Sleepless in IIM-A

Hey

2009-12-13T10:29:00.004+05:30

I wonder if anyone stumbles across this blog these days.

Its been almost three years since I graduated. Life's so different now. I have been upto so many different things. I wonder when I'd get the time to write about all those.

Anyway, I have just started a new website as a hobby - http://www.flickometer.com - aggregates movie reviews. Should be one of the very few sites in India which does this.

Do visit it !

Back from the dead.

2007-02-28T15:25:00.000+05:30

Hey guys !

I've been up to so many million things since I last wrote. You guys have no idea how many things have happened since then. I'll start penning them down here if enough people are interested in following my life. :))

Anyway, for now, register in www.cricstock.com. Its a nice cricket stock exchange. Its my website.

Back with a bang ! [Ouch]

2006-05-29T11:16:00.000+05:30

Its been a pretty weird week.

The first day, I got up groggily at around 8-15, took my toothbrush, put on the paste and tottered towards the bathroom. In a trance, I put the toothbrush into my mouth only to discover that it tasted slightly weird. Nevertheless I went on.

Later I discovered that I'd put on the Odomas cream lying next to the tube of toothpaste.

A little later I discovered that I was damn lucky I didnt use the Chlotrimazole tube instead.

The second day, I was hard at work when as usual, Pepsy came over to have his little chat with me. He started telling me about his evening plans. He told me he was planning to meet up with an old friend of his, who was bringing along three hot girls. They were gonna catch a movie and then go to a pub after that.

"Cool" I said. "Have fun, dude."

He then asked me what were my plans. I told him that I had a little bit of work left and would try to complete as much of it as possible.

He shook his head and said "Loser."

Two other guys, a girl and a computer game called me a loser that day.

The third day, I wasnt in too much of a mood to work. I was arbitly visiting a lot of orkut scrapbooks. I visited the book of this particular friend of mine called Chhedi (http://www.orkut.com/Profile.aspx?uid=7168965254833767655). He had a profile snap of himself with the beach in the background. I left him the following scrap.

"In your profile snap, can you move the dickhead a little bit so that I can see the shore?"

He replied back with this scrap,

"I can see tht u r indeed jealous of the grace and charm of the person who keeps springing up in your orkut picture list, and understandably with a face similar to constipated redwood tree, you would but naturally want to rid the realization of your inadequacies by going on nudging me to remove the picture... cut it out, it aint working buddy... "

I didnt understand much, but I understood why people call him 'Duckie'.

The fourth day, sometime in the evening, I got an SMS from some weird number which went like this "Hi Karthik. How are you?"

For some inexplicable reason, I assumed that it was some hot girl, and with a smile I typed back the message "I am doing good. How are you baby?"

She replied back, "I am fine too. Did you wish her?"

Her message confused me for a second. A second later I realized that the number belonged to my sister. Two seconds later, I realized that it was my mom's birthday and I hadnt wished her.

The fifth day, Sam called me up and reminded me about the bet we had about a girl. We had agreed that we both will fight for a girl and whoever spends time with her or does something to gain her favor would get some number of points. He told me that in the last couple of days, he had talked to her 4 times, messaged her 14 times, played scrabble with her once and had talked her into a movie the following weekend.

"I think I am about 70 points ahead." he said gleefully.

After I was done talking to him, I thought maybe I should open my account and atleast meet up with her. I picked up my mobile and sent her a message "Hey there ! How about meeting up at Barista today... say around 9?"

Back she replies, "Umm... who is this?"

The sixth day, I was hard at work again. I would have opened orkut or my yahoo mail just about 4 times the whole day. Which means, I spent barely 10 minutes in about 9 hours doing something apart from my work.

Thanks to my luck, exactly on those four occasions my boss had walked over to tell me something.

After the 4th time this happened, I decided that I wouldnt let this happen again and I wouldnt do anything apart from working on the presentation for the rest of the day. In fact, I decided I wouldnt even turn my head. Maybe my boss would get impressed that I am so caught up in my work that I couldnt even hear him coming.

So I fixed a frown on my face and stared non stop at the screen.

A little later, I heard someone coming over. I didnt turn around and stared purposefully at the screen. The footsteps stopped near me and someone tapped on my shoulder. Pretending as if I was completely oblivious to the happenings around me, I put on a dazed expression and turned my head.

Pepsy took one look at me, one look at the screen and shook his head.

"Loser", he said.

The seventh day, I was just about to go to bed when I realized that I hadnt switched on the repellent yet. Feeling a bit lazy about switching on the light, I groped in the darkness for the repellent's switch. I think I didnt quite touch the switch, because something happened and I was slammed onto the wall.

As I lay sprawled on my bed, with my index finger smoking as if I had just zapped someone into a frog, the door opened.

"Enti ra, dude" my gulti neighbour said, "Why did you just bang the wall?"

Its been a pretty weird week, I tell you.

Liberation

2006-04-08T10:35:00.000+05:30

I felt unusual. All of a sudden, there seemed to be nothing to look forward to. I walked towards my dorm, my head exceptionally light. I looked at people milling about, at people slouching in their chairs in the CT, laughing as they sipped their drinks while their books lay piled unceremoniously in a corner.

A bunch of kids ran about here and there, chasing each other and giggling merrily. Ever since the first batch of PGP-X arrived on campus, there's been a major distortion in the demographic profile of IIM-A - I noted silently and smiled as a little kid bumped into me and tilted his little head all the way up to look at me with his innocent little eyes.

I had just taken the last exam of my first year at IIM-A. Perhaps fittingly, on this same day last year, the final list selected to IIM-A was announced and I had stared at the results almost in disbelief. Now, I cant believe that one eventful year had shrieked past me.

'Eventful' ! What an understatement !

I flipped open my laptop's lid and logged onto Dbabble. I scrolled down the list of electronic notice boards, trying to find the 'PGP1' NB. Funnily, it seemed to have disappeared. 'Oh!' I thought and scrolled down to look for the word 'Tuchcha' and there it was - the Tuchcha NB ! I clicked it open.

"I SURVIVED THE FIRST YEAR AT IIM-A !!!!" screamed a message.

And more.

"Tuchchaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa !"

"Eaayaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh !"

"The last few days, I felt like a prisoner of war, inching towards the border inch by inch. Today is the moment when I've just crossed that line, the line which represents liberation. Freedom !"

I sat back into my chair, put my palms behind my head, closed my eyes and smiled. It felt good to think about nothing.

A little while later, it had sunk well and truly in. Prostee, Moti and I were sitting on the ledge in front of D-16, which overlooked the cricket grounds. We were watching the ongoing cricket match and talking nonsense. Its the kind of a thing which you would normally see in an engineering college, and rarely in a B-school. Definitely not in the first year of IIM-A.

"So when are you starting?" I asked Moti.

"9th."

"What are you gonna do till then?"

One corner of his mouth went up to represent what we have come to know as Moti's utterly stupid and perverted smile.

"Ok, I get it. Shake the world huh?"

Its a well known joke, which I am not gonna tell you guys. Although, its gonna be there in my book. Moti wont be spared for too long.

"So, who are the girls in Deutche Bank?"

Again that smile.

"Oh, ok. Paro, right ? Who else?"

"No. Only her. Across the three IIMs, there's just Paro."

"My God. I can imagine whats gonna happen."

"Hey, look who's coming." Prostee nudged.

Our SFI-I (Strategy Formulation and Implementation, Part I) professor was a short, balding, good-natured man, extremely dedicated to instilling in us the ability to think strategically. His classes, although requiring a lot of work on our part, were quite comprehensive. He was walking down the path along with another person.

"Oh shit. I didnt notice HIM coming." Prostee said.

I craned my neck and uttered an involuntary "Shit!", for, walking with our good-natured SFI prof was the man who was revered and feared the most in the first term. He was a legend and a terror among the students of Section D for his unnerving ability to tear apart arbitrary class contributions to smithereens and make the students feel like shit. Despite this, he was enormously respected because we still havent forgotten the insights he gave us in Human Resources, and we are unanimous in the opinion that his classes were the best we've had till now.

We instantly and completely involuntarily got down from the ledge.

"Oh, hello. How are you all?" he greeted us, smile-laughing in his typical fashion.

"Fine, Sir. We just finished our final exams."

"Yeah, yeah, I can see that. You wouldnt be sitting like this otherwise." and that laugh again.

"Yes, Sir. We've been watching the cricket match for quite some time."

"Hmm.. So you guys are into the second year. You wont study now, huh?"

We just smiled. He laughed and walked on. "Good good. Enjoy your time, guys."

As he walked along with the SFI professor, we noticed him saying something to him.

We looked at each other.

"You know what he must have said to him?" Moti said.

"What?"

"I think he said 'Let them come back for SFI-2 and I'll remind them of old times.'"

"Oh shit !" Prostee and I said in unison, as we were brutally reminded of this one important fact.

Sunil Maheshwari was gonna take Strategy Formulation and Implementation II in the fourth term.

Night rider: Part I

2006-01-26T23:55:00.000+05:30

"I dont understand this." I complained in the middle of a pretty serious discussion.

"What?" said Kota

"Why would they provide a '60,000 miles or money-back' guarantee on these tyres when experience shows that they last for just about 40,000 miles?"

