A day with an old friend

Now that MBA is done, its time to look back at life, meet up with old friends or at least catch up with them over the phone, learn and be surprised about the relationships that have sprouted between a few well known people, sit at home and do nothing, eat, drive the bike that has been abandoned for two years, watch TV, go to the grocery store nearby, get snacks for mom & sis in the evening, go meet friends during the weekend, watch a movie if possible, go online for a while and not find anything interesting, ping a few people and get no response as they’re probably busy, wait for the offer letter that never seems to be coming, give suggestions to juniors about summer internship, visit old colleges, collect certificates, visit temples, pray to lord for a bright future and for the early arrival of the offer letter, call up people in the company to find out the reason for the delay and always end up getting the same reply – “we still haven’t finalized the location.  We’ll be sending u the offer letter in the coming week.  Be prepared to join at a short notice.”

Was that a good enough snapshot of whats been happening with me off lately?? I guess so.  Nothing really great to describe, nothing really adventurous except for the extensive sleeper class travel in the burning heat that I carried out during my visit to pune for the commencement ceremony, to shirdi and back. 

One incident I find worth writing about is probably the visit to my engg college.  The best part is that in the process, I met up with a very old school friend of mine.  Would you believe we were meeting up after 12 years?  Yes, it is true.  We were together in school for just one year.  Sixth standard.  Then both of us parted ways.  She left school and I stayed on.  Given the lack of advancement of technology during those days, we couldn’t stay in touch even if we wished to.  After so many years, a few months ago, I was searching for some of my old friends, including her, in the social networking sites like orkut and facebook expecting them to be registered in one of them.  I couldn’t find her.  This woman used to be too good at math during school.  So I had this belief that she would’ve landed up in one of the IITs and all.  Naturally, you’d expect IITians to be tech-savvy and well verse with the internet.  So I was kinda surprised to not find this woman registered anywhere on any site.  But I didn’t give up this search.  I accidentally happened to search for the same name a few months later and was extremely surprised and happy to find her.  I left her a message.  She got back to me after approximately 2 months with a one line reply.  Yes, just a one line reply.  I felt bad.  I was thinking “was this effort worth it?”  And guess what, the reason she gave for such a short reply when I later asked her – “She was bad with typing.”  How funny! 

A few more months later, I found her online and that was the first time we were talking after a long gap of 11 odd years.  The first thing I asked her was “Which IIT are you currently in or have passed out of?”  Surprisingly, she said she was doing MBBS!  I was completely stunned by this answer.  Later on I realised she had taken up this path purely because of pressure from her parents and that her passion for math still existed. 

Well, enough of the past.  Let me tell you what happened during my visit to Vizag.  Obviously, we met up and she hadn’t changed much.  Especially the height!  I think this happens with a lot of girls.  They simply stop growing at a very early age.  Both physically & mentally! ;)

It didn’t really feel like we were meeting up after a really long gap.  We were at ease with each other.  Well, don’t think it is just my feeling.  She told me the same thing too.  The next day she came to my college along with a friend of hers.  I showed her around.  Our college campus is really pretty.  Everybody would like it during the first visit.  And then I had to catch a train back home the very same evening so we bid adieu to each other not knowing when we would see each other again. 

This short visit to vizag was followed by a trip to Pune along with my parents for the commencement ceremony.  We set off to shirdi from there and then headed back home after the darshan.  The journey was pretty much uneventful but extremely uncomfortably and tiresome. 

And by the way, I voted this time.  Yes, this is the first time I voted.  It was a thrilling experience I must say.  All those of you who have a chance to vote and haven't done it yet, please do so.

am I on a long holiday??

This part of my life, I would like to believe, yet far, is probably the BEST!  What more could one ask for after going through the gruelling schedule during the first and second semesters at a B-Skool.  Those were times when I was fighting hard to build a recognition for myself among my batchmates, trying to find out what specialization suited me best, trying to prove a point or two, working all alone on group projects as my groupmates were expert social loafers etc etc.  I'm truly happy to be currently stationed at this corner of my journey called 'life'.  Its simply awesome in several respects.  It simply is.  You are free to 'Do Nothing!'.  No responsibilities to shoulder, no restrictions on anything you do or not do.  To add to this fun, I'm part of a group that calls itself CKB (Chaddi Ke Baahar!).  Now again, as is the case with solving group assignments, there are pros and cons associated with being a part of a group, a well diversified group.  Now let me explain this diversity part in a little detail.  The diversity would range from Geographical, Lingual, Aspirational to relationship status!  The group has got people originating from Kashmir to Kerala and from Maharashtra to West Bengal.  People who have varied interests in life - Finance, Marketing, HR, Operations.  People who are single, committed, were committed and broke-up, had multiple crushes and still unsuccessful, some ready for marriage and some not quite yet!  We are 13 different people in all but one as a group.  I hope I have been able to give you a clear picture of the composition of the group.  

After getting placed in November and then finishing off my CFA Level I exam in early December, I've been on a long vacation.  Since our college campus is located on the outskirts of Pune, it presents a perfect atmosphere for vacationing!  At times you wake up in the morning and look out of the window and wonder if you are at a hill station.  The campus is decently well-maintained and is buzzing with activity all through the day and sometimes well into the night.  Now that we don't have anymore classes to attend and with hardly one or two assignments or projects to submit, we have literally got nothing to do on campus.  I wake up late in the morning and the only motivation for waking up at that time too is breakfast - the best meal of the mess!  Being not the kind who craves to stay healthy and in good shape, I'm discounted of the trouble of waking up early in the morning and going for a jog or playing  a game of tennis. Breakfast done, what next?  This is a perennial question on the minds of the members of CKB.  So we decide to go out for lunch, snacks, dinner and again for lunch, snacks, dinner the very next day and this goes on.  Off late, I've been spending so much money on 'food' and the worst part is that no one would even believe this fact looking at my slender personality.  We've indulged ourselves into exploring new eating options and destinations in pune.  We keep keep trying various cuisines and each time some member or the other is left unhappy given the diversity of the group and their tastes.  

There is another group that I hang out with.  This is the group of people who hail from the same state as I do - Andhra Pradesh!  I'm lucky to be a part of multiple groups so when it gets boring at one place, I always have an alternate option! ;)  I'm sure CKB is going to kill me for this line.  So will the gulti-gang.  The advantage of a gulti-gang get-together is that I can speak in a language which I'm very comfortable speaking.  The kind of jokes I can crack in my mother-tongue, I cannot crack as effectively in any other language.  At least, this is what I feel and believe.  So we recall comedy scenes from telugu movies and burst out laughing for hours together whenever we meet.  This group also gave me the opportunity to host Pongal special lunch on our campus.  That was one experience on campus which gave me a lot of satisfaction in terms of work that I did. Thanks gulti-gang for the opportunity and support.  

So as part of this long holiday of mine called the "Final Semester of MBA post placement", I keep eating out, eating out and eating out and still remain slim, do nothing but spend money, learn swimming, sleep during the afternoons and also during the nights, surf the net, chat with friends, look constantly at the facebook and orkut homepages which hardly present anything new and interesting, try my hand at lawn tennis on a concrete court, read others' blogs and write my own at times.  Well, I've gotta go out now for dinner.  So catch up with you guys later.

travails of a fearful misadventure

On the morning of 3rd March '09, the 'chaddis' of the CKB2009 group were enjoying the beautiful morning weather with tea at the cottage in Munnar, Kerala.  The chaddis were on a trip to 'God's Own Country - Kerala' to celebrate the successful completion of their MBA programme.  I was busy as usual photographing 'Still Life' as my friends would call it, in different angles and by playing around with the settings in the camera.  Little did I know about the misadventure that I was going make in the later part of the day.

My enthusiastic fellow chaddis had made a plan to visit a water theme park on our way back to Cochin from Munnar.  I was fervently trying my best to avoid the plan by writing it off as a 'not the right option' to explore Kerala.  I was trying to convince them that having come to Kerala we should rather explore more of its natural beauty.  As expected, I fell in the minority and I had to give in to the pressure of visiting the water theme park - Veega Land.  Well, this is not the first time I was visiting a water theme park.  I'd done it before when I had gone on a Industrial Tour with my B.E college mates.  

I have my reasons for not liking a place which other people would love to visit or make it their home as the tagline of Mumbai's Water Kingdom/Essel World goes - "ghar nahi jaaoonga mein!".  The problem is that I feel I'm out of control when I'm taking a free-fall or going down a rapid slide.  I guess the problem started with my first air-travel.  It was a very small aircraft (a 2+2 seater) and I was on my way to Bangalore from Visakhapatnam to report for my Summer Internship.  The way the pilot was manoeuvering the plane left me jittering.  Since this experience, I've always felt a little concerned when it came to sitting in high speed vehicles or rides.  No no, don't get me wrong.  I don't mind riding vehicle at high speeds 'coz I know I'm the one in-charge and I can take control whenever required.  So thats the issue with me.

Come Veega Land and all my friends are excited about the various rides checking out the map to find out the locations of the rides and I'm sweating thinking about what would happen to me! :(  My friends were doing ride after ride and asking me in between to join-in but I would refuse!  Finally, I made-up some courage to go up the stairs and lie down on top of the slide.  Uplaksh deserves some credit for forcing me onto that slide.  Yes, I finally made it.  I grew in confidence.  Then I slowly started to resist the fear inside me and began to enjoy the rides one after the other.  I however chose to stay away from some death-defying rides like the 'Vertical Fall' etc. which scared me just by looking from outside the ride.  I must tell you, all my friends are really courageouos people! The girls especially.  Hats-off!  

I was really raring to hit the wave pool as that only involved lazing around in still water.  I forced a few of my mates to join in with me.  We hit the wave pool and I became  very active all of a sudden.  Here I was confident nothing big and dangerous could happen to me.  So I enjoyed myself in the wave pool till it was time to go!