MAXI and the Missing Middle Class

Ok, i think i will take some time and write whatever i did over the last few days for the 29th edition of MAXI Fair. Though my writing style will be highly condemned and in fact ripped apart by Fr.Jesurajan.(if at all he comes across this blog, who knows, XL is like a tiny world)
This post will be very long(if i complete it) and hopefully informative.

One of the reason for me to be at the place i am is The MAXI Fair. So, after 5 months on campus, i become part of yet another editon of MAXI Fair. And guess what, i get to be in the Maxi Admin Group. Now, whats that? For that, i should explain first, what is not Admin. MAXI is a Marketing research fair where problems of various companies are researched , for example : to study the consumers before setting up a new retail chain in the city , or what is the brand recall for a brand. Now , i know its boring to hear it this way. I thought so as well.

So, what happens is this. Every problem is disguised in the form of a funny theme based game. It could be in the form of an angel that curses people for guessing her age wrong as 19 when she is actually 1999 years old(i know, thats foolish, sometimes marketing is making asses out of customers ), so she curses him and he has to go and find the most beautiful box for her out of 4 designs,(one of which might turn up on your neighborhood retail stall if its chosen by most number of people). So the customer chooses a box. So he advances to the new level where a Scary Devil Like Creature (couldnt believe it was harsha sodhani/soda-pani) would be shouting "Khoon , Khoon " so the customer is rushed by another betal to make his choice quickly and go out.And he goes on to the next level.

But there were some real good learnings out of the few minutes when i carried a camera - 1)A housewife making her choices on which shop to go as she had to solve aladdins problem problem of shopping for Jasmine along with Genie, she thought very carefully on factors like Quality, distance from house, Price,Organisation of the store. All those guys who are getting into marketing , go get your first lessons from your mother, housewives are the last persons that marketeers could fool.

A teenage girl explained which age group would pick which kind of snack. I should confess that i was equally fooled when my own batchmates started acting as wife and husband , the best part was when the subject of research told which snack is used by which group, these guys started to fight more saying "see, i have told her the same , but she doesnt accept, why dont you explain her why you are saying this and the subject went on to explain the reasons of how people choose snacks as well.



So, this is what all the Non-Admin part is. Here comes the Admin. I dont think Admin is an apt name to this , but yeah, it makes one feel good. What we do is, we go around jamshedpur and ask for sponsorships. We luckily gathered enuff to run the show. This is a respectful part i should say. Then comes the ticket selling part. Here comes the second part of the title- Middle class. We should be selling round about 2000 tickets in jamshedpur, now the catch is, we have to sell it to the right people, i.e. Most of them SEC A, Then comes SEC B and a very few SEC C. So, we went door by door to each flat (i guess i covered atleast 150 flats) and managed selling around 100 tickets. Anyway, by the day of fair, we almost reached our targets.
Btw, find a sketchy explanation of how Socio economic classes are classified here.

On the day of the fair, we do something called profiling, we put basic questions like Age, Income, Education, Job Type and two funny questions for which i had to learn hindi.
1) Kartheek says " Yeh Jho, snacks ho they hain na, haldirams, bhujiya, bingo, kurkure , waise, yeh aap ki faily hafte mein kitne baar karidthe/kaathe hain" - uff!!!
2) Kartheek says " Aap ghar mein machar bagaane keliye kya isthimaal karte hain , coils, mats ya, liquid repellent".

So, as i input the answers to these questions in an unreliable but well developed software, it tells me, which SEC the subject belongs to and which stalls they should visit(basically , which companies research they should participate in). Now i sat at that desk for almost 4 hrs and would have profiled atleast 300 people. So, it had a good effect on me to write such a long article.
The learnings:
1) Tier II cities has people who are filthily rich, i walked into some houses which had plasma TV and many just blindly speak about growing metros. I bet that Tier II city consumers are all geared up to to spend lots and lots . Infact , i knew this when crowd turned up in great numbers to Cafe Coffee day in guntur. Its not a joke, but they would happy to say that a burglar looted 50000 worth gold from their house, if thats the only opportunity to show off their wealth.

2) Bottom of the Pyramid seems to be under the pyramid, no one is actually caring about it i guess. I had a tough time not selling tickets to lower income people as they were not required for the research. It was a tough call, never had i discriminated people in my life in any aspect. Reminded me of the Corporate movie that Madhukar Shukla screened. At one point, i felt as if i was growing cruel(thats an exaggeration i guess) , but it seemed unavoidable, we needed the well educated and high earning people, then who is taking care of the Bottom of Pyramid.

3) This is the Big One. Middle Class is disappearing in India. I know this is too generic a statement to make, but i am sure that i am right. I was there at the profiling desk asking for income, education, job of the subjects . Leave behind all the classifications , i saw only two classes- Rich and Poor. I dont know if i can say this without concrete data, but i could sense something today sitting there, the middle class had been splitting and dispersing into these two classes. India, had been turning into a land of opportunities and those of middle class who did everything to grab them , moved upwards, others just drowned into the sea of poor. And opportunities seem to come to those who are opportune and affluent . So, the rich become richer and poor becomes poorer continues.

Since i was asking education and job type, i could find out that, one thing that carried the poor to rich was EDUCATION. I could visulise it as a bridge between two cliffs. Hope India gets Educated more.

I was surprised to see that people easily giving figures like 30000 and 40000 as monthly incomes. The manner in which they said the number gave me an idea of the percentage of their income they are ready to spend . I was guessing how many choclates they would be buying in a month :P .

Uff.. I wrote too much, I will end this, all in all , it is a great learning experience.
Thats me at the Profiling Desk. " Aap ke umar kitni hogi madam" Kartheek asks :)

Writers

This piece of writing comes as an appreciation towards the lives of all the writers that i could have a glimpse into. It so happens that i buy a lot of books and all i could do was go through the first page that introduces the author. These are some inferences i could make.

Every writer would have a experienced a depression that questions their very existence. They could be in the form of poverty, bad marriage, love failure, social outcast , death of parents or lover - These create a vaccuum in the writer's life . It leaves them with a lot of questions unanswered and most of their stories are answers to those questions. Some writers actually recreate their life in a more tragic way in their stories, this seems to give them a peculiar pleasure that there are characters that suffer more than them. Writers are like stressed down spings , as they get wound by the vicissitudes of fate, they just spring open with all the creativity.

The thought process that a writer has , builds great connection with the readers. This is because the writer comes out with such a shameless description of a character's thought process that every reader will be assured that they are normal and their thought process is common. I believe writers get out of their hypocritic web that every common man is caught up in. They see themselves naked , and so are their characters. They do not hesitate to present a thought like wanting to kill owns own friend because he just laughed at his coat. They will be more than candid to say that a character's actual intention is to make love to his beloved female , rather than love her. They break the social idealism and put forward the radical views that are curbed in every common mans mind.

Writers are the biggest failures at writing at one point or the other. Like history is mostly about the people who won wars , not many times do we hear about all the writings that didnt get published or get the worst reviews. I was reading Gogol's failure as a writer intially and his desperation to write something good. It only gives me a boost that i continue to write some rubbish and hope some day that i turn out a masterpiece.

Arbit!!!!

Bargaining for mediocrity...
Dreams: Reality = 20:1
Thoughts:Actions = 100:1
Live life XL size
Another CAT ~ The first CAT i didnt take since november 2004
So near.. So Far
Research a Business and account for the costs, manage the finances, communicate and market to the clients, analyse quantitatively and keep in track of the economy
High ROI can mean Very high returns on high investment or High Return on low investments.Which one would i prefer?
Step function vs Continuous Function
two minutes to go to a meeting..

P.S : No P.S :-P ..

Stop.. A CAT just passed by us

Its funny that an Exam makes a person feel nostalgic. An exam that has the highest stakes and ofcourse most over valued by most of those who take the Exam. I wonder if i had the guts to take it again. Anyway, i think i will remember the three years of CAT prep through out my life. How would it be after 20 years if CAT continues to happen on the 3rd sunday of November. I think , Archies would come up with the concept of best wishes for CAT very soon(thats a good idea).

Its irony, that i am in XLRI now, may thats the sweet revenge i could take on CAT :) . But its that time of the year again. So i just wanted to acknowledge the event when 2 lakh pencils fill atleast 3 crore circles. May be if anyone who filled those circles and then comes across this blog. I will just leave a cliche here(cliches are cliches because they are true for a long time)

Whatever happens, happens for good.

Indifference and poetry

In the fervour of everything
indifferent i am , i sing
every colour and every hue
turns to me to love and lure
every smile and every laugh
had been trying to take me off
all the silence and all that's loud
tried to push to the ninth cloud
In the fervour of everything
Indifferent I am , I sing

P.S: No particular reason why i wrote this one, its just as indifferent as it could get.

Nothing and Everything

There is nothing i can write about everything that happened at this place. It is as if the whole place had come alive. When i say alive , its not about lively, its just that everyone here had seen a microcosm of life (from past to future). When i cleared CAT/XAT after 3 years, i thought thats it , i have seen the worst.
Haha.. Now i only laugh back at it. Anyway , this time, i would only say - i had a reminder , that there never should be an assumption of absolutes- its an oxymoron.
Some learning again.
I will keep this post very short.
PS1: Cadburys
PS2: I am one of the coolest persons :)

Kabhie.. Kabhie..

i rolled over from my bed and tried to feel the floor. It seemed that i had to cover some more distance to touch the floor, i felt like i was just floating in air , i didnt bother to open my eyes and see what is happening around me. At some moment i felt like i was falling rather than floating, however it doesnt make any difference as long as there is nothing below me, so i assumed the free fall to be a float. There was a drizzle, it came from below me , droplets of water hit my back , they spread in the mesh of threads of my shirt , i rolled over to feel them on my face. I still didnt bother to wake up and see whats happening. Why would rain come from beneath, does that mean i was rising with my head turned towards the ground?

Ignorance is bliss. I enjoyed the bliss, but the very habit of dissecting the seemingly irrational couldnt put my mind to sleep. So i continued, if i was rising towards the sky , i would soon be into the clouds where all the rains come from, so i would go splash into the clouds where there would be tankers of water which let out rain like water out of porous hose. But wait , that is like a fairy tale, clouds are just a collection of water vapour and other gases, so where will i reach at the end. Will i go to the sun, how hot will it be- And just then , i went splash into water, i could feel everything around me though i still chose to be blind. It was a sky of water, i could feel it by the way water rushed into my ears and the way i gushed out bubbles from my nostrils, still nothing seemed to be wrong, no science seemed to applying here. This time, i was neither drowning , nor floating , i was travelling. I knew i carried a smile on my face, that the water couldnt wash away. I tried to move as if in sleep, i folded myself inwards, the speed of my travel doubled. It was as if someone was sucking an ocean from behind my back. I was racing against water. And suddenly, i was thrown out of it, I was like a pole vault athlete at the highest point of projectile, a dolphin that was trying to just go a wee bit above water but actually went so high and so fast that it reached escape velocity, i was whirled out and i could feel the warmth now, but it didnt seem like the sun. It was warm enough to keep my smile intact- And just then, Gravity took over. I started to free fall, and i felt that i was in closed doors, I slowed down as if i was landing somewhere, i started to dislike it , i thought of finding out this time-

And then , the phone rings -" Kabhie, Kabhie Mere dil mein" , before it went any further , i rushed my hand into the pocket and cut it off- "Nice tune by the way " said the prof.
I said to myself "shit".

P.S : My phone is silent for almost 90% of the time that i dont remember whats my ring tone. But few times when it actually rang , it had the attention of everyone- unfortunately, they were in , Dean's Office ,Library and Class room. The dream part was the other problem i am facing these days in classes- dozing off(ofcourse, thats because i dont sleep the night before)

Two sides of a coin

Happy Days: Rewind and Review-2

Review
First of all, Shekhar Kammula is one of the most sensible film makers we have around, even though he loses himself in trying to force some geeky stuff thats totally irrelevant.

Lot of moments in life are very sensitive and delicate , they are very difficult to reproduce on screen . Shekhar kammula is one of those who does it with perfection. Happy days comes around as one of those of his movies where the audience slip into their past and relate with the characters. Fitting in 4 years of time in 3 hrs is not at all easy , and to portray innumerable instances of college makes it much more complicated. Though i watched it online, i could figure out the execution in terms of cinematography was perfect. Music is outstanding and Lyrics are the best that i have heard in the recent past.

The scenes on lead pair are a treat to watch. Characters of Rajesh and Tyson have been scripted very interestingly.And needless to say , Shekhar somehow manages to walk through the complicated thought process of the fairer sex. May be this is the first time that i have sat down to criticise a film. Shekhar somehow got into the wrong idea of College days are all about love, he does talk about friendship, but its clear that the concept of love takes over in every alternate scene. Its difficult to depict other issues in college, but it seemed to be misfit when you show the protaganist talking about how he feels about his lady-love throughout the movie and suddenly realises that he has nothing to do in life and then the principal comes to rescue and says "You are a leader". And Wipro doesnt actually offer jobs just like that, i know that everybody gets placed on-campus, one doesnt need to rush it through as done in the movie. I mean , the way Rajesh gets a job is ridiculous,(atleast the screenplay is not comparable with the award winning Dollar Dreams).

The geeky stuff is an absolute misfit most of the times. There could have been more strength in the movie if at all it had some more story and an interesting screenplay. After three intelligent movies, shekhar some how couldnt associate with more factors than women and love. But i am happy that he had made his mark at last at the box-office. He struggled for a long time to come so far.

Happy Days :Rewind and Review

Rewind:
Many told me that watching Happy Days would take one back to the college days and reminisce every thing. Yes it did do the same to me. So , i will let my fingers fly.
We did all of those , the great JNTU Salute, Pledge (there were times when i could recite it in sleep, and if it was to shown on screen , you will have a beep for 2 minutes) , propose to girls , collect biodata,dancing at the bus stops, Midnight Assemblies and some wierd games that i cant describe here. The claustrophobic hostels had more than anyone can think of. And then we had classes , and we had the long mass bunk , that made the admin wonder and send a letter to everyones home. It was the time when we learnt to read anything and everything in one night. It was very easy.There are many processes in college that had been there since years , those actually doesnt make much difference to anyone's life, Classes, Exams , Grades , Admin , Faculty etc , Its always those things that are very dynamic that make a lot of difference. And the most Dynamic one's are human beings. Ok, I will cut the jargon - Friends.

4 years is a long time , let's do some calculation : imagine that your memory started record things since you are of the age 5, so by the time you end your college, you would be 21 .So , a total of 16 years of memory, 4 years in that counts to 25% of the life till that point. These 4 years happen at a single place with a fixed set of population (except for th inflow of juniors and outflow of seniors). So whatever we do there has a strong impact on life. Everyone finds their group of friends from these fixed set of people. But the fun again is people never remain the same, they change. Just within those 4 years , one will see life as a sample . And everyone after coming out of college gets a shattering shock that they are all alone to face the reality.

My Room No in XLRI is 301, I was wondering the about the connection with the flat 6 of us shared in engineering , it was 301 Vijaya Raghava Resdency , Chandanagar, Hyderabad. We managed to find it for a meagre rent of 1600 per month. What i experienced there would be like a memory that has been bound in book. Its difficult to manage people , not in the managerial sense but on a personal note, everyone gets so connected or obsessed with something or someone and that forms a long chain of bonding that crisscrosses within itself. I managed to write about everyone i met in my college in a very inetersting way (cannot post it here) . But looking back , i would say that meeting everyone of them was a privilage and pleasure. Many people speak about having good friends , friends who are perfect and stuff. But that would be asking for an utopia, the difference is all what contributes to the drama. It has been 2 and half years since all of us walked out of that place called college and even though i still struggle to stay in touch with everyone, the news that someone of us is doing well in life spreads happiness across everyone.

I thought of writing so many things that i forgot most of them. But College is not actually about absolute happy days. Its like coming to know that when you jump high and land on the wrong foot, you will get hurt and you will bleed , and it will pain if you dont have someone with you. Yes, i will have to make it a point here as most of the movies make sure that their story revolves around this topic - girls . I would have rather called it love, but let it be so, i dont mind being MCP sometimes. This is where a lot of equations change , this is where the illusion of adoloscence comes in. I dont want to give any gyaan on it but i have been a biographer of many such stories, i know how people feel in it. They go mad with happiness and then they go mad.

As i lost track , i will end the post with some incidents i can remember that are just some things to cherish in college. I wish i could film these scenes . (Names have been changed )

"Rajesh hands over the letter, and says "Please read it " . (From a long shot) She walks away and kiran calls up sameer who is waiting at the gate and says "she is coming towards the gate, she is openeing the letter, for now the expression is ok, try to have good look". Sameer says " Ya , i got her , she is coming this way, she is almost done with later, just hold on " . Kiran :" Hello , you there? , what is she doing now, is she smiling ? hello , you there" Sameer: "She smiled"

Kondal bowled the last ball. Batsman manged to connect and pushed it down to long on, it was almost done. They hurried the first run , and then quickly to the second , sharath picked up the ball and threw it to the bowlers end. Sunil removed the bails and there were celebrations. Kondal was still confused about who won , it was tie and we won as we had less wickets. It was rematch , the previous match was also tied.

" Fuck you, no one is going to say sorry , go to hell "
Prasad walked on to the raj as he tried to pick up a brick and throw , prasad dodged and gave full thrust blow on his face.

Everyone assembled in the fields near our flat at midnight and he explained all that thought about her.

We turned the volume high and started singing all at a time "Woooooooh Lamheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee "

Everyone got on to the stage and did some insane dance honoring our shankardada. And we were on paper the next day.

X signals to Y , just by moving an eyeball, they both feel thirsty at the sametime and go to have a glass of water. There happens a transaction of atleast 20 marks.

Sunil was totally drunk, i was supposed to take care of him, he is not even peeing in the right direction. I left him in the other to sleep and as we were continuing with the party , he walked in and went straight to rahul and slapped him.

"Leave the seat"--"Why" -- "Idiot , dont you get it, see that she sits here"

"He is not here yet, he should catch the next bus" and then , the bus starts to move , he is seen at the far end of the road holding a bag in one hand and drafter in the other. Turns the bag around and straps it round his back, bus accelarates,and this where you can understand the newtons principles of relative frames. He pushes hard aginst the ground and cuts through the crowd at the bus stop and almost reaches the rear of the bus as the driver changes gear. He throws the drafter to his friend in the bus and reaches out to the railing and gets on to the bus as his friend pulls him up with one hand. He gasps for breath, smiles and asks "did we get the movie tickets".

P.S: Review in next Post.

Beauty

Ok, this will be a quick one , but can be a long one. The post might turn a bit disturbing as you read through , so take ur call and click on the top right most button on your window if you cant handle reality.I know thats not the right thing to say to a person who had taken the effort to type thekartheek.blogspot.com and come to this window , but that works in Marketing :)

OK, this post is not about Marketing , its not about beauty that you would be thinking about.

I just finished watching American Beauty , Absolutely great film. I was one of those who dissected its poster when it won the Best Film award in 2000, but didnt bother to watch it as it didnt have any relation to gladiator.

The point is why dont we make such movies. Some one would say , "we are perfect , we have a strong tradition and culture that we have been abiding by since ages " . Well if i can borrow some thing from the British to answer that - i would say "Bollocks"

We are a bunch of hypocrites like any one in the world. The fact that we dont accept that, takes us to a different level . My perception of the USA was always through movies, the slightest temptation i had to go to the states, was to cross check my perceptions. To me , America was a Land of opportunities , where people rampantly carried guns (and had a great style in using), its a place where the people below poverty line own a car , a place of different cultures, out of which none can be claimed as thier own, a place where its wierd if you just married once in your life , its so wierd that you will be the most liked character in the movie , unfortunately 90% of the audience have been divorced atlest once.Its a place where all the business is , all the technology is , all the army is . Its where corporates are supposed to ruthlessley loot the third world countries , and they have a great number of ways of doing those , like they are sucking the countries through some pipes laid under the pacific and atlantic, Hollywood is fortunate
enough to have lot of stories to make movies about. And , Its a place where i think , one can find the most number of psycho-killers, drug addicts (this need not be true, this is just my perception based on the movies). And you can find people like Will Hunting too (Hope i find one person like that).

Oh ya, i forgot to mention , its a place where there are fair enough chances for anyone who had landed from even the jungles of africa or some god-forsaken place of the world - to get laid within a week.

Now, that is America . The movie American Beauty started off giving me an impression that it was portraying all the psychological dysfunctionalities that exist in their world. But the best part is , it daringly does all that and surprisingly manages to say "Chill dude ! This is reality".

Ok, now, just click and hold the left button on your mouse on the globe that google earth shows, move sideways from USA to India. When Mohan Bhargav dared to counter the village head's preposterous presumption that India is a great nation that has a tradition since ages, i said to myself "Wow". As i said , the worst thing with us is that we dont accept even the bad thing. Now , i am not suggesting anyone to keep whining about our problems and insecurities everyday, but we thwart anyone who comes out to say " We too do wierd things" . No one dares to mention the penchant that Gandhi had for sex even at the age of 13-14 . For every one person who tries to be a non-conformist , there are atleast ten faceless organisations who are ready to wash them away along with their footprints.Watch Parzania for some daring effort.

We have one of the stupidest notion of society absolutely obsessed with the notion of "relative grading". Its like saying "My individuality is defined on the basis of my neighbours individuality". "Excuse me, did i hear individuality". Parents do everything for their child so that they are better than our neighbhours . Some lakhs of students take competitive exams in india for whom the basic reason is "someone else is taking it" My friend mentioned this to me- Pavan Verma mentions in his book The great Indian middle class that India is the only country where the number of people taking an exam increases with the difficulty in passing that exam.I dont need to answer why. We think that there are no extra-marital affairs in our country , everyone loves everone , no drugs , nothing.

Imagine this , suddenly , you wake up one day and the whole society vanishes , you are all alone by yourself . Then you will feel as good as dead , because you dont have anyone above to whine about and no one below to brag about yourself. We have enough number of insecurities, we hide them within us and go through a torture that we hypocritically call patience. And this patience is irrationally linked to the traditions and so generations are tied together to follow the trend.
We have more number of cultures than America and we claim to be our own and still we end up hating each other. We seek identity by tring to eliminate diversity , but still we hold up the big bill board "Unity in Diversity" .We have the wierdest crimes and factions that are sensationalised in the media.

Well i have lost track of what i wanted to write.I will end it here.Let me bring down the intensity with P.S . These mite be long as well.
P.S 1: The post was not meant to say that we are screwed up, but the point we over dramatise and under-act on any of our troubles is because we refuse to acknowldge them.

P.S 2: When i have read such writings, first things that popped up in my mind were , "Whats this guys problem in life ? " . Well, I just got inspired by the movie, thats all.

P.S 3: Just as a diversion from serious things , Was awake for one whole night and then went to classes next day, God, TAS form took so long. One of my friend answered for the question "What is your short term goal" - "to earn lots of money", thats to prove that there is some honesty left in this place beyond all the gas.

P.S 4: We managed to get away with the least scoldings in MCN class. (Will blog about it later)P.S 5: There were some posts earlier on my blog which i realised later that it was a too daring an act for me to have it on my blog. I deleted one post by myself and my friend convinced me that the other post was worth to be there on the blog. In other words , he said "stop being a hypocrite".

P.S 6:I would like to end it with some quotes from American Beauty - Oh! Before that , Long Live Kevin Spacey.

P.S 7 :Quote1- "Its a great thing when you discover that you have the ability to surprise yourself , makes u wonder what else you could do that you have forgotten about."

P.S 8: This dialogue comes as a voice over after kevin spacey dies , oops! , i spilled out the plot, dont worry , he tells it in the first dialogue that he is going to die. Thats the beauty of screen play. Ok, the dialogue " I had always heard your entire life flashes in front of your eyes the second before you die. First of all, that one second isn't a second at all, it stretches on forever, like an ocean of time... For me, it was lying on my back at Boy Scout camp, watching falling stars... And yellow leaves, from the maple trees, that lined my street... Or my grandmother's hands, and the way her skin seemed like paper... And the first time I saw my cousin Tony's brand new Firebird... And Janie... And Janie... And... Carolyn. I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me... but it's hard to stay mad, when there's so much beauty
in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much, my heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst... And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life... You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry... you will someday."

"P.S9 : Glossary : Janie- his daughter , carolyn - his wife . And if you dont know who Mohan Bhargav is , Go to hell , but watch Swadesh before going.

P.S10 : To those who have taken trouble to read this line - Thank You and thats all folks.

Superheroes, Guilt and Girlfriends

I just finished watching Batman Begins. That completes the set of Christopher Nolan’s films(I don’t when did he make Insomnia, yet to see that) . First of all, Christopher Nolan is one of those guys who should have gone to science school and I am sure he would have invented Time-machine by now. He just can not make movies without going back and forth in time . If you have to watch his movies , better get some brains along with you.

Now, let me justify the title . Inspite of all the effort that Christopher Nolan had put in to make the movie different from what a conventional superhero story is, he couldn’t change two things – Guilt and Girlfriend.

Every super hero has guilt as his Achilles heel . Why is this so? Well the only reason I can come up with is this – Superhero is supposed to be invincible , he is immune to all the accidents , weapons and everything , in the worst cases he has ultra modern technology to save himself , so the only thing that can kill him or torture him should come from within him . And so , the answer is Guilt . As I generally generalize , “Guilt I believe is the most dangerous feeling that turns even the strongest human being into a very vulnerable one” . Well I am not talking about superheroes in that quote.

Now , what is it with the girl friends ? Yes , of course , Spiderman wouldn’t sell at the box-office without the upside-down kiss , nor would superman without the free ride in the clouds , with a bonus kiss. But its again how weak the super strong superhero’s character turns into as his dearest love leaves him. He always has problems with wooing his girl. He can swing across streets, save her on the verge of slipping down the precipices , take a point-blank shot into the eye , carry a boeing and place it in a baseball field , but if its romance time – they become duds . If I generalize that girlfriends turn people vulnerable , I know that my blog will be pulled down. But other wise , I think superheroes are loners in their disguised identity and so they become more susceptible to things like love and care. And as usual , girls are always the right thing to go for to have a longer script , as their minds are the mothers of pendulums. They come and go and come and go and so on – I mean come on – Its been 3 movies from spiderman, and mary jane had been in out of our hero’s life for more than 6 times. Anyway , I think one more assumption is , girls are much more difficult to woo than bringing down a Supervillian and for that , one’s superpowers also fall short. They just cant stop asking for better .

Ok, before I write anymore and get blacklisted , I will end with the traditional P.S .

P.S1 : More forms are coming in , and I slept for 10 hours today. (If anyone is reading this blog for the first time , I am in a B-School)
P.S2: Groupthink and creativity cannot co-exist, atleast for me.
P.S3: There has been a grade inflation.
P.S4:Question- “ Every leader has a sense of purpose, what is your statement of purpose” – First answer that strikes to mind – “Not Applicable”
P.S5: Its 5:00 am and the only light in my room is from my lappy , so a lot of green bugs are just hovering on the screen and some committed suicide by diving into the chasms of my keyboard before I tried to shoo them away, which means, I should turn it off and go to bed.
P.S6 : I just wrote a 650+ word blog , I would have finished the TAS form – that doesn’t happen because it has a deadline till 16^th.

Oktoberfest, SIP and Goddamn Sleep

This might be my post after coming back here, and i realised that the holidays had made my life hell as i now cant handle a day with less than 7 hrs sleep. Thats Insane!! . Not for the present class schedule , but for all the events i get involved and the occasional random things i do , like checking videos on Youtube, ads on Adverbox and sometimes reading class books.

The second term actually seems very interesting , it has a lot of time for liesure in a day. The point is , i tend to screw up things when i am given a option to choose from choices , I know thats not what a gonna-be manager shud be saying. But thats how it is. I have started to sleep in class, not actually sleeping but i try my level best to not to fall asleep. But this so called 'try' from the eyes of a 3rd person looks like as if i am fighting between life and death. I wriggle my face every 5 minutes as if to cast away the looming shadow of sleep from my face, and then i rub my eyes for atleast a minute non-stop, until they go red and then the trade mark yawn - the other day , i felt so embarrassed that i was yawning big time infront of a prof who is supposed to be the coolest of the lot. I was sitting right under his nose and executing the afore mentioned gestures. I couldnt stand the self embarrasment and so bunked the next class. I guess that was my first voluntary bunk.

And i was doing almost the same thing, this time though , i was in the last bench, this was what one of my friends asked me " you seemed as if there was something extremely wrong with you, your eyes were red, you face was long and you were absolutely uncomfortable" . I was doing al l this when the marketing prof was shouting at the top of his voice.

Ya, the Oktoberfest, the last minute preparation and execution of the Dracula Event went on well. I somehow feel that there are so many areas of our brain that are asleep for a long time, when they came alive its a rejuvenating experience. I now regret my inability to keep up with quizzing after 10th class. God!! there was loads of knowledge that i went blind to. Anyway, i am enjoying being a learner again by being in the audience in every quiz . I guess , i shud start getting qualified sooner or later.Every other thing that happened in oktoberfest was a proper food for thought. Now , i feel that i shud have been more involved in than what i was. And i realised that there are a lot of good writers on campus. Need to learn from them too and catch up with them.

Now the big thing, The SIP , I think this where the whole batch is tested for everything it claims to be, not on the standards of their intellect , but on their ability to withstand the vicissitudes of fate . My supposedly Mar-Focus has also been diluted for now by the senior's suggestions as they say " When you are being picked arbitly, you can't pick them systematically" . So it seems that i will have to take every chance. I dont know how heavy is my CV . But the talk over a CV had already gone beyond normal or even abnormal.

Above all this, i am writing something which i think might turn out to be a very good original if executed well. But there will be a lot of push and pull in the next one month atleast till the SIP to keep thiongs in order. Whatever may happen, i am still worried about one very precious thing - SLEEP .

Its 3 am and i have a class at 8 30, in case i come back to this blog after a few years - Its Fr.Jesu's class tomorrow.

P.S1: I feel like studying Biomechanics to know whats happening to my teeth.
P.S2: P&G and TAS forms to fill.
P.S3: Prasanna says he sleeps for 2-3 hrs a day. WTF. Is he human.
P.S4:JAM is fun , though i did it only once and got swept out easily. As i said already there are many smart things to do.
P.S5: ID crisis is a clear outcome of one's own perception, but no one can help it.

Absolute Happiness :D

God!! There are very few times when i blogged when i was absolutely happy. I have a class tomorrow at 8 30 in the morning , where i will break my back sitting straight for 90 mins. Whatever be tomorrow , I will blog today.
Everytime, i saw the phone ring with prasanna's name on it , i just prayed that i would hear "Mama , Job Vachindhi ra" . I dont know, how we live together with people and become a part of each others lives. I have seen good things happening to closest of my friends, and when those things are least expected but most anticipated , those would be the most memorable moments. Prasanna called me at 6 or so when i was going blind over arranging groups of Financial Management. I thought, this time i would definitely hear it , well i had to wait, he had one more interview to attend. But , i got the call that i wanted at 12 o clock and i heard exactly what i wanted to.Like the cliche -'I cant express my happiness in words' , but i somehow had a quick recap of all the 6 years we both spent together, it was like a walk back down the rose garden of memories. I felt for the first time that i was very far away from people , so far away that we couldnt meet each other in the happiest moments . One of the main reasons , i am writing this is to remember the moment. I couldnt document a similar moment when Sandeep's onsite was confirmed. May be, the reason that i was part of their lowest times of life makes me realise how happy they would be feeling about all this.

Well, i wont make the moment any more boring by writing more about it.
Would just say again, I am more than happy today.

P.S : I realise now , how happy people felt when i atlast got into a B-School . And i reacted so dumbly.

Logged in

My status message on Gtalk was misunderstood by enough number of people to lead to this post. It might be difficult to get into XLRI, but its much more difficult to get to XLRI. Travelling is one thing that i wished to do , but i do not do things unless i am forced to. So i had to come back to XLRI from Hyderabad thats far far away. Well there was one single thing common between both the places , it was raining at the same intensity at both the places. But Calcutta walks with all the top prizes.

We payed 1200 rs from Calcutta airport to Howrah railway station. We were actually supposed to pay 1000 , but after seeing the streets through which we passed through, i felt it was worth paying him an extra 200. I will not write much , but i will leave the post with these pics . The one where one can see my feet is where the water flowed into the taxi.

Change is Good

Well, this is not that philosophical cliche that i am restating, but its what everyone would be seeing along with the cute dog that was called hutch dog . And O&M is trying its best to rename it as Vodafone dog (that has too many syllables , i guess). Hutch and O&M had provided some of the finest advertisements that has been a treat to watch. Many say that the ads actually didnt translate to sales . I kind of agree with that, i never felt that a network followed me, instead there were many times when i had to follow the network. I guess today, even if vodafone bought Hutch, it still has to stick with the dog(inspite of claiming that Change is Good) , so it seems that the only change that occured is that , the dog sold off Hutch and bought vodafone, in other words, its not Dog's Hutch , its Dog's Vodafone.

Ok, i actually wanted to talk of something else. Infact , i want to see the philosophical side of the phrase 'Change is good' . I referred to this many times even in my previous posts. Vodafone was trying to do a very interesting thing in rebranding hutch , it gave no scope to the speculation on the issue of change. Instead of answering the question 'Is Change Good?' with reason, it came up with a statement 'Change is Good'. (yeah they did give some reasons in the footnote). And so , you wake up one day and see that Hutch Shop is now Vodafone Store , and before you start to worry about whats happening , you see letters in big font reading 'Change is Good'. And you would blindly reason to yourself that everythings OK.

How many times does change occur in our day-to-day life and how many times do we hear this line 'Change is Good'. Excuse me for delving deep into the spirals of flashback . Every thing i guess, which had been remarkable in my life had been an event of change (i know that its a silly statement to make, i mean its the same for everyone) . There are many new things we wake up to everyday, and not every thing is as rosy as the huge hoarding of Hutch with a cute little dog.Any thing more on this would make this piece boring, so rest is left to the imagination of readers.

Other Updates : 1/6th of my MBA is done with and it so seems that i am landing up without fail in B+, i know its too early to make a statement like that. I do not know what people in other B-schools do during exams, but if i can take an actual count, i can prove that i slept for more hours during my MBA term exams than my Engineering exams. But Exams went well, i mean, after a long time i had to keep my brain ticking continuosly for 2 - 3 hours .

And then two weeks at home, i managed to go to a cinema today. T20 world cup couldnt be at a better time, but it seems that i would be missing the final. Its a wierd feeling that i am called a student after two years in IT . My mom is worried about my sleep timings , 2 am to 11 am - the other day she was saying " i thought you would learn some discipline in B-school, but what happened to you". What a misconception!!

But , its actually been a tough task for me to be organised, i am atleast getting used to writing down things that i should be doing (dont ask me, if i am doing them on time) . B-school taught me that . I had to meet my friends only on lunches. Everyone in this world seems to be so busy.And , I still cant figure out what happened to hyderabad within three months, it might be some huge immigration of people and vehicles , traffic here has gone crazy.

So, thats it for now. Yup.. P.S follows

P.S1 : Movies watched - Zodiac , Elephant, greatest game ever played , Fountain and Manorama.
P.S2: I will excuse Darren Aronofsky for Fountain and will continue to be his fan, but any movie like that again, its a requiem for him.
P.S3: If i have a time machine, i would go back in time and congratulate Mr.Parkinson for such a beautiful law, and then i would would just go back a little bit in time and would frame the law by myself. I mean thats so obvious "WORK STRETCHES TO TIME AVAILABLE" atleast for me, there had been no exception.
P.S4:I saw bumper sticker on a car that read www.earnextraincomeindia.com , now just hold there and check how you read it - this is how i read it - ear next rain come india .com , ok , i know thats very dumb , its also called creativity in some places ;) . If you read it the same way i did , click on the link to find the answer.
P.S5: there had been interesting events in last 1 month , which i would like to call short stories, even till the moment before i started this writing. I tried to pen some , but cant post every thing.
P.S6: I should thank srinivasan for showing it to me that you can write more than one P.S for a piece. P.Ss are fun.
P.S7: 2 days from now, i will wake up in XLRI to 2nd term , i hope my roomie holds the hoarding 'Change is Good'. I wonder how i will manage to make it to 8 30 classes in winter. :)
P.S8: Yup, forgot to mention, i have got braces and they are a pain :(

All said and done.. its done..

I have this habit of worrying too much that things wouldnt be done. But somehow they seem to get done. We are at last done with the talent nite, supposedly conducted by the junior Dracula. I could only put some effort by the end, funny to realise that i have shaked a leg on the stage (cant actually call it dance).

Not much to write while going to sleep at this time of the day. Like the saying goes, every ending gives rise to a beginning, i have 3 submissions to complete tomorrow. So every other thing, hope this also gets done.

Quote : We may not be rational, we may not be collective , but we are collectively rational.

PS1: screwed up QT for the 2nd time. Didnt feel good about it at all.
PS2: For a change BFA went well.
PS3: Just to mention once again, i something thats similar to dance.
PS4: My low profile doesnt seem to help.
PS5: Grades seem to taking over my mind and just then i was bit by dracula.
PS6: Hope i survive the next 2 weeks.If i have to talk business here , next two weeks translate to 50% of the marks.

So much to write...

Its almost 2 months in XL, and 1 more month to go for the 1st term to end, technically 1/6 th of MBA. I was in a way tongue tied on all the events that happen in this place, and at the same time i indulged in minimum analysis on all the events. However , something that i cant resist is to be amazed by the variety of people here. In a way , even after 2 months, the place still seems new. At the same time it seems to be having a lot in store to offer.

As Organisational behaviour says, "Perception is Reality". Perception drives everything. The way i see things is the way i look at them. Interesting part is how perception had been changing since i came here. Its changing for the better.

And to speak about myself. I am trying new waters, its the last experiment i can do being a student. Some good results i hope out of this experiment are, i make a movie that shall stay for years and i pass out as a good person from this place (need not be the best outgoing student). And of course have some decent grades.

Ok, this seems to be the most boring article i wrote, but thought that i would write something to keep the habit going.
Other updates: Got into Dracula(Dramatics and Cultural activities association),
CR isnt an easy post, but my indifference seems to help me,
I am still in a way doing well with the subject , but not the same with marks,
I discovered that teaching is a very tiring job, but i still love it,
feel like going home.

News as on 28/07/07

Headlines
-Our class lost 2.5% marks in a subject.
-I got 30/30 in QT test and subsequently , i failed in BFA (supposedly).
-I became a member of the Student Affairs Council.(SAC)
-Old Monks have come down to deliver their Signature.

Details and opinions

-our class lost 2.5 % of the total marks for the term in a subject as we couldn't do a sum given by a prof. This as it seems is a very tragic moment for the whole class, or rather for majority of the class. Looking at the very concept of marks and exams, an individual of 23-24 years would have taken 70-75 tests per year on an average(starting from an age of 12 years). And we havent still grown immune to them. When i say immune , i do not recommend negligence , but i guess we are mature enough to balance our life on various things along with marks. But marks seems to the be all and end all even at an age where people are old enough to reproduce.
(I also belong to the marks fearing club)

-Its all in your mind. I know that i am saying this in hindsight.The first two tests i took on campus had been a learning in a way that you do what you think you can do. Its not as easy to implement as it is said. QT and BFA tests are just a measure of my mindset before the exam rather the content and understanding of the subject.And i see the same trend throughout our class.

-The first time ever in my life that i stood for an election and it showed me all facets of it. The most important facet - Moral flexibility (thanks to 'Thankyou for Smoking' for the word ). Fortunately or Unfortunately, i didnt have it a bit . The best thing to cherish is to come through the elections with clean hands, which i did.And ofcourse, i cant forget the words of Uncle Ben.

-Culture shock is the most talked about thing in a B-School. I had enough shielding to save myself from the shock, but i realised that its inevitable. Its as inevitable as change.So much for i can say now. But just to add to the headline of Old Monks, the dry days will henceforth dry off.

P.S1: Adventure trip was an experience, especially for the way i will hate the words strategy and motivation.
PS2:Quote- "B-schools are nothing but placement agencies" Unquote
PS3:Counterquote "What else are B-schools supposed to be?" (quotes and counterquotes are not my words)
PS4:A bike called Swever runs on urine.
PS5: I attended a Quiz and a Fin event given an exam the next day. I rarely did it in my life.
PS6:from the documentary Drowned Out - Arundhati Roy says in the international conference on water utilistaion "I came here to know what power smells like, i found out that it stinks". I was surprised to see her in tears on the issue of narmada bachao . I thought people like her had iron hearts to take on this world.
PS7: Word of the week :BAKCHODHI

muddy waters

So much for the rain
that tried another stain
as it came in a deluge,
to the eye it wasnt huge

for it rose from underneath
and traveled to the zenith
the air turned foul and hazy
as the waters that splashed -
were all muddy

P.S: the poem as usual seems very artificial, but i had to write it because of 2 reasons. 1)One of my friend appreciated the usage of the phrase muddy waters in my mail to her. 2)The waters i was talking about turned out be more muddy.