"Yeah. It doesnt make sense."

"Maybe they can always claim that the tyres are still good, if and when the customer asks for his money. But the customer would never want to take chances with tyres and would change them anyway, which would explain the low numbers." said Prashant.

"Maybe."

"Or maybe the shop which sells the tyres figured that the customer would never get back to him." said Kota with a twinkle in his eye.

"Huh? Why not"

"After 40,000 miles, he's gonna be on the other side of the world."

Thats when the seriousness in our marketing discussion went for a six.

This was just one of the n number of meetings we've been holding this term. Otherwise it has been an okay term till now, predominantly because the surprise quizzes surprisingly havent started yet.

As usual, we have some amazing profs. I'll tell you guys about one of them and his antics in the class.

If you remember, long back, I talked about a guy called Ravi (henceforth referred to as Cheddi), who kept sleeping in each and every class. Well, the guy still sleeps through classes.

Over the months, different professors have treated this differently. In the first term, one particular prof lambasted him on a couple of occasions. That did keep Cheddi awake for a few classes after which he returned to his normal sleep cycle. Later, in one of his meetings with the prof, the conversation went something like this.

Prof: Oh, Ravi.... (smiles) you sleep a lot in class, you know.

Ravi: (sheepish smile)

Prof: Today also you were sleeping right?

Ravi: No Sir, I wasnt.

Prof: (turns towards the TA) Amit he was sleeping today right? (Amit nods sincerely)

Prof: See.

Ravi: No Sir, I wasnt sleeping today, (pauses), yeah, yesterday I was sleeping.

Prof: (smiles, with no signs of being taken aback by that reply) Actually, I have given up you know.

Some other profs ignored him right from the beginning. One professor even announced that he didnt mind people sleeping as long as they didnt snore. I can almost imagine a conversation between the professors on the fictitious Facutly electronic Notice Board, at the beginning of the term.

Prof1: Shit, I have Section D.

Prof2: Yoohoo !! You are done for. Its the section with that rat, Ravi.

Prof1: I know. Why do you think I am pissed?

Prof3: Tell you what. Just ignore him. I tried drilling some sense into him during the first term, but the guy managed to doze off even while I was thrashing him in the class.

Prof1: Hmm. I think I will be okay as long as he doesnt snore.

Prof2: In fact, dont be surprised if a lot others sleep as well. For two reasons. You teach economics, and your drawl sounds like a lullaby to them.

Prof1: Shut up, old man. You think you do a great job with Fin?

Prof2: Yep, I manage to keep a lot more people awake than you. Most of them want to major in finance anway. So they are pretty serious. Fin is interesting dude. Unlike economics.

Prof3: Hey, you interesting fin prof, I just read the list, you have section D as well.

Prof2: WHAT?

Prof1: Yoohoo ! Whatya gonna do ! Whatya gonna do !

Prof2: I will teach that road rodent a lesson he'd never forget if he sleeps in my class.

Prof3: Correction. There's no if.

(To be continued)

Unauthorized access detected

2006-01-16T02:29:00.000+05:30

'Shit, why did I even decide to do WAC with you? I have to do all the work.' I cribbed.

'What can I do? My mamaji is here', she whined into the phone.

'Oh, thats your excuse today? The day before you had an injured pigeon in your room. Yesterday your excuse was that stupid filthy little dog. Today it is your mamaji. Are you the zoo-keeper of IIM-A?'

'Shut up !'

'And why are you sending me all these links?'

'To read, of course !'

'I am just gonna cut and paste all that crap into a doc file and mail it to the TA.'

'Yeah, do that. And ask her to pick the relevant stuff herself.'

'Okay. I am gonna do that.'

'Yeah, do it.'

Noni and I had started working on the WAC report just a day back and we were already having our third cribbing and complaining session. Both of us were trying our level best to shove the work away from ourselves.

'What are you doing now?' she asked.

'I am mailing her.'

'Yeah do that.'

Playfully, I composed a mail which went like this...

To: radhas@iiimahd.ernet.in
CC: 5jyotia@iimahd.ernet.in
Subject: Our WAC report
Please find attached our WAC report. Please pick the relevant details and grade them accordingly.
Thanks,
Karthik,
Jyoti.

I double checked the TA's address and made sure that it had three i's instead of the two in 'iimahd.ernet.in' and clicked on the send button.

Into the receiver, I said "Check your inbox."

'Oh, you actually sent it !'

'Yeah, I did. You asked me to, didnt you?'

'Yeah. I did.' she paused. I guess she noticed the TA's wrong email address, because she said. 'But where's the attachment? You didnt attach the file.'

'Heh heh. But what if there actually exists and address like iiimahd.ernet.in and it is redirected to the iimahd.ernet.in domain?'

'Yeah. It might exist. Especially given your luck with the TAs!'

'No, I think this time I'll be okay. I have got the returned mail message already.'

'Okay.'

After a bit more of aimless nonsensical chatter, I hung up.

A little while later, Prostee and Atul came to my room and we decided to study a bit of finance. My concentration, as usual, wavered after sometime and my focus shifted to my computer. Aimlessley, I started checking all my email accounts.

One particular mail caught my eye while I was going through my institute email account. I clicked on it and went through the text.
I swore.

The mail went like this...

From: radhas@iimahd.ernet.in
Subject: Re:Our WAC report

I did not receive the attachment along with the mail you have sent. Please resend the same. If you have any queries regarding your report you can contact me at wing 12K.

The last date for the submission of the report is 21st January,2006 4.30 PM. The report has to be submitted as hard copy and a soft copy needs to be pasted in the courses folder same as WAC-I.

Thanks.
Radha Sriram.

'What on earth is this?' I swore aloud.

'What happened?' Atul asked. Prostee looked up from his book as well.

I told them about the little prank I played on Noni, and then showed them the mail. Needless to say, they burst out laughing like crazy.

'Dude. Why does it happen to you all the time?' Prostee said.

Having laughed to his heart's content Atul said, 'Lets check its header. I am sure Noni is playing a prank on you.'

'Yeah, I sort of think so too. You can manipulate the 'From' address in any mail client.'

We clicked on the message's header and as expected the mail originated from Noni's system's IP address.

'See !' Atul exclaimed. 'She has used the client Mozilla Thunderbird to do this.'

'Yeah. I see.' I said thoughtfully. 'Shit. She has the nerve to try to fool me. She'll face the consequences', I paused. 'Microsoft Outlook should also be able to do this sort of a thing, right?'

'Yes, I think it allows you to change the from address. I am not too sure though.'

'Hmm.' I opened Outlook and started composing a mail. After 15 minutes of intense creative activity, I sat back and looked at my extremely technical sounding mail in sadistic satisfaction.

From: student@actlan.iimahd.ernet.in
To: 5jyotia@iimahd.ernet.in
Subject: Unauthorized access: IP-User mismatch detected on Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:56:03 +0530

Dear Jyoti Agarwal,

The mail server’s cron job detected a mail originating from the IP address 192.168.102.13 with a manipulated header. (Please find the header details of the mail after this message.) This mail amounts to impersonation which is considered a malpractice according to the institute’s rule book and may result in consequences as severe as expulsion from the institute. Please consider this as a warning.

(This is a cron-job generated response. Please don’t reply to it.)
Administrator.

Return-Path:
Received: from iimahd.iimahd.ernet.in (iimahd [202.41.76.254])
by stdmail.iimahd.ernet.in (8.11.6/8.11.6) with ESMTP id k0FJQ3P09250;
Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:56:03 +0530
Received: from stdwww.iimahd.ernet.in (stdwww [202.41.76.247])
by iimahd.iimahd.ernet.in (8.11.6/8.11.6) with ESMTP id k0FJPxq24422;
Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:55:59 +0530
Received: from [127.0.0.1] ([192.168.102.13])
by stdwww.iimahd.ernet.in (8.11.6/8.11.6) with ESMTP id k0FJPx508099;
Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:55:59 +0530
Message-ID: <43caa225.8090104@iimahd.ernet.in>
Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:57:33 +0530
From: "radhas@iimahd.ernet.in"
User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.7 (Windows/20050923)

'Hey guys, listen to this.' I read my masterpiece aloud to Atul and Prostee. 'What do you think?'

'Great stuff!' Atul laughed.

'Play a prank on me, huh? I am the bloody prankmaster! She's gonna throw a fit as soon as she reads this.'

'Yeah. It sure is gonna take her by surprise. Eventually she'll find out though.'

'Yes she will. But for a second, she's gonna get shocked. That will do for me.'

'Yeah, that she will.' We laughed aloud and gave each other hi-fives. I sent the mail.

I tried getting back to my work. I read a page or two of finance, but couldnt wait for some sort of a response for that message. I clicked open the sent folder to admire my masterpiece again. I smiled as I read the message for the nth time.

Then something caught my eye. 'Hey! Wait a minute! What the hell is this? Guys, take a look at this.'

'Atul and Prostee came over and stared at the screen. A split second later they were both clutching their stomachs and going bonkers with laughter.

'She...she...' Prostee said in between gasps of laughter. 'She must be laughing her head off at how big a jackass you made of yourself just now.'

The from address of that message read,
'Karthik Laxman [5karthikl@iimahd.ernet.in]; on behalf of; student@actlan.iimahd.ernet.in'

A dream.

2005-11-15T17:07:00.000+05:30

Disclaimer: I wrote this right after the summer placement process. Originally, I didnt want to put this up, until someone pasted the whole post as a comment on one of my earlier posts. So I thought, what the heck, let me post it myself. Please note that this is just my personal opinion and doesnt represent anything or anyone else.

The most important event in the second term occurs right after the mid terms - the summer placements.

Now, summer placements might not have been such a big deal, if only there hadnt been a thing called as an I-bank. I-banks or investment banks, for the uninitiated, are organizations which facilitate IPO issues, mergers and acquisitions, and trading for institutional clients. And in the process they make insane amounts of money.

They also pay their employees insane amounts of money.

I probably dont have to mention that all those record breaking salaries offered to IIM-A grads that you read about in the papers are all by I-banks.

To begin explaining to you, the effect these banks have on the IIM-A psyche, let me start with the way placements are structured in IIM-A.

There are hundreds of companies which come on campus for the summer placements. To let the students pick the best companies and let the best companies have a shot at the largest pool of students first, the placement committee of IIM-A (placecomm) has, over the years, divided the list of companies into two or three categories and allotted them slots during which they could interact with and interview the students. These slots are called Day 1, Day 2 and Day 3. The categorization is usually done by students on the basis of the quality of job, reputation, pay and career prospects.

For example, red hot companies like HLL and P&G companies would appear on Day 1, and students would die to get placed in companies coming on Day 1. Vindi Banga was placed on Day 1 with HLL.

Well, that was a few decades back.

A few years back, one particular Director working in a big bank in New York, with the idea of contributing back to his alma mater, convinced his superiors and colleagues to travel 15000 kilometers to Ahmedabad, to recruit analysts and associates for his bank.

The salary offered was more than five times greater than those offered by the Day 1 companies. Placements were for locations in Wall Street. It seemed a no-brainer for this bank to be given the first shot at interviewing the students.

And so, Day Zero was born.

"Hey Bharthi, how many people have been placed today ?"

"Many. But there are at least 20 more who are yet to be placed."

"Shit. They are gonna be awfully upset if they spill over to Day 1."

"Dont worry. Day zero's not over yet. We can still hope to place everyone."

"Yes. Lets hope."

Bharthi's cell rang and she moved to answer the call. Immediately after that, she yelled out a few names - her voice barely audible over the din in the room.

He looked around CR-10. 200 people impeccably dressed in suits. Some of them joking around, some smiling with satisfaction, some others in a pensive mood, and some with a worried expression. The tension in the room wafted through the noise into the atmosphere.

Information Asymmetry is a concept encountered in microeconomics. It refers to the situation when one party knows more than the other party about a product being transacted. For instance, a person who purchases life insurance would be better informed about his health than his insurance agent. Needless to say, it is in the insurance company's interest to do as much as possible in order to reduce the information gap.

When the final placements happen, companies have an important number to base their selections on - the CGPA. But when the recruitments for summers happen, the number's not known yet, or the time period is too short for someone to be judged purely by the CGPA. In such a situation, various factors play a role in deciding a candidate's suitability for the job, one of which is the student's past profile.

As far as the students are concerned, a summer internship in an i-bank means bypassing one and half years of hard-core, maddening competition to secure an i-banking career abroad.

Its a short cut.

"People, please be quiet", Bharthi's voice tried to make its presence felt in the noise. "The offer window opens now. I am gonna announce the names."

In a second, silence enveloped the room. This was the moment people were waiting for - the announcement of the final offers.

"Rajshree Dutta..."

One by one names were announced to heavy thumping of desks. The smiling student went to the adjacent room where documents had to be signed.

As time went by, tension grew in all those faces whose names havent been announced yet.

Will I be pushed to Day 1? Do I have to go through this stressful process again tomorrow?

That was the thought uppermost in everyone's minds. And when their names finally came, a huge wave of relief washed away the anxiety.

When the last name was announced, a roar went around the room. The celebrations began...

The number of I-banks coming down to IIM-A has grown in the last few years, and a lot of "bulge-bracket" banks come down these days. Banks like Lehmann Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Citigroup are usually expected to hire IIM-A students for summers.

Its funny how almost everyone on campus is suddenly interested in finance. The amount of preparation that goes into a day zero interview simply cannot be not described here. (It would go into my book though).

There is however a sad angle to this. There are over 200 deserving students here in IIM-A and the number of such offers are less than a half of that. A lot of people are left out.

Its tragic to see people attach so much importance to Day Zero that they are shattered when they dont make it to these jobs. Some of them are hit so hard that they are not able to muster the strength to continue with the stressful placement process and lose out on jobs on offer the next day.

People change their perceptions about others. Seeds of bitterness are sown.

A hundred hands slapped him on his back.

"Good show man !"

"Congrats, dude !"

Smiling, he went to the other room. A bunch of placecommers were sitting around the placecomm head. The placecomm head looked at a sheet of paper and said "Kotak. Do you accept?"

"Yes, I do."

A placecommer came to him with a sheet of paper. She gestured at a spot and asked him to sign there. As he took the sheet from her, he smiled at her.

"I guess, with me, everyone's been placed on day zero."

"Yes. Its been a great year."

"What about all the companies which are coming tomorrow?"

"I am afraid, we'll have to turn them down. There just are no students left for those jobs."

"Just for curiosity sake, what are the companies that are coming down tomorrow?"

"Oh, all those foreign I-banks. Foreign placements are out of fashion these days. I guess, they wouldnt be coming down next year onwards."

"Hmm." he said.

He looked down at the sheet, scribbled his signature and under it, the date.

The date read, "10th November, 2015".

"I dont understand why people get depressed when they dont make it into Day Zero companies. There are some terrific companies coming down for Day 1. The kind of roles they offer are extremely exciting. Did you look at the pay most of these companies are offering? They are awesome. And it can only get better. There would come a day when students of IIM-A would reject foreign i-bank offers for jobs in India. There'd be a day when every IIM-A graduate would decide to stay back and contribute to India. There'd be a day when foreign i-banks would be relegated to Day 1. Ten years down the line, we're gonna see it happen. Damn, its been happening around us as we speak. Indian companies are flexing their muscles abroad by acquiring companies left and right. They are taking over foreign companies which are as much as three times their size. Indians are shaping the corpoate world all by themselves. Take this to its logical conclusion, and you'd see that India is as good a place to be in as any." - Ashwin.

T-nite: Part I

2005-09-02T02:37:00.000+05:30

One of my earlier posts titled "T-nite: Background" gives a basic introduction to the inter-section cultural event which happens every year in IIM-A. Now, I'd really love to give a complete description about it, but unfortunately, the end-terms are approaching and I'm hard pressed for time.

To keep you interested in my writings, I therefore leave you the newsletters I wrote on behalf of Section D during the T-nite. Explanations are embedded in italics. Please put forth any other questions you might have. :)

The first newsletter was circulated on the day the T-nite began. It was meant to be an indication of things to come.

Devil's advocate - A section D effort to bring to your notice the day's little incidents narrated with a section bias.
9th August 2005, Day 1: T-nite.

"Hey, what’s the opposite of Dominoes?" Kaka exclaimed excitedly.

Time came to a grinding halt. People eating those pizzas froze mid-chew. One dancer in the classroom's well slipped. Another guy painting a poster missed his stroke completely. An insect missed its turn and crashed into the wall.

Everyone turned to look at Kaka. I looked up from my laptop. The shattering silence lasted for a complete minute. A dog howled in the distance. The screensaver came on, on my laptop's display.

"What is it?" a brave comrade finally asked.

The expression of discovery on Kaka's face would have put Columbus to shame. He rubbed his palms in glee and said,

"Domi doesn’t know."

No one said anything. You could hear people grinding their teeth. Some swallowed. Everyone gave a dirty stare at the CR (Class Representative), their eyes bearing extreme disgust at his no-bumps-during-Tnite policy.

Finally one person went to the board and put yet another tally mark against Kaka's name. (A count of the number of kicks to be given to a person after a specific period)

Then the CR came over to the centre, climbed onto a bench and in a hoarse voice, with suitable background music, gave an exhortatory speech worthy of those American movie heroes. People got back to work.

In typical WIMWI (Well known Institute of Management in Western India) PGP1 style, the T-nite has been approached with intense preparation and hard work. Preparations began early last week with a flurry of volunteering and group allotments. The talented ones went into the performing teams. The creative ones sat down to design posters and cartoons. And then there were those who went into logistics. All the rest who couldn’t belong to any of these categories suddenly discovered good managerial skills in themselves and became general managers.

They are an interesting lot, the general managers. Any point of time they could be seen running here and there, holding intense discussions with anyone willing to listen. They move as if their asses are perpetually on fire.

Our guy was no different. In a few minutes he had talked to almost everyone inside the class. Desperate, he walked out of the class and found a guy sitting on the parapet with his guitar, wearing a forlorn expression.

"You repairing the guitar?"

"No, I..."

"Okay listen, have you listened to this song ?”

"Uh...”

"Can you play it on the guitar?"

"But...”

"It would create a great impression if you can. Can you work on it?"

"Hello! I am not in Section D."

Besides the intense work in the background, sections began to move in an organized fashion outside the workshop. They came to the mess together. They shouted slogans. And they even had dress codes.

A couple of days back, the whole of a section was seen in black attire. The enthusiasm was certainly in the spirit of the week, but look what happened.

My friend and I spotted a couple of guys in black hovering around LKP (Louis Kahn Plaza), and thought that maybe we could enquire good naturedly as to how their preparation was going on.

I went over to the guy, and asked him. "Hey dude, how’s the T-nite preparation going on?"

He gave me the blankest stare in the world.

"What happened? Hey, if you dont wanna tell me, its fine."

"Kaunsa room saaf karna hai sir?" he said.

It was then that my friend nudged me and pointed at the broom the guy was holding, and we realized our mistake.

Yeah, it was a wee bit difficult to tell the sweepers apart from the section guys. But hey, it happens.

Finally, the surest way of gauging the effect of a night spent preparing for the T-nite is to keep awake and listen to what happens in the class the next day.

Confused by the sudden drop in the CP (Class participation) meter, the prof resorts to cold calling. He wakes up a guy in the front row from what he thinks is a state of profound thought, but what is actually deep slumber, and asks him his opinion on why the case actor behaved the way he did.

The guy adjusts his glasses, wipes his mouth and begins...

"Sir, you see, man is a social animal..."

- Brought to you by the Section D newsletter team.

T-nite narration to be continued in Parts 2, 3 and 4.

Fool's Proof

2005-08-24T17:34:00.000+05:30

Dear Mr. Laxman,
This mail is regarding the group assignment which was to be submited by you and your group on 20.08.05. I have not received your group assignment and it will not be accepted now.
Best Wishes,
Pallavi Desai, (Name changed intentionally)
TA,
Individual Dynamics.

I snapped out of my torpor. What in Gods name is this ?

20th was a Saturday. We had spent a total of 5 hours on the ID assignment the day before the date of submission. And that too, knowing very well that there would be a QM quiz the next day.

Most of us screwed up the QM quiz big time. But at least we had the satisfaction of having submitted the ID assignment well in time.

Prashant was the one who had mailed the TA on the day of the submission. I quickly sent the group a message copying the TA's mail and asking Prashant for clarification. Immediately I dialed his number as well.

"Hey Prashant, did you check the message I sent?"

"Yes."

"What happened? Did you mail it to her?"

"Yes, I did yaar. I have no idea how it didnt reach her."

"You must be having a sent mail on your mailing client. We can show her that as proof."

"I already checked out that option. Unfortunately I sent the message using the other client which is a bit primitive and doesnt keep copies of sent mails."

"Shit ! What are you talking about ?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, lets go talk to the TA. I am calling the others as well."

As I walked towards the faculty cubicles, I kicked myself at not having submitted the assignment myself. Shit, we should have submitted a hard copy to the TA. We must have been fools to mail it to the TA, when every other group wanted to submit a hard copy personally to the TA.

But then that was because of something else. The TA was extremely attractive.

Kota, BV, Atul and Prashant were already waiting for me. We climbed a couple of floors and looked around for 7-K.

"Excuse me ma'am".

"Yeah", Pallavi turned to look at us.

"Ma'am, we got a mail from you saying that our assignment didnt reach you. We've come to get it clarified."

"Oh, yeah." she said. "I havent received the assignment. You can check my account."

She showed us her inbox. Sure enough, there was no mail from Prashant on the day of the submission.

"But ma'am, we mailed it to you."

"Ok, can you show me some sort of proof that you did? The mail must be there in your sent folder right?"

"Ma'am, thats the problem. We sent it through an interface which doesnt have sent folders."

"But I must have some proof, right?"

After a brief pause, Kota volunteered. "Ma'am, the day before the submission, we mailed the assignment to each other. Would that be enough?"

"But that wouldnt have my name on the To list right? The professor would look for that."

She then smiled. "Guys, I am not saying that I dont trust you. But I have talked to the prof, and she wants to have some solid proof. I really cant do much about it. You'd have to repeat the course next year."

I turned to look at BV. He looked as shattered as me. We promised the TA that we'd get some proof and requested her to talk to the prof again. She said she would. We said we'd talk to the prof the next day. We then walked straight to Atul's room.

"We are in deep shit." I said.

"Repeat the course ! Fuck, forget it. I am not gonna stay in this place if I have to repeat this course next year. I am leaving right now !" BV said.

We looked at each other, not saying anything. After a while, Atul swivelled on the computer chair towards the screen and pulled out the keyboard. "Lets see what we can do."

The next one hour, we tried a lot of things. We logged on to the mail server. We checked the accounts for a sent folder. We checked the other email account which was linked to this one. We called up the mail administrator. We tried asking if any mail logs were maintained.

To no avail. We couldnt collect a shred of evidence.

The next day, we gathered in the professor's chamber. The professor seemed to be a very nice person, but we could sense her reluctance to let us go without a serious penalty. Convincing her was gonna be an impossible job.

"I understand that you have sent the mail. But the reason I am so particular about the proof is that I dont want to set a precedent by letting you go free."

"But ma'am, we did send the assignment to each other on the local messenging service. There's no point in sending a completed assignment to each other and not submitting it to you, right?"

"Isnt it possible that the person who is supposed to have mailed might have forgotten?"

"Yes, it is. But then two of us had called him up well within the deadline. He confirmed that he had submitted it. Even if he hadnt till then, he would have mailed it to the TA upon the reminder."

After more convincing and further debate, the professor finally relented. "Okay, you bring the print outs of the messages you sent to each other. I will talk to Pallavi and then see what I can do."

The mood was far lighter when we came out of the professor's room.

"Cool ! We might escape out of this unhurt after all." Kota said.

"Yeah. Thank god, we messaged it to each other. Who sent that message?" BV asked.

"I sent it to the group. But since I sent it to the everyone of you, it must be with all of you." I said.

"Okay, lets get the print outs to show her."

Feeling a lot better, I sauntered towards my dorm. Dildo was as usual loafing around on the first floor. He had a bag around his shoulder.

"Hey, where are you off to?" I asked him.

"Am going to the hospital. Ramon has fallen sick."

Ramon is from Germany. He has come here for a term as part of an exchange program. He stays on the first floor in our dorm.

"What happened to him?" I asked.

"Gastroentities."

"What? Minor stomach trouble and he went and admitted himself to the hospital?"

"This is nothing. He gave his end term paper in half an hour and ran back to the dorm. He was adamant that he'd not walk to the hospital. He took an ambulance to the hospital."

"What the... This is the problem with foreigners. This is what they think of India." I laughed.

"Wait. This is nothing. He even wrote a will."

My mouth dropped open.

"Listen to what his will said. 'If I die, give all my money to Christopher. I think I am in reasonably good condition now. So sell all my organs in the German black market and give Christopher the money. With all that money he can buy himself the speakers that he always wanted to. If any money is left, he can also buy himself the sports car that we always dreamt of.'"

By now, I was in splits. "This is outrageous."

"I have to go to him now, because he keeps telling the nurse that the bubble going up the drip bottle is gonna enter his body and kill him, and the nurse doesnt understand a thing." he said.

Shaking my head and still laughing, I wished Dildo luck and climbed another floor.

I opened my room and opened the lid of my laptop to switch it on. A minute later, the phone rang.

"Yeah Atul, whats up?" I answered the phone. "Yeah... oh good, we have the message... ok.. okay, read it out.... WHAT??!?!... SHIT!!... SHIT!!!. SHIT!!!.... SHIT!!!."

I replaced the receiver and yelled. "SHIT !!! SHIT !!! SHIT !!!" and went to a corner and sat there with both my palms on my forehead. I sat there for one whole minute, after which I went to the laptop and opened the messaging service. I browsed the inbox for the message that I had sent out the day before the submission.

I found it. I clicked it open.

This is what it said.

To: Atul, BV, Kota, Prashant
Attached: ID.doc
Prashant,
For you to put in the exhibit and mail it to Pallu baby.
- Oka.

T-nite: Background

2005-08-16T21:38:00.000+05:30

T-nite stands for the Talent Nite. Basically, a cultural show put up by the fachchas (freshers - by now you should have got used to the term) for the tuchchas (the seniors).

As with everything else in IIM-A, its made extremely competitive by conducting it as an inter section contest.

The contest is spread over four nights and tests sections on a variety of parameters like creativity, skill, talent, noise producing ability and above all, enthusiasm.

It usually begins with something called as the Pub Run, where 'runners' belonging to different sections race from a particular point towards the mess and try and capture as much space on the mess walls as possible. Different sections of the walls hold different number of points ranging from 0 to 100. Space is captured by sticking newspapers with the section name written on them. Later the newspapers are replaced by creative posters.

The Pub Run is followed by the two mess nights. A mess night is a 100 minute show put up by the sections (25 minutes each) admist extreme levels of booing by the tuchchas in the mess. The atmosphere is hot, passionate, electric and more often that not, is an intense shouting match. If a section has an appealing slogan and can outshout everyone else who shouts against them, they score a point. If they dont, then god help their performance.

The semifinals and the finals are held in the RJMCEI auditorium and are longer than the mess nights (40 and 90 minutes respectively). Audience is willing to be a little more patient. Shouting matches take a backseat and talent shines through. Quite appropriately, the RJMCEI nights carry considerably more weightage than the mess nights and the pub run.

A lot of weightage is given to the method of entry of a section into the mess/auditorium and onto the stage. Creativity in dress codes, slogans and the general enthusiasm level is evaluated.

Also embedded into the evaluation system is the section's newsletter and website.

I think a lot of my section mates read my blog and actually find it readable, for, I wrote the section's newsletter. :)

Over the next few posts scattered among other daily happenings, you'd find me describing Section D's journey through the T-nite. You'd also find excerpts from the newsletter embedded in between in italics.

So, read on !

Know thy readers.

2005-08-03T20:30:00.000+05:30

Dbabble is like the blood of IIM-A.

Its actually just a software, playing the role of an online notice board. But to really understand its importance, you'd have to shut it down for a day. People wouldnt know where to go for those essential updates. Sport lovers wouldnt know how to schedule events. Romantics wouldnt be able to proclaim their love, straight or otherwise. The nerdy ones wouldnt be able to get those articles to keep them occupied during those few minutes they are not studying their cases.

Dbab with its numerous notice boards, is really the lifeline of IIM-A.

Before I took it for granted, I found it quite fascinating. Take the jokes notice board for example. Someone would post a joke, and thus start a thread. Soon half a dozen replies would follow.

If the joke's liked and is original, there would be applause. "Good show !". If the joke's a repeat the message is "RCP". And if the joke's by a fresher, regardless of its originality, the response is "Mug le, fachche." (Go study, fresher).

Something happened today which made me wonder if the profs dont have a notice board for themselves.

I mean, think about it. Its a possibility. There would be one prof who would start a thread which might go like this.

"Hey, I conducted a surprise quiz today. The students didnt know what hit them !"

and then there would be a dozen replies.

"Good show !!"

"Great stuff ! Keep it up !"

"Hey, I did it too !"

"Gusshow ! Give it to them !!"

"Keep one more tomorrow ! They will blow the hell out of them !"

"This is good, but not good enough. I conducted back to back quizzes. My students were dumbfounded."

All this might amuse you, but do you guys realize how much of a risk I'm taking by flirting with these kind of topics?

Today afternoon, as I was turning the key in the lock on my door, I called out to Samba. As I do nearly every afternoon, after classes.

"Are O Samba, how was your favorite class today?"

"It was terrific yaar. Today he teased so many students that I just couldnt stop laughing."

"What did he say? Do you remember anything he said?"

"Of course. I've written them down !"

"Wow!"

"Okay." he looked at his notebook, "First there was this guy who had a confusion about the cash flow statement. He didnt quite understand what the concept was, and asked why an amount had to be subtracted at one place and added at the other."

"Ok."

"And he replied to him that to gain something you have to lose something. Kuch Paane Ke Liye, Kuch Khona padta hai. After all haar ke jeethne waale ko hi to Baazigar kehten hai." (I am sorry, non-Hindi folks.)

I laughed. Samba went on. "And then he pulled your friend (One of my BITSian friends is in the same section) again into a discussion on Rajnikant and Baba (Baba is Rajnikant's name in a movie). He goes into movies every now and then. Its hilarious !"

"Then, we were looking at the ITC report where one particular entry had something to do with the exchange rates. I dont remember it exactly, but one girl with an economics background suggested that it involved macroeconomics, to which he replied 'You dont need macroeconomics. Economic times would be sufficient. Pick up the initial rate, pick up the final rate, find the difference and multiply by the amount. You'd get it'. The girl just shut up. And after that he'd ask your friend, 'Baba would agree right?'"

"Hey, you guys sure have some serious fun."

"Yeah. He tells us that he has to resort to this sort of antics to keep the students awake, as its the third class of the day."

I laughed. Samba continued, "Then some other guy asked a question. To which he said, 'How can you be wrong, you are the kadavul, or some word like that. I dont know what it means. But it sure did shock that guy."

My wide smile froze. Kadavul is the Tamil word for God. It sounded familiar and recent. Where have I seen this, and why would the guy would be so shocked by the remark?

Oh yes.

Oh no.

Kadavul is the pen-name by which one of the...

"After that he went completely into other topics for about 10 minutes. Now what was that... Yeah, he went off on a tangent. He talked about some guy in Section C or D who wrote something in his blog. Something about accounting being a philosophy. He quoted a few lines, I dont remember what it was. He then said that accounting definitely wasnt philosophy. Hey what happened to you ?"

Kadavul is the pen-name by which one of the guys I know signs off in his blog.

No points for guessing who the guy in Section D is.

My smile was now completely gone. And the color slowly drained from my face.

"Wait a minute. Is that your blog he was talking about?"

Know your facts.

2005-07-29T03:24:00.000+05:30

Here are a few interesting pieces of facts which you might want to know. Please note that this is serious stuff and not at all intended to be funny, as any fact is.

Fact #1

Mid term examinations begin on 1st August. 6 exams are conducted over 3 days. When some students looked at the timetable, they were amazed, and for a moment ecstatic on finding that there was a holiday after the midterms. And it wasnt the weekend.

Later they found that there were classes scheduled on Saturday.

Later still, they found that classes were scheduled on every Saturday after that week.

Fact #2

It is probably destined that I'll never have good food anywhere except at my home. The food at BITS and at Oracle was horrible.

The food here is actually good. However quizzes are usually announced after the day's classes at around 1-10 pm, and are scheduled about an hour later, leaving the students some time for lunch.

Hardly anybody leaves for lunch, using the time to put in a bit of preparation for the quizzes.

Recently, they moved the quiz notifications to the notice board next to the mess, forcing the students to atleast come to the mess to check if there's a quiz scheduled or not.

Fact #3

Every dorm has a well stocked pantry. The pantry manager is an important position in the dorm. The importance of the pantry manager is well summarized by the following statement by our dorm rep, "The Canteen is open only till 4. What will you do after that?"

It is somewhat suspicious that after 4, sleep still wasnt considered as an option.

Fact #4

Blackbooks are confidential sets of question papers of the past few years, and are in general considered to be an indispensable tool for exam preparation. One prominent Operations professor declared the mid-term in Operations as an open book test, and said that students could bring anything.

He then said that in his experience any kind of material is useless.

He has over 25 years of experience.

Today he sent the students a mail with all the previous question papers attached.

Fact #5

The day before yesterday, we got a mail from the PGP chairperson.

It began like this.

"Advice to students who want to do well in exams: SLEEP!"

Fact #6

The most common keyword entered on Yahoo seach which leads to my blog is "Kamasutra".

Fact #7

Some bloggers refer to me in their blogs as the sleepless guy.

Fact #8

Its 4, and I just realised that the dorm rep was bloody right about the pantry.

You sure you wanna raise your hand?

2005-07-23T18:19:00.000+05:30

I have so many things to write about, but there's no time.

Not a problem. The situation is not too different from everything else. There's so much to study, but there's no time. There's so much of group work to do, but there's no time. There are so many assignments to complete, but, yeah, you guessed it, there's no time.

When there are so many things to do, the first thing you can do is to prioritize. You list the things in order and make a long queue of tasks (in our case, a queue which has no end). You then pick the first task in the queue and work on it.

So here I am, recording yet another piece of my stay here in IIM-A, so that when I go completely insane, I would atleast know how.

A couple of days earlier, I somehow drew myself into doing an analysis of the styles of the different professors instructing us. Each one of them has a different way of interacting with the student. Each professor has a unique style of responding to the student and getting him or her to think.

For instance, one professor would absolutely refuse to give any answers whatsoever. Almost philosophically, he'd tell us that we have all the answers within us. Probably, like the way God is within all of us.

Student: Sir, if I have received an advance payment for an order, but I havent delivered it yet, do I show it as sales in this year or in the next year.

Sir: Whats your answer?

Student: Umm... maybe the next year, because I recognize sales only when I have delivered it.

Sir: So, whats the question?

By the time we are done with the question-answer session, the professor would have asked us twice the number of questions we asked him. But damn, I never knew I had accounting within me all the time.

Directly opposite to this philosophical school of response is the cut-it-short, make-you-eat-your-words kind of response. Here's an example.

Student A: Sir, the employee doesnt leave probably because he is proud of his work and hence is loyal to the company.

Sir: When you are useless and have no other option, thats the only thing you can do - take pride in your work.

Student B: To motivate the employees, the company has to make them feel at home.

Sir: What are you suggesting? Bring a motherly figure to office to take care of them?

Then, there are others who would turn the question into an opportunity to display their wit and the class ends up laughing like crazy.

Student: Sir, I just cant write it in paragraphs. When I find it a lot more logical to write and read in points, why should I write in paragraphs ?

Sir: Thats because we dont do the logical thing always. Why do you come to the class ? We could probably install a virtual classroom in your dorm, and you could lie as you want (Here he makes a peculiar Nataraja kind of pose) with chips in one hand and a drink in the other. It is lot more logical and easier than getting everyone to gather in this class at a particular time every day. But still we do it.

Sir: In fact, WAC (thats the name of the course) prepares you for life. Thats what it does, it makes you a man. We take little boys and turn them into men. After you are done with WAC, you would have no more false expectations from life.

Another professor is neither the snubbing nor the joking kind. He would patiently listen to your point, as he does in this case.

Student: Sir, we have two different lines here. We have 36 bins of of 5 shirt material each. We have to split that into two batches such that they can be worked upon by different machines. We could probably split it into two batches of 30 and 6, but when we consider the demand ratio, it would be optimal if we split it into batches of 32 and 4.

Sir: (with a bewildered expression) Thats okay, but why are you telling me all this?

Thanks to these type of tactics, the students have moved away from the group discussion mode where they all clamor for air-time to say the first thing that comes to their mind, to a much more mature type of classroom discussion, at the end of which, you actually feel you have learnt something.

Some things stick in your mind though.

Like this professor, who has an outstanding way of telling you that you are raising a silly question. He does it by producing an analogy which would instantly make you realise your stupidity. Check this out.

Student: Sir, the firm's specialty has always been corporate law. They should cut down on litigation and eventually concentrate just on corporate customers.

Sir: What would happen if the corporate customer requires litigators?

Student: Sir, the company could probably refer the case to a firm with whom the company has friendly relationships.

Sir: Wonderful. If you have a beautiful girlfriend, would you go around introducing her to all your friends?

What's in a name ?

2005-07-17T02:09:00.000+05:30

A lot, trust me.
People aint getting names for nuthin.

But whatever a name may mean in the big good world outside, in IIM-A, a name has a specific meaning. To be more precise, your name is a giveaway to the kind of fantasies you have.

A week after the fresh batch arrives, the dorm seniors hold sessions wherein freshers are expected to let go and express (and in some cases unleash) their fantasies.

Now I am not gonna go into the specifics but the point is, your new dorm name would be picked up from your own words while you narrate your fantasy, and from the ideas it puts into the seniors' heads.

Look at whats at stake here. Your dorm name is unlike your ordinary nickname which people have fun using for a while, and get bored of, a little later. It might very well end up sticking to you for life. You think Vindi is Mr. Banga's first name? This is serious stuff, dude.

To add to the stakes, there are no standard rules for naming people. There are normal names like Billu, Champi, Gattu and then there are interesting names like Noodle, Kela, Tinkle. Then there are umm.. different names like Orgy, Dildo, Mayir Singh (Mayir is a Tamil word for hair - hair not on the head) .

How would you like it if you are christened Dildo, and are unfortunate enough to become famous later on in life ? I mean, I would give anything to see the faces of businessmen reading headlines like "Dildo shakes up the industry by signing a $10 million deal", "Dildo brings smiles to the 3 million shareholders", "Dildo indispensable, if Lehmann is to survive" etc.

Needless to say, no one understood the importance of caution on the day of the fantasy session better than me. I carefully constructed a fantasy involving enough fun and action, but avoiding all the words which might not fit in well between my first and last names.

For some reason, I wanted to be named ghoda (Horse in Hindi). I dont know why, maybe thats the best name I could come up with in the short time I made up my fantasy.

But yeah, I thought it was a pretty macho name, considering that ghoda might also refer to a revolver. Crack shot, eh? Or bring into the picture my dark skin and I could be a dark horse. Cool possibilities man.

Suitably excited, I cautiously narrated my fantasy, emphasizing the scenes where I am riding a magnificient horse (no pun intended here). With as much effort as I would have put into a public speech, I delivered my narrative perfectly according to the plan. After it was over, I sat back satisfied, enjoying the others' narratives and laughing at the dirty little words they let slip by mistake, only to be pounced upon with glee by the seniors.

I wasnt wrong about the importance of not saying something stupid. A couple of days later, in the naming session, one guy was named Softie. Now its upto your discretion to decide whats soft.

Yet another was named Maasik, a hindi reference to periods. Please note that I am not talking about time here. Another guy was named Garmi (Hindi for heat). Yet another name was Pumper.

When my turn came, I was more or less assured that my name would definitely have something to do with a horse.

"Karthik Laxman. His fantasy involved him riding a dark horse, and ambushing a couple..." the dorm rep spoke out.

I had already begun to visualize a tall muscular dark horse, galloping away towards the horizon, its magnificient mane dancing to the tunes of the wind.

"We thought we could name him ghoda.."

The dark horse throws his head and utters a triumphant neigh, drawing awestruck glances from the other species.

"But we thought that the name didnt suit his personality..."

The horse freezes mid-neigh. Wait a minute. What the...

"So we decided on the name Tattu." (Hindi for pony).

fuck !

My tall, muscular, neighing, dark horse suddenly shrunk to a pale, shivering pony. Gone were the muscles. Gone was the splendid mane. The frightened creature tottered to its feet and let out a little yelp.

Staying Alive.

2005-07-15T17:11:00.000+05:30

"You have committed a crime today."

"Sir.."

"What were we discussing now?"

"I dont know Sir."

"Why?"

"Sir, I dozed off."

Introducing to you, Section D's new sleep(ing) manager, Ravi.

The man, the superhuman, the dude who had the temerity to drift off in one of the most unlikeliest classes - HR. (Refer to my earlier post to get an idea of how an HR class is like.)

Ravi sits in one of the corners of the C shaped benches, comfortably away from the professor's view most of the times. Most.

If you ever feel sleepy in a class, which I assure you, you will, just take a look at Ravi. Watch his eyes and forehead play tug of war, each trying to drag the eyebrows towards itself. Often his neck enters the picture, tilting his head almost onto the shoulders of the lady TA who would sit next to him. You'd stop feeling sleepy and start laughing.

This is, I guess, one of his responsibilities as the sleep manager. The other responsibility is probably to divert the attention of the professor by getting caught often and in the process save all the others who might be drifting off. We're still working on the list.

These are the kind of things which keep the people here inches away from the tempting grasp of insanity.

When your batchmates have all been toppers or outstanding achievers all their lives, you know you are gonna find the competition getting to you. You might have been a topper yourself all your life, but there's every chance that you fail here.

A lot of people face a rude reality check in their first few weeks in IIM Ahmedabad. Going through such a phase is not easy. It will leave your self esteem humbled and your ego shattered. But thats okay. Only when you get depressed and feel like giving up, you have a problem.

We had 4 surprise quizzes this week. When I returned to my dorm after the first quiz the situation was something like this.

Oka: Arey O Samba ! How did the test go ?

Samba: I have to tell you this man !

Oka: What happened?

Samba: I knew that there would be a quiz today. I prepared hard and I wrote every damn thing that was asked. I mean, I predicted that there would be a quiz today.

Oka: Hey, thats cool man. Good for you !

The day I had the second quiz, the conversation went something like this.

Oka: Samba dude. How did it go ?

Samba: My prediction tool is awesome man !

Oka: Oh, you predicted this quiz as well ?

Samba: You bet ! Tell you what, I am gonna make this prediction tool and sell it for $1000 a package. Our dorm mates could have it for free, as part of dorm loyalty.

Oka: Ha ha. So you cracked it today as well, huh ?

Samba: Ummm, I just predicted that there would be a test. I didnt prepare for it. I told my group mate. He prepared for it and cracked it out of shape.

Oka: Ohh.

Samba: But who cares man. I have a prediction tool which works !

So long as we all are happy.
After the third surprise quiz, as usual I asked Samba.

Oka: Hey, did you predict the quiz today ?

Samba: Shit man, I have a small correction to make in the tool. I wrongly assumed that if there's no class of a particular subject on a particular day, there wouldnt be a quiz on it the same day. I have to add an extra constraint to my tool now.

Oka: Hmm. I see.

On Friday, during the final class of the day, when we were fidgeting in our seats waiting for the professor to finish and usher in the much awaited weekend, we realised that there was going to be yet another surprise quiz.

By now, comfortably numb to such surprises, (Indeed, its not a surprise quiz if you are gonna have it every day) we had little trouble in giving the quiz, flunking it and forgetting all about it.

I return to my dorm to find Samba lying half naked in his room (representing the weekend freedom perhaps), reading the newspaper.

Oka: Hey... you are all dressed up. Whats up man ?

Samba: (reading from the newspaper) London stands united. It takes a bomb for these people to be united. Assholes.

Oka: Bomb in London ? What are you saying ? When was this ?

Samba: A couple of days back. Terrorists blew up the subway. A dozen dead and a lot many hurt.

Oka: Is it Al-Qaeda ?

Samba: Who else?

Oka: Man, we should hire them to drop a bomb over this place.

Samba: I doubt if it would make too much difference. Profs would still hold quizzes among ruins.

Oka: Right. Forget it all man. (I turned to go back to my room)

Oka: (turning back to him) Hey, what happened to the quiz? How did the prediction go?

Samba: Fuck the prediction tool. And fuck the quiz. I am gonna sleep.

Oka: Right. I am gonna go blog.

I clicked opened the lock on the door and entered my room. I turned towards a paper I had pinned up on the wall, and put a cross on it. The third one in a row.

Three weeks over.

I am still alive.

To put a point across...

2005-07-11T15:33:00.000+05:30

When you have group meetings all afternoon where you discuss Operations and juggle around with numbers, trying to figure out how the production engineer in your team worked out which one is the bottle neck...

When you spend all your evening trying hard to find insights into the Human Resources case which, in your opinion dont exist, but would seem all too obvious when the prof brings it out in the class the next day...

When you spend all night working out the accounting problems, exhausting a couple of pens and a bunch of paper in the process and then at about 4 AM drift fitfully off to sleep, only to be interrupted by nightmarish visions of balance sheets with you under liabilities and the system under assets, the sheet as usual not balancing...

... the only place left where you dont do any studying and therefore potentially is a place to sleep, is the class.

But the greatest amount of learning happens in the class, and you lose out a lot if you doze off. So what do you do to not miss all that learning ?

The answer is, dont worry about it. The profs will make sure that you dont drift off.

Typically (and especially in HR) the prof enters the class and goes on a spree of cold calling - picking on all those who exactly at that moment, pore into their notebooks trying to find that elusive case fact or those who take notes with a furiousity which they never knew was there in them.

Try sleeping then.

If you have a prof-view-zone antenna and manage to open your eyes just in time when the prof turns around to look at you, and nod your head as if there could be no one apart from you who has grasped better the essentials of what he just said....

Try answering the question he asks you and try defending it.

These are some of my observations and take aways from today's HR class. The class is one of a kind. You'd be ruthlessly ridiculed, embarassed and mocked in front of 80 odd people, but at the end of the class, you'd still want to bow down in front of the prof and say "Respect."

Enough of theory. Look at what happened in the last couple of classes.

(The first case is about a chip manufacturing company which has to meet high quality standards.)

Student A: Sir, the problem they are facing is that theyare not hiring properly. They should hire the best talent.

Sir: You have a room with a machine in there. The worker's job is to come in the morning, switch it on, look at the machine all day, and then switch it off in the evening. Do you need best talent for that ?

Student A: No Sir...

Sir: Come on, its absolutely ridiculous ! You dont need the best talent for that. You need a duffer for that.

Student B: Sir, I think the employees should be motivated.

Sir: How will you motivate a guy whose job is to switch a machine on and off all day? Will you ask him to keep looking at the button and derive motivation from that ?

Student B: But...

Sir: No, no, no. Your capacity to think is limited.

...

Sir: Okay, what are the implications of a rating system ? Where the employees are not ranked with respect to each other, but are given grades rather.

Student C: Sir, there wouldnt be much competition, and they wouldnt work as well as they would if they had been ranked with respect to each other.
(You cant blame the guy. Just a while back, the ranking system was discussed where it was concluded that it brings out good solid work from the employees. But look what shut him up.)

Sir: Do you think that the professors in IIM-A arent doing their jobs well ?

Student C: Umm...

Sir: Twice a year, I get rated and some sort of a raise. Because of that, do you think I am not doing my job well ?

(The second case is about an international hotel resort company which has a high employee - read GO - turnover problem.)

Student D: Sir, they shouldnt fire all at once. If they could do it in intervals, maybe they wouldnt find it so hard to find replacements.

Sir: (who had his back to her till then, turns around slowly) Do you know, there are two ways to cut a chicken. One is the jhatka wherein they chop off the head in a second, and the other is the halaal where they cut the neck slowly. Which is more painful ?

Student D: (No response.)

Student E: Sir, the GOs are probably having differences with the customers and end up fighting with them where they should be polite.

Sir: What if the customer wants to fight? What if he likes a bit of aggression ?

Student E: Sir, the customers are sophisticated people.

Sir: How did you know that ?

Student E: Its given in the case that their average age is around 37.

Sir: Oh, even after all these years, I still dont think I am sophisticated !

Student E: (obviously no response.)

Student F: Sir, they arent conducting any exit interviews. That way they are losing out on some useful feedback.

Sir: Who should conduct the exit interview ?

Student F: The chief, Sir.

Sir: Oh, the chief is the one who fires them, and he should conduct the exit interview ? What feedback do you think the GO will give him ? He will tell him that he's an idiot.

(and now the clincher.)

Student G: Sir, the problem is that they arent assessing the candidate properly when they hire them.

Sir: What should they do?

Student G: The candidates should know the type of job they are going to be involved in.

Sir: Do you know IIM-A ?

Student G: If they could assess the GOs properly before they hire them, they wouldnt find them incompetent later on.

Sir: In the half an hour that I interviewed you after CAT, was I able to assess that you'd give such stupid answers in the class later on ?

Respect man. Respect.

Mills and Goons.

2005-07-04T14:36:00.000+05:30

The best few hours in a day in IIM-A are, quite counter-intuitively, the classes. The professors are extremely intelligent and immensely capable of forcing you to think the right way. This, they do through questions, interrogation, ragging, mockery and ridicule often bordering on the outrageous. Sometimes, you end up being the laughing stock of the class. But thats something the professors are especially fair about. Everyone gets his or her chance to be laughed at.

To give you a background of the case (its always a case) we were discussing today, there's this company whose mill in Indiana is old and overstaffed with people who arent exactly productivity gurus. This mill is running into heavy losses and is offsetting the profits the company makes in its other mills. The decision to be taken by the case actor is whether to spend a considerable sum of money to modernize the place or to shut it down, the dilemma in the latter option being the town's heavy dependence on the mill for its survival.

Of course, if there's some other innovative idea the class comes up with, it would be discussed and built upon.

Here's an excerpt from the discussion in the class. (I really really wish I could record the whole thing so that I can reproduce it all here. Now you will get to hear just a tiny fraction of it.)

Student A: Sir, the building at Indiana is five storeyed, whereas the mills at the other places are much smaller and hence more productive.

Sir: So, you are suggesting we chop off the top three floors.

(Scattered laughter)

Student A: No sir, we dont use all the floors for the operation. Maybe the other floors can be lent out and used to generate some other form of revenue.

Sir: Oh, you mean we open a restaurant on the fourth floor and a disco on the fourth floor so that all the people in the town come and dance ?

(Laughter)

Student B: But sir, we have to remember that the town is under economic depression. So it might not be possible to generate revenue like this.

Sir: Yeah, they are all depressed people. So how about this, lets get a psychiatrist there, and then all the depressed people can come in and seek counselling thereby generating revenue. We can also open a disco on the top floor and keep the depressed people happy. Indiana would be the only place in the United States where the depressed people are happy.

(A roar goes around the room. After the laughter's died down...)

Student C: Sir, the problem with this place is that the people are not productive. Every employee should be under vigil by their superiors and should be told that if they dont work they would be gone.

Sir: So, we should put a gun to the workers and say "Work, otherwise I will shoot you !" and the production will shoot up. (He points his forefinger at the temple of a student on the front row, and nearly startles him)

Student C: No, Sir..

Sir: Actually, it might work. If the labourer doesnt work, his supervisor will have to shoot him, and since the supervisor's boss would have a gun on the supervisor, he would have to shoot him as well, since there's no labourer to do the work. We might avoid the lay offs and get rid of the labour problem completely, without having to pay a dime by way of severance pay.

(Students take a while to recover.)

Student D: Sir, how about sending some of the people in this mill to the other mills which are doing well. They can get trained there and we would avoid the problem of lay offs too.

Sir: Hmm.. essentially you are proposing the parasite model. These are the people who have sucked the mill dry. And you want to send these people to the other healthy mills telling them, "Go to those healthy fat mills. They have a lot of blood. You can suck them to your hearts content". Ultimately, the bloodsuckers will suck the life out of every mill, drown the towns in depression and we can close down.

(This time, there's quite a gap before the student retorts. I am clutching my sides.)

Sir: You think, the other mills will accept such people ?

Student D: No Sir, those people can be given some time, in which they can be monitored and if they arent good, the management of those mills can fire them.

Sir: Oh, this is even better. Instead of killing the parasites ourselves, we export the parasites, export depression and then let those people kill them. Thereby we solve all the problems.

(Another uproar, and this time the noise culminates in a uniform thumping of desks. The point of the day, however, is yet to come.)

Student E: Sir, why dont we sell everything to a competitor ?

Unforgettables - I

2005-06-28T00:55:00.000+05:30

The next few days, we went through a series of orientation sessions, dorm meets, lecture sessions by seniors, presentation by SAC (Student Activity Council) members. Really it is quite difficult to present it here in a coherent fashion with a sense of flow. Especially if you take into account the fact that right now I'm blogging where 250 others are busy preparing for the next week's classes.

But I cant resist the temptation of leaving you a few quotes, which I definitely wouldnt want to forget. So here are they.

"Welcome to IIM-A. You've won the war. However the battle just begins" - the director, IIM-A.

"The session will start at 9 tomorrow. Not 9 oh 2, not 9 oh 5, but 9. Its 10 minutes past 6 in my watch. Set your watches." - PGP Chairperson's only statement after he was invited to speak in the introductory address.

"See, you are speaking from your point of view. You arent the one who's going to teach for 2 hours continuously. You should think from my point of view as well. When you think of options, you should consider all the affected parties and come to a mutually agreeable action." - A prominent professor's first retort on a student's suggestion that a microphone might not be necessary.

"Kamasuthra is an Indian speciality too. Why dont you open a brothel ?" - A prominent professor, upon a student's suggestion that KTPL should stick to restaurants serving ethnic Indian food, because thats its speciality.

"Frontlog. Prepare for classes one week in advance. Anyways thats what 250 other freshers would be doing" - a thoughtful 'Tuchcha' or senior, giving away a few words of wisdom to yours truly.

"Its your first class and I dont want to humiliate you." - A prominent professor says with a sigh after a student made a final point near the end of the class.

"I have to be polite now, but yeah, what you just said is utter bullshit." - A prominent professor, reacting to a point made by a student in the class.

"If you find yourself depressed, stressed, disillusioned with life, or if you are wondering about the meaningless of life, you can come to us for counselling." - Professor of Psychology, one of the speakers in the introductory session.

"There's a machine in a big room and all a guy has to do is to switch it on and switch it off. How will you motivate him. Will you ask him to look at the button a little more closely ?" - Professor of Human Resources, on a students point that one of HR's responsibilities is to motivate the employees.

"He has 5 gold medals from MIT. I would be scared to shake hands with him." - Arun Raghavan, fresher, on one of the professors.

"D-2 yehan hai, pani yehan hai, D-16 kahan hai ?" - Tempo shouts of D-2 girls in front of my dorm D-16 after the bucketful of water emptied from the third floor just fell short of them. Later, ten of us, mostly barechested, chased the girls with buckets of water and dunked them completely.

"In IIM-A, there is absolutely no ragging. Seniors dont rag freshers. Professors rag them." -Words of encouragement by dorm representative 'Dildo', earlier known as Nirav.

"You must be feeling sleepy now. Dont sleep. Never sleep in the afternoons in your first month in IIM-A." - A few words by Sarath to yours truly.

"Crap." - A prominent professor.

"Even if God comes in front of me, I'll push Him aside to look at you guys studying day and night." - a senior, deriving sadistic pleasure out of the fresher's predicament.

"You guys remind me of umm... let me see... oh yeah, sacrificial lambs."

The lull before the storm.

2005-06-28T00:39:00.000+05:30

AC had my train ticket.

Three of us, Chandrashekar, AC and I were going together, and he had booked the tickets. I had just transferred the money to him through the internet, thanks to ICICI.

Actually I wasnt quite sure what his name was. Even in the mails he sent to the IIM-A egroup, he signed off as AC. So, by some sort of intuition, or probably some supernatural power or just by dumb luck, I guessed that his name is Arvind.

I later discovered that there were 10 others who were going to IIM-A, some of them with their families. Needless to say, there was quite a bit of bond-building in the train. The journey was pleasant and completely uneventful, as even the eunuchs were not allowed into the AC coaches.

I have had a lot of experience with eunuchs on trains. They usually hunt in groups, in any number from a pair to half a dozen, and their favorite target is the young, especially the student.

First there's a clap, then before you could swivel around to face the origin of the noise, someone jumps right in front of you. And in that split second, if you think that its one of your friends trying one of those childish tricks to scare you, you'd be mistaken, especially after you are touched 'lovingly' on the face. Of course, once you have had the chance to completely take in the man/woman dressed in female grab, there's hardly any room for doubt.

Chances are, the very apperance of the eunuch is enough to scare the shit out of the student. He (its always a he.) is especially terrorized when the eunuch puts her hand over different places on the student's body.

If, despite this, the student manages to maintain a stern face and push the probing hand away, the eunuch turns to the next strategic tactic. A view of 'Taj Mahal', as they call it. Which is accomplished by standing right in front of the student and lifting her saree or skirt high enough, to reveal... umm, well, to reveal 'Taj Mahal'.

I havent seen a single student who's able to resist 'rewarding' the eunuch after the final 'revelation'.

When students go to BITS from Chennai at the beginning of a semester, there would be so many of them, that the whole train would be full of students. Eunuchs have a field day on those days, and I have a nagging suspicion that some of them have even invested in real estate after a few such ventures.

You see, some of my friends keep saying things about their landlords...

The best part about the train journey was its prompt arrival. And it was only about half an hour when AC, Chandrashekar and I found ourselves in a taxi merrily purring along a straight road towards Vastrapur.

Chandrashekhar noticed that there were quite a few posh localities in the city. AC noticed that Ahmedabad had its share of billboards too. I noticed that the gujju girls were very pretty.

In under an hour we reached the IIM-A gate. We took the taxi beyond the gate and a little further into the campus, and got our baggages out. After I had unloaded the final piece of luggage from the taxi onto the road, a heavy suitcase, I rose and stood erect to see what lay in front of me.

We liked what we saw.

Between the tall green trees, stood buildings designed in a brickout architecture, the color perfectly complementing the rest of the view. And in between the nearest two buildings, lay a magnificent ramp, which as we would later come to know, is known as the Harvard ramp.

The following day, I registered myself to the program, and completed a lot of other little settling-down chores. I met a lot of people, and started getting cheeky with the few people I knew for more than a day. It was pretty cool.

One problem though, was remembering the names of the hundreds of people I met. I'd see a guy whom I'd have met a little while back, and enthusiastically start saying 'Hi....', and then the realisation would strike me that I dont know his name. Trust me, the average brain retains just about 25 % of the names it learns. In my case, its about 1 %. I remember the names of people who have the same name as me.

But I've discovered ways of getting to know the name again without feeling embarassed.
One of the ways is to ask him the full name. The other is to ask him for his email id. Yet another method is to ask him to spell out his name, feigning ignorance(with a stupid face).

I was sitting opposite this guy with whom I had travelled on the train from chennai.

'Hey, you got a sim card ?'

'Yeah, I did.' he said.

'Give me your number'.

I type in the number into my phone book as he dictates it. After I did that, I paused at the next screen. The phone was asking me for a name to be put next to the number in the diary. I thought. and thought. After about half a minute, I asked him how he spelt his name.

He gave me a blank look. 'What ? Its the same as yours right ? You dont know to spell your own name ?'

I guess I have to revise my retention estimates.

Pro(b)logue

2005-06-19T17:03:00.000+05:30

It has been a fascinating life till now.

And chances are, its only gonna get better. I am a day away from boarding the train to Ahmedabad, and three days away from formally registering to the PGP programmme of IIM-Ahmedabad.

At this precise moment, in a fit of introspection and deep thought, after having delegated the packing work to my mom and dad, I've decided to give shape to my latest idea. To completely record my adventures and misadventures at IIM-A; right from day one. I have no idea as to what purpose this would serve, but for a change, I decided not to think about the benefits before I begin something. (I am not being completely honest here. I do have a few vague ideas about what I'd do with such a piece of literature ;) )

I've named this blog 'Sleepless in IIM-A' in expectation of long hours there in Ahmedabad. We'd know in course of time, if this nomenclature proves right. :)

The road to IIM-A (the metaphorical road, I mean), has been very interesting. A part of it has been captured in my blog on my stay in Hyderabad, (Do go through "LMAO - Laugh My Ass Off !!!" - http://oka356.blogspot.com) and hence I wouldnt talk about CAT and my GD/PIs here. I would rather begin from the time I left Oracle.

On 31st May, 2005, when I was running around here and there between the different Oracle buildings, getting those crucial signatures which would get me the relieving certificate, Pratik called me up and asked me what I wanted as a farewell gift from the team. Frankly, he was disappointed that I was getting anything at all.

"Are you expecting anything as a farewell gift ?" he had asked me a day earlier as he had quite often in the past.

"No. How can I ever expect anything from a team which has you in it."

"Good. But I am afraid we wont be able to live up to your expectations."

"Live 'up' ? Hmm, but why ?"

"Ramesh has asked me to think of a gift for you."

Now, on the phone, he asked me if a laptop case was okay. Trust me, I was quite shocked. Because this was by far the only sensible thought he has ever had in his whole life. Before he could take my shocked silence for a no, I hurriedly said that it was a great idea, and that I'd love it.

A week earlier I had placed an order for a Dell laptop, and given the address of one of my friends in US as the shipping address. To pay for the laptop, I woke up one other friend and asked him if he could pay. I still think Avin was too sleepy to realise what was happening. Unwittingly he gave me his debit card details. And voila ! A Dell laptop was paid for ! As was a digital camera, a scanner, a printer, an ipod mini, and... okay kidding, Avin - just the laptop.

My little sister Priya and I collected the laptop at the airport from the girl who was returning home from the US. It was a funny experience, especially for Priya, as the girl's dad who was waiting at the airport kept saying "very good" for everything I said.

"Hi Uncle, I'm [beep] (I say my name here). Your daughter is getting a laptop for me from the US"

"Oh, very good, very good" he said. "Are they cheaper in the US ?"

"Yeah. Very." I said. "By the way, this is my sister."

"Very good, very good. I'm Dr. Ravindran."

"Very good, very good." I said.

His daughter was quite nice, a bit pretty too, I thought. But she appeared extremely confused. I introduced myself to her as soon as she came out, and she blinked at me a couple of times. I had to go on and tell her that I had come for the laptop.

And there in that dim place outside the airport, lit dully by the nearby lights, appeared my laptop out of her bag, its metallic silver exterior shining brilliantly.

Thoroughly captivated by my new possession, I thanked her profusely and headed home in a trance.

Since then I have been thinking of an exotic name for my laptop.

A bit hesitatingly I decided on Neo. Preethi said it was too common a name. Mohan remarked that I chose the name because its close to the nigger. (Maybe he meant Morpheus and made a indirect reference to my sexy, dark skin which is perpetually a source of ridicule). Matters came to a close when Pratik remarked that it makes me what he always suspected I was - a gay bastard. I decided to think of an exotic feