he came through. We had an amazing time on STEP together.. with the road trip in Greece and the pizza land adventure being the high points of my eurotrip. His cooking skills are exemplary and I was treated to a multitude of Biryanis when I was craving for Indian food on STEP.

Though being a slacker at studies, I could manage a good set of grades due to his tutoring at the last minute before exams. A fin-enthusiast, his summers in Bangalore must have been satisfying both on his professional and personal levels. His non-platonic endeavours with the fairer-sex both in and outside the college have been a constant topic of discussion among us. Except when it comes to sports, he is a lazy bum with any outbound activity and is the only person I know who has slept in every movie we have gone to watch in a theatre. Obviously this testimonial is for the sake of writing a testimonial and I know we'll be in touch all along and hope to laugh about this in the distant future.
-Swadheen Shukla
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Disclaimer: This is from my side, dont rely totally on the above testimonials..each one of those is the individual's opinion

A new beginning

Now I become the proud alumnus of IIM Calcutta.

The Trip to North East - Part II

After the long 1st part now comes the 2nd part, I've no idea how long this one would be.

So after the adventurous trip from darjeeling we finally reached Gangtok. We checked into this hotel called Shonali international. A 3 bedroom suite costed us around 450 bucks..Now the 3 bedroom is not a room with 3 beds..But a bed which is large enough to accommodate 3 normal sized people...so our soham was obvious left over. He got a special bed. The worst part was there was water problem all over Gangtok. It was the 3rd day they were facing that problem. The hotel service people were kind enough to get water in buckets for us whenever we asked for. Another strange thing about Gangtok is that the city sleeps early. By 8:30pm all shops and hotels close down. We went out at 9pm and there were hardly any hotels. There was one hotel called Bayul which was open at that time with no customers in it. We were happy to find it open and went in and sat there. The lone server gave us a menu and asked what we would like to order. Whatever we asked for he said it wasn’t available..finally we asked him to get whatever he has.. for that he said he just had 2plate chicken and no rotis... we got pissed and left that hotel...and then went further..finally we found a hotel called Tashi Delek restaurant. This one is big and has an open air restro also. We got something there but it was not upto our satisfaction levels. By the way Tashi Delek is "Namaste" in Sikkimese.

While coming back to our hotel we took a taxi, thats when we met this person Dhava(Dhaba). He is a very active person. He told he would arrange for our Nathula and Lachung trip, initially we were a little sceptical about the guy so we didn’t pay him any money but later we realised that this guy is a gentle soul. Infact most of the Sikkimese people are very cordial. They respect the tourists because tourism is their daily bread and butter. So you can trust any Sikkimese person. The next day we left to Lachung which is around 150kms from Gangtok. The trip costed us 800 per head. This is because it's off peak season else it could go up till 2000.

The way to Lachung is one of the worst ghat roads I've ever seen. There were even quite a few of breathtaking moments while going. You see warnings about shooting stones and landslides. The road is narrow and it is a 2 way road. The driver of our cab was Mr. Dhrubha. He is one arrogant rash driver. He doesnt like following any vehicle..He will do anything to overtake that vehicle. So just imagine with all this it was one hell of a ride to Lachung.

The first stop was at “Seven sister falls”. Its called so cos the waterfall before touching the ground hits seven rocks and changes its course. We stayed for sometime and took some pics.


The waterfalls in background



Then we moved on to a place called Rang Rang, where we had our lunch in a hotel. We got nice dal and fish curry there. This food was also included in the package.



The next stop was some waterfalls I don’t remember the name, If some one knows the name of this waterfalls please to update me. We took some pics there, I almost broke my bones. I slipped on a rock but was lucky to get away with just some scratches. Then we moved on.



We were getting closer to the mountains covered with ice. It was getting colder and dark. We stopped at another water falls. This one is the scariest waterfall I've ever seen in whole of life time. It falls from a great height. The height of which is not mentioned anywhere. This waterfall is called Amitabh falls for the obvious reasons. The water there was so cold that I was shivering inspite of wearing 2 shirts and a jacket over that.


You can see me in the pic..


A full size photo of Amitabh falls

At around 6pm we finally reached Lachung where we checked into a small hotel. By then it was pitch dark over there and there were no street lights but still we decided to check out the village. We walked for quite a long distance, The following pic shows the wooden houses in the village.


Can you see a kid posing for the photo

The next day morning we left to the place called Yumthang, where you get to do skiing but to our disappointment the way to Yumthang was blocked because of an avalanche. So we stopped 7kms before Yumthang and played with ice over there. We were disappointed with the trip because we couldnt do the skiing which was the main reason for coming to the place.


Snowman

We left to Gangtok that afternoon around 2pm. In the mid way there was some landslide and all the vehicles were stuck up on either side of the road. It took around 4hrs for the whole thing to clear up. The BRO came and cleared it using bull dozers and dynamites. We explored the hilly village in mean time.


The Landslide

Finally we reached Gangtok at around 9pm. By then our hero Dhava was ready with all processing for Nathula. Dear readers for Nathula you need to get permits done a day before and it’s better you get it from some travel agent. We checked into another hotel called Viewpoint hotel. This hotel costed us 550 per day and even in this theres one large bed and an extra bed. I chose the extra bed :). We then planned to go to casino but the hotel wala was very strict he told that he would close the gate of the hotel at 10:30 and after that even if some one bangs the gate no one would open, he even told us to check out if we want to go out. So we gave up the idea of Casino. That night me and Soham tried weed :) I dint get high with it may be cos of the quality of the weed. This is the first time I tried and probably the last time also.

The next day we got up around 8, and got ready for the Nathula trip.
The driver of this cab was Sunil. Along with us there were 2 families. A couple sat in the front seat. The second family was a Rajasthani family consisting of mom, dad and 2 sons. They were so excited that we were from IIM Calcutta :). They asked us to guide their son, Most of the time I was silent but my friends Soham and Swadheen were active in giving free fundaes :). Somehow the discussion went on about girls. Thats when the lady told that girls in Darjeeling are so beautiful for which 3 of us concurred but our ultra pseud Kalyan refuted saying girls in Europe are beautiful. There was a pin drop silence after that then I again broke the silence saying I am a desi and I like only desi stuff ;)

We reached Nathula at around 11pm. It is at 14000 feet above sea level and cold and windy. My hands shivered even after wearing gloves. I couldnt click the camera properly, It was that bad. We went close to the gate,which was electrified, and took pics. The Chinese rang a siren and warned us. Our Accountant was shouted by Chinese military people personally when he stepped on the barbed wire.


That's where we were warned by Chinese


Look at the Chinese army man looking at my friend's feet.

After this we left to another point called Baba Harbhajan Singh Mandir. It was constructed in memory of a person named Harbhajan singh who was in army and died during his service. It seems after his death he appeared in dreams of people in army and warned them of all impending dangers like avalanches, attacks etc. The army people are staunch believers of him and whoever passes by that route stop in front of it and leave only after offering prayers.


Baba Harbhajan Singh Mandir

We bought some souvenirs there. Then we left to Tsomgo lake a video of which I already uploaded. In simple words it's heaven on earth. For a beautiful description do check the video. We took a yak ride there. The Yak on which I sat was called Jack.


Tsomgo Lake

Then we went to Sherbathang market where we bought some more souvenirs and had our lunch( wai wai and chowmin).


Hot Hot Wai Wai


We then left to Gangtok and reached there around 8pm. We requested the hotel wala to keep the gate open atleast for that one time for us. He was very strict over that but after repeated request he told he will keep it open till 11:30pm and will close the very next minute. We thought something was better than nothing and left to the Casino. It was a nice experience there. We initially lost our money in roulette but later with some strategy made up for all the loss, We then left the place and while coming out we met 2 of our friends who were coming to the Casino, we again went back to Casino accompanying them. This time we made losses again but were not confident enough so left. Finally it was not worth it :(

We went back to hotel at around 10:30pm itself. We talked to Dhava about our plan for the last day. We wanted to cover the Rumtek monastery, Lingdum monastery and Teestha water rafting.

The next day we checked out the hotel at around 9am and got into the taxi. The driver of the taxi was Subash who was again very cooperative; He drove really fast for us so that we could cover all those places. We were running out of time cos we had the Calcutta train to catch on that day evening at Siliguri. We first went to this place called Banjhakhri falls, this is the worst place and I dont suggest anyone to visit this place. I think may be kids in KG may enjoy that place else it’s not worth it.

After that we went to Lingdum monastery. It was big and very peaceful.


You are supposed to roll that and chant this mantra "Om Mani Padme Hung"

Then we left for Rumtek monastery. This monastery is one of the most visited monsateries in Asia. A lot of Bhutanese visit this place. Theres a small book shop cum canteen to the right side in the monastery owned by one cute lady. She told she is from Kharaghpur. We bought the Buddhist incense sticks over there. Then we visited a Tibet curio, you get all antique stuff there, outside the monastery. The owner of the shop is Ms. Siring an old lady. We bought a lot of goodies there.


Rumtek Monastery

We skipped our lunch to do the rafting as we running out of time. The place where we do rafting is Millie. The rafting thing costed us 1400 Rs and a 100 more for photography. It was a nice experience rafting. We did for almost 8kms. The wind was very strong and it was difficult rowing there. We even got into the river and swimming for sometime. Then after rowing for 8kms we finally reached our destination. We were shameless to change our dress on the main road though there was changing room just to save 15 bucks ;)


After we were done with the rowing

We then left to New Jalpai Guri by our taxi. Thats it.. This is how our trip to North East ended. It was an awesome experience and I would like to suggest all my readers to try visiting North East atleast once in your lifetime :)

Things to keep in mind
1) Keep winter clothing when you are visiting North-East
2) Vaseline, Boroplus are must
3) Sikkimese people are very courteous
4) Kolkata mobiles are not roaming in Sikkim

A funny bengali song

This was taken on one of those bumpy taxi rides on the roads of kolkata outskirts. I found the song very funny. It will be a great favor if some one could let me know what this song is.

The trip to North-East - Part I

I am back home after a week long trip to north east :)
I should say this one week I went through an experience worth a lifetime.
I've seen a lot of places and met people from different backgrounds.

Before I write in detail about them I would like to inform one thing to my readers that the real beauty is in north east, both the people and the places. A special mention to the women in darjeeling. They are simply mind blowing, just 2 eyes weren't sufficient :) to watch them. We met a rajasthani family while we were going to Nathula, and the lady herself told us that gals in darjeeling are very beautiful. She said that each one of them looked like kareena kapoor(her definition of beauty) and they dont need any makeup.

Male readers:- if you are single or looking for a change try your luck in darjeeling :)
I wish I get placed in darjeeling ;) after my MBA.

Title :- The trip to North-East

Starring :

Swadheen ( The Accountant - The whole trip was accounted by him, GOD knows the facts but according to him the trip costed altogether 21000/- ; by the way our man is interning with PWC)

Kalyan ( The Cameraman - The whole trip was captured by his Lumix, 18x optical,10Mpxl camera)

Soham ( The Late lateef - Right from the start of the trip he was the main reason for every delay, but whatever it may be without him the trip wouldnt have been so exciting. He was more like our guide)

finally
Yours faithfully ( Nothing :(..I was just a participant)

Disclaimer: All the persons in the story are real and any resemblance is well intended and is not coincidence.

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6th Mar 7:30pm - We were still in campus at that time, With great difficulty we got 2 taxis and rushed to the Sealdah railway station. The train left the station at 10:00pm. We played cards for sometime and then crashed. It was very cold in the middle of the night and none of us got blankets with us, we tried to cover ourselves with whatever possible, tees,jackets etc.

7th Mar 8:00am - Reached New Jalpaiguri(NJP) station.It's 14kms from Siliguri. We had our breakfast there and took a sharing cab to Darjeeling. On the way we went through places like Kurseong,Sonada,Ghoom and finally reached Darjeeling. It got colder as we climbed higher. Thanks to Soham we got a wonderful hotel(Bird'eye view hotel) to stay.


Bird's eye view hotel


The hotel is adjacent to Cedar Inn(Where Shahrukh stayed for Main Hoon Na). The owner of the hotel is Mr. Uttam, a very friendly person. I'll give his phone number to people only on mail request. The best part was the bonfire, which is very unique to this hotel, on one side you can see the whole of Darjeeling and the other side the bonfire and booze.

Bonfire and Booze Party
(Uttam,Kalyan,Soham,Unknown; L->R)

8thMar 4:00am - We got up early to leave to the Tiger hills. It was so cold that we were shivering even after wearing sweaters and jackets. The spot at Tiger Hills has 3 floors and for each floor there is a different charge (I dont remem how much, may be our accountant will be able to tell this). From Tiger Hills you get a wonderful view of the Kangchen Dzonga (Kanchenjunga) , the third highest peak in the world, and the sunrise.

Sun rise view from Tiger Hills



Kangchen Dzonga view from Tiger Hills
(!#%#,Kalyan; L->R)

After that we visited the Ghoom monastery. It's a small monastery but well maintained.


Ghoom Monastery

Then we went to the Batasia loop. Here the train track is looped to handle the sudden decrease in gradient. I dont remember the name of the person. Our guide, Mr. late lateef, told some story about the
civil engineer and his wife how they resolved this. Here wore the traditional Nepali and had a photo shoot.


(Late Lateef aka Fatso aka Haggar, Cameraman aka Mamma mia, yours truly unknown, The Accountant; L->R)

We reached our hotel at around 10:00 am, thats when our care taker(Mr.Uttam) told us that the following day there is a strike in Darjeeling and no vehicles or shops will run. We thought over for some time and decided that it's better for us to leave the same day to Sikkim so that we can save one day. One of us,none other than the fatso cried over this plan. He wanted to visit the joey's pub and get drunk. We all said no for this as it was sheer waste of time and one full day was not worth for joey's pub. He had no other choice but to comply to our plan.

The next important thing for us was to find out the taxi timings for Sikkim. We wanted to take the last possible taxi to sikkim so that we could cover as much as possible of Darjeeling. First we visited the St.Pauls School, where the shooting of Main Hoon na took place, but to our disappointment we were not allowed inside. We then went to the city center to find out taxis for Sikkim. After a lot of researching finally got one, where we booked seats in a share taxi which would leave at 3:00pm(the last cab to Sikkim). It costed us 500/-(for 4 people).

Now we had 4 hours so we decided to visit the zoo. It was quite a distance away from our place so took a taxi for 100/-. There were a few shops outside the zoo with nice paintings and handicrafts. We bought some paintings and other stuff. After all that we were left with 1.5hrs, We thought it will not be possible for us to make it if we go to the nice chinese restaurant(Lakit) near our guest house, so we decided to eat at a chinese restaurant near the zoo itself.


Red Panda

We ordered for 3 chowmin and 1 fried rice(that was for me). The food was not so great. They served drinking water in bottles. I thought we bought drinking water so picked the bottle, later when we walked quite a distance from the hotel all my friends laughed at me for stealing the bottle. We took a taxi back to the city center. Once we reached there we then thought it would be better if we let Mr.Uttam know that we are leaving in an hour so that he can be ready with all the bills. His number was only with Soham but to everyone's shock he had no mobile with him. He cried saying he lost the mobile. We had just 45mins left with us. Our Accountant told he would go to the chinese restaurant to find the mobile and will wait at the Sikkim cab stop. We three of us left to our guest house.

Our man, Mr. Soham, stuffed himself so much that he had to rush to loo urgently. We took a taxi back to hotel. While climbing up in one of the steep uphills the car coming on the other side got stuck and we all had to get down to push the car out for sometime. It was one of the most desperate situations, at one side we were running out of time and at the other side Mr.Soham was holding his butt :). Finally the taxi could make it and we reached the hotel. We had just 10 mins left with us. We quickly packed our stuff and got into the taxi. Then Swadheen called up and told that he found the mobile but I didnt tell Soham about this. We were a little confident that our Swadheen would hold the Sikkim taxi sometime for us. We reached the place in about 10 mins and were happy that the Sikkim taxi has not arrived yet. We all sat on the steps of the shop next to this stop and were talking about the whole incident. Thats when the taxi driver popped up. He had the camera with him, He told he came to return that. This one was a shocker for everyone. We were happy that we got back all the stuff we lost. :)

There was one beautiful Sikkimese lady standing next to us and was arguing with a guy from the time we reached that place. We thought some fight between the couple.

We were pissed with the taxi guy. It was because of this guy that we had to rush from the time we booked our tickets as he told that the cab would leave at sharp
3 and will not wait for anyone. After almost 1.5hrs a taxi came and the person told that this taxi would take us to Sikkim but we will have to pay some extra amount to which said straight no. We argued for a long time with this taxiwala. All other passengers got into the taxi and the Sikkimese lady was sitting in the front seat,we four of us were in the middle seat.
The argument went on for 15mins, finally even the lady shouted at us saying everyone in the taxi has paid the extra amount and asked us to pay up so that the taxi would move. We finally agreed to pay the extra 300bucks. The taxi left Darjeeling at almost around 5pm.

This was each one's position in side the the cab.
Sikkimese Lady - Darjeeling Guy - Driver
Soham-Kalyan-Me-Swadheen
Chatterboxlady-lady-guy-guy

The Chatterbox lady behind us was talking on top of her voice from the time the taxi moved. We got used to that after sometime and all of us dozed off and slipped into dreams. It was getting dark as moved on. After almost some 3-4hrs when it was almost dark outside the cab stopped and both the lady and the guy in front were arguing. Me and Swadheen thought the guy is getting off there. The driver told Swadheen to come and sit in the front seat. I wished him luck to sit next to the lady, So our man immediately jumped off. But to our surprise the guy didn't get down instead the lady came and sat next to me. I was surprised on what was happening, I even asked out loud on wat happened but everyone was silent.

Now the positions in the cab are
Swadheen - Darjeeling Guy - Driver
Soham-Kalyan-Me-Sikkimese Lady
Chatterboxlady-lady-guy-guy

Later when the cab stopped at one stop for toilets, the guy went out; thats when the lady told us that this guy acted lechy and was falling on her. Then I thought from then I should be careful in all turnings. The road from Darjeeling to Gangtok is fully ghat road and has some infinite turnings.

As we were getting closer to Gangtok this guy started acting crazy. He put his hand behind the driver's seat and was pretending to sleep. He was trying to reach her. I was totally shocked on his behaviour, twice I pushed his hand the otherside. Once I put my hand to block his but still he put his hand over mine and was acting the same. I tapped him and told him to behave properly. Then he got very furious. He started yelling at me, and threatened to hit me. I just kept quite as I didnt want to take the fight any further. Our peacemaker Swadheen got into the scene immediately and tried to talk softly with him and just control the situation. I thought we were four and we could easily thrash him down but then our whole holiday will get disturbed, we may even have to go to police station, which was all sheer waste of time and for us time was the most imp thing at that moment.

We reached Gangtok and this crook got down before everyone. The lady asked us to accompany her till her place. We did so and our hotel was also on the same way. Thats when she told her name is Polin(Pauline) and she works in the high court. When she got down, she thanked her special friend Swadheen. Our man asked her for her mobile to which she said 9&^%,... " I dont remem my number" :-D

Thats how our journey from Darjeeling to Gangtok ended. I've realised how unsafe it is for girls moving alone in this route.
...to be continued

Chalo Sikkim!!

I've just one more exam to go and that is Strategic Management. This is one course I really liked and I believe I've learnt to some extent. God knows will I ever get chance to implement all those I learnt.

Tomorrow evening we are leaving to Sikkim, an adventure trip :). Actually the plan was to go even to Bhutan but some one said it's difficult to cover Bhutan within 6 days so temporarily dropped the plan, We'll see if we can make that also :)




I didnt tell about this trip to my parents cos they would spoil my trip by calling me every now and then asking my whereabouts. I just told them that I've some work so will come once that's done.
I hope we have a safe trip and come back home in one piece, incase I dont update my blog by 14th of this month you may safely assume that I'm lost in Sikkim and yeah this reminds me of the the series "I shouldn't be alive" in Discovery channel.

Family - another perspective

This is a serious post and the longer it is the boring it becomes so KISSing it.

I am doing this course called Indian Social Structure. I was reading about family and relationships and felt it's thought provoking.Never in my life I gave a serious thought on family (in isolation) cos I felt it something too silly to think about and has always taken it for granted. I believe it's the same case with most of the people. I've realized how complex is a family only after doing this course. I would like to the share just the sociological definition of family and will keep it crisp, saving the rest of the globe for my exams.:)

In sociological terms a family is an institution based on the idea of compulsory hetero-sexuality. A feminist would definitely agree to the definition of Family as an arena of power struggle, uneven asymmetric distribution of power, typically the old over young, male over female. This idea resides in the concept of marriage (legitimate domain of sexuality) in Indian context.

One thing I observed in sociology, the word institution is over used. According to it marriage, family, caste, relationship...and the list doesn't end (il y a beaucoup) all are different institutions.

Snake!

At 11:00am Pranay was banging everyone's door in our wing
Pranay : "Abey uto yaar, jaldi uto.. merey room me saamp agaya.."
I was shocked .. I got up with my eyes still half closed... opened the door to find the frightened Pranay!...
Then I went to his room, to find how long the snake was. He told the snake was on his desk. I couldn't find anything on the desk. I was about to move the chair, thats when I spotted the snake. I got goosebumps when I saw the snake. Thats when I actually got up from sleep.



Initially I thought it was some laptop wire thats why couldnt spot it. I immediately moved back, realized that it's very risky to try anything funny. We immediately called the workers in our hostel. The snake was really long. It could easily be more than a metre.



The encircled part in the pic shows the snake's head.


After almost one hour they killed the snake.






The mess workers told that the snake is not that poisonous but it bites a lot.



Poor Pranay was really scared even after that. I am sure if I were in his place,I would be still worse. From now on he'll check twice before he sits on his chair.

I got my room cleaned today, after a long time just to make sure there is no snake or any other creature hiding under my bed.

But still the mysterious thing is--> "how did this snake climb up to 2nd floor". I never knew that snakes can climb trees and walls.

One important learning:- Carbolic acid(Phenol) keeps away snakes.

Birthdays!!

I never celebrate my birthdays and I don’t feel it is anything to be happy about, because of which many times I even forget my birthdays. Last year, when I 

was in Mumbai, my parents reminded me of my birthday. 

This year the people here really made my birthday a memorable incident and now I believe birthdays are the unhappiest events for anyone. Yes that was not a spelling mistake, "Unhappiest" in quotes. Normally on birthdays you see all your friends coming to your place for the party, wishing you and presenting you the gifts. 

But here more than your friends your enemies are interested on your birthday. Just like in a PC game where in you have many levels, similarily the birthday celebrations here have different levels. The pain level increases as you progress into the next levels. In the first level the specimen is taken to quadrangle or mess top so that it can accommodate a good number of people. The people here are so frustrated with the courses and grades that they look for every reason to vent the frust on someone. And birthday is one such occasion where no one can question anyone. Just like in anyother college the specimen is kicked on the butt(called birthday bumps) till everyone gets atleast one chance, after which follows the actual thing.

In the second level the specimen is slapped with chappals on the butt repeatedly till the person tires out, often they pass the baton to someone else so that the "phat phat" sound continues. Believe me the 10000 wala garland in diwali is not as loud as this one. After this brutal session the specimen would not dare to feel his butt. Along with the specimen the 2 sideys of the specimen also have to undergo the torture for the only the mistake they did in their life is being his neighbours.

Then in the third level the cake and rasagolla arrive. Now dont think the torture has ended here. This indeed is the Icing On The Cake. The birthday cake is smashed on the face of the specimen followed by a rain of rasagollas. Believe me rasagollas may seem to be very soft and sweet but you will realise how hard it can hit when someone throws it on you with real force. As a matter of fact Calcutta is the highest producer of rasagollas. So people here can afford to use them as weapons of mass destruction.

The following was the invite sent to people in the campus, describing the specimen (unknown). It's called fames but none of it is in any aspect fame.

--------------------------------------------------------

This is kind of a testimonial but purely intended to be blasphemous

-----------------------------

~ "? ?" fame

~ LAFOOT fame

~ 'thu nee yabba' fame

~ work from home 'I-Banker' fame

~ got placed in an I-bank in Summers 'Laterals' fame

~ "I HATE Sanjeet Singh" fame

~ works for Al-Quaeda under the fake name 'Ibrahim Al Musaied' from Dubai fame

~ 'Sheikh No-balls-uddin' of *** Saudi fame

~ has a fetish for Jameela... his pet camel in Saudi fame

~ only gets his hair styled by his personal barber from hyderabad fame

~ hasnt got a haircut for three months now fame

~ eternal trader on NSE fame

~ earns money for trips to hyderabad by trading in options fame

~ official ER Secy of Section C fame

~ floated Section C videos on youtube fame

~ used to sit sandwitched between two girls in school fame

~ got caught while giving a 'voice proxy' for a girl in IITM fame

~ second g** partner of Sayan g** Roy fame

~ Claims to know arabic, japanese and bengali fame

~ cant speak more than two words in any of these languages fame

~ too shy to dance with a belly dancer while working in Saudi fame

~ 'Gym Carry' of IITM fame

~ passes out after every drinking session fame

~ Shola's super best friend fame

~ "Shola jo bhadke dil mera tadpe" fame

~ heart-breaker of 10 beautiful orissa girls in Carpe fame

~ Sticking to the wall like Spiderman while drunk fame

~ Macro eco midterm topper fame

~ one week night out for quali maths fame

~ badly in need for internship at Chennai fame

~ unfortunately placed in Bangalore fame

~ 8 weekends ka advanced booking to go to chennai from bangalore fame

~ 'preraaaaaaak' fame

~ extra player in IIMC football team fame

~ athlectics champion from IITM fame

~ potential presi of Adventure club fame

~ max freerider of adventure club fame

~ asked out on a date by a famous PGP1 fame

~ rejected the offer because he wanted to play hockey fame

~ wanted to be a forward in Hockey at Samhaar but when made a defender - RG'ed with the team by giving away a goal fame

~ discovered interesting uses of his 'hockey' stick fame

~ Mess rep of IITM fame

~ 4 years alum of WH messy rep fame

~ WH Mess Rep to HAS after seeing ***RG: 'Yaar, tune abhi thak kuthe nahi pakadvaye?'

~ sleeping in the theatre while watching 'Dark Knight' fame

~ psuedo wingie of 'ANX 110s' fame

~ rarely found in 'Graveyard' fame

~ great escape from the fire in Ankit Anand's room fame

~ please dont write about katrina in my fames fame

~ 'IIT M mai ****RG se poocha gaya ki kaha hoti hai RG ki class, to usmai bhi RG kar ke bola ki RG ki koi class nahi hoti' fame

~ Class mai drawing fame, best cartoonist in class fame

~ invented new game of tetris in class fame

Be there at WH Mess top/NC at 11:59:59 to vent out all your RG frustrations on ****'RG's ass

Sideys on offer: Rishabh 'Chotu' Guptha, Ankit 'Gainda' Anand

Contri's by: Vinod, Sayan 'Gay' Roy, Yusufi 'Hagga' Kapadia, Tharun 'Rambo' 'Shola'Tarzan, Venky the webmaster, Sai'fraudy placerep'Ram, Swade$

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note : I enjoy celebrating birthdays of others :-), specially hitting with rasagollas ;)

 

Now I say birthdays are no more merrier.

asatyameva jayate!

Today I experienced one of the saddest things I could ever think of. I don’t want to take the names of the people involved. It feels like shit now. I've no words to describe this but the word very close to this is cognitive dissonance. I strongly believed something but it proved to be wrong today.

I was accused of lying and cheating by a person, whose status I really revered all these days.

At that moment, I was so shocked that my throat totally dried out, I couldn’t speak a word when the person so blatantly lied saying that I cheated. Now I've lost all the trust I have on the person and the people of his status. People can go to any extent to cover up their mistakes.

Lost hope in the system as well!

Nth order free-riding by Prof

Today we had an exam on 'hrm' which had 2 parts in it.

The part-A was an open book and part-B a closed book exam. 

As a normal practice we are given loads of material for every course before a term starts.

So there is this blue color huge book, which is a xerox copy of some cases and learnings. The print in the book looks so poor that it is an absolute turn-off. I bet none would have cared to open the book.

SO while we were writing our exam, the Prof who taught us the Part-B portion came to the exam centre and warned everyone that none should have this book while writing the exam and if someone having it on the desk the paper would be confiscated.

All those who cared to get the book deposited it. The part B had just one problem which was for 50 marks :O. 

Later after the exam the Prof mailed to everyone saying that the 50 mark problem was lifted straight from the blue color book ...

.., with all smileys ..he says it was to check whether we cared to go through our books..

I am chanting this

"Asatoma Sadgamaya
Thamaso Maa Jyothir Gamaya
Mrithyor Maa Amrutham Gamaya
Aum Shanti Shanti Shantihi"

One of our Professors lectured on the strategic pursuit of Human needs. The framework goes like this

It basically explains the hierarchy of our needs, starting with bodily needs followed by monetary needs and finally ending with self-actualization.

The framework above says that in the process of pursuing one's needs one has to adhere to the dharma, which is moral and social order. Indian culture never encouraged celibacy nor it discouraged earning money. But being ethical in both is what it emphasizes from the above framework.

A lot of people(even me) think that it is Maslow who discovered the hierarchy of needs but having gone through this ...I realize the greatness of our culture and rich heritage.

Our contribution to the humankind is unmatchable, We may not have produced enough Phds,nobel laureates in the recent times but we have a lot to our credit.

Vedas, Upanishads, Vedantas, Yoga, Yama, Niyama, Ayurveda, Kamasutra, Arthasastra..the list goes on...

Retrospect!

This is a summary of my experiences in the whole of the year 2008.

January (Janvier) :- The whole of the month I was in Saudi. I still remem the new year party, I got sloshed, puked, abused a few...and finally crashed on a sofa....

I had to come back to India to attend my interviews. I came back on 27th Jan. Reported at Mumbai office, I was very happy to be back in India

February (Février):- I was in Hyd. Everyone at home were scared looking at me thinking I was sick with some disease. (Reminding all my readers again that I cut down weight by almost 10 kgs in a month). Once again readers, my bday is in Feb so in case if you wish to gift me something and confused on what to give, please drop a message I will let you know my wish-list :)

March (Mars) :- I was back to Mumbai office. In the middle of the month I had to go to Bangalore for another intvw. This was the month I made biggest of all the gains I ever made in stock market. I could predict every move of the market.

April (Avril) :- The bull run continued for me till the 14th April(Ambedkar Jayanthi :O).Ok the story goes like this. I was so over confident that I put all the money I made till then and also a significant amount from my best friend in the greed to make huge profits, on 11th(friday) of April. I was very confident that the following monday markets world wide would fall. As expected there was a bloodbath in world wide markets except ours. I was surprised to discover that 14th April was Ambedkar's  Jayanthi and it was holiday for our markets. As Murphy’s  law goes the markets went against my predictions on tuesday and I lost almost all of the money I invested. I was so psyched that in a hurry to recover the money, I placed orders with the remaining amount in my account on thursday and again to my shock friday was holiday(this time Mahavir jayanthi). The following monday again markets went against my expectations and thats it. That was the end of all my dreams. I was in a shock and it took sometime for me to recover. I was sad that I lost not only mine but also my friend's hard earned money.

May (Mai) :- This month was again a turning point in my life, a lot of things happened. I got 2 job offers which I declined for a seat in IIM Calcutta. Within my company I had 2 US and UK onsite opportunities. I was in a dilemma to whether go for IIM or to take GMAT and go for US/UK onsite. But finally decided to join IIM.

June (Juin) :- The first week in the campus was the best experience I should say. I felt like dropping out of the course. I couldn’t take the pressure :O. Later it subsided and I started enjoying the course. In the first few days I was complaining on everything. I thought there would be many grounds and stadia like IITs. Now I realised it's actually waste of money because we hardly get any time to play. The free time we get we spend for club activities or watching movies. So the limited sports infrastructure in the campus is the optimum I believe.

July (Juillet):- The first exam in the campus was the qualifying mathematics. Surprisingly it was a cakewalk(Our seniors scared us that the Profs fail students mercilessly). We had our midterms in this month.

August (Août):- We had gone for the Inter-IIM sports meet in this month at IIM B. We were thrashed by B in almost all of the events. It was a big disappointment for all of us. I was part of the Hockey team. We were very confident that we would win at least hockey, but we lost it. We were leading in the first half of the game but towards the end they scored two goals in quick succession. That was the first time I played on a turf court.

September ( Septembre) :- The first term got over and officially we finished 1/6 th of MBA.

October (Octobre):- We had a week vacation for Durga Puja.  Didn’t realise how I spent the time.It gotover in a jiffy. Everyone was busy preparing for internships for whole of the month.

November (Novembre):- The summer placement week was one hell of an experience. We had GDs for most of the marketing companies, which often ends up becoming fish market. You can see the heights of desperation in people(that includes me). seriously feel the process is so painful. The typical questions why you? Why me? huh! had to memorize details of a lot of companies. The best experience of all was this-> I attended a telephonic intvw with one of the leading logistics companies. our placerep informed me that it was an operations and logistics role. So during the intvw I went on talking about my passions blah blah on operations to only discover to the end that they were looking for strategy :). I somehow tried to convince them that strategy was also my interest but then the heat was lost by then :D...finally got placed in a investment bank start-up.

December (Decembre):- I should say this month was by far the best one till date. Our second term got over in the first week of the month. So done with 1/3rd of MBA. We had our Cul-fest during 19-21 Dec. It was a failure as it was wrong time for any cul-fest and we had a low turn-out. A lot of colleges in Kolkata had their exams during these days. Still it was fun organizing the events. During 28-30 Dec we had another fest called Reminisence(Alumni reunion). This time it was batch of 1983. It was a great experience to interact with people with 25 years of work experience. Most of them were Managing Directors, CEOs and Professors in leading Bschools. I was part of the organizing team and got to rub shoulders with honchos of the industry.

I am doing a French course and have picked up a few lines.

Bonne année à tout le monde - Happy New Year everyone

illogical stuff!

I got this message from a friend of mine when I was in a very bad mood. I was so frustrated with a lot of things that this is how i responded then. now it seems  too funny :)

vinod: 26 DEC-TSUNAMI,

26 JAN KUTCHH EARTHQUAKE,

26 FEB GODHRA ISSUE,

26 JUNE FLOOD IN GUJARAT,

26 JULY MUMBAI TRAIN BLAST,

26 JULY BLAST IN AHMEDABAD,

26 NOV TERRORIST ATTACK IN MUMBAI

unknown: so

vinod: ne yabba so enti

26 is bad for india ani cheptunna

unknown: MAR,APR,MAY,AUG,SEP,OCT are still not affected kadha...so half the year 26 is not unlucky

vinod: hmm letseee

unknown: illa theesukunte...everyday ekkado akkada edhokkati jaruguthundhi

illogical stuff

vinod: sarelevoi

unknown: no

vinod: ippudu dani post mortem cheyalsina avasram ledu

unknown: cant accept silly stuff like this

inka cheppalante..anni calamities ni theesukoni okka mathematical series form chesi.. ee sequence lo problems vasthayi ani cheppali

vinod: babu nannu dengaku

unknown: okka pani cheyi regression analysis cheyi... weighted exponential smoothing cheyi

vinod: cheyi nuvve :)

unknown: tarvaatha jaragaboye calamity ni predict cheyi.. inka extra info kosam nostradamus predictions theesuko...prathi page number theesukoni dhaanitho inko series form cheyi

vinod: ok

unknown: inka terrorists la date of birth theesuko.. nee date of birth ki add chesi sequence form cheyi.. dhaanini regression analysis chesi...adhi time reversible Markovian chain form avuthundho ledho check cheyi

ardam ayindha?

vinod: ya

unknown: emi ardam ayindhi?

vinod: mooyi be

unknown: thidthav entra

vinod: ant e appu salu chestha ani

unknown: sare chesi result circulate cheyi

vinod: vakay

Life at IIM Cal - part I

It's not even 4 months and I feel as if it's been ages here.

My room, dirty as always.

Sleep is one thing, I miss a lot here.

I flicked this mickey from someone's Bday cake (thinking it was made of cream :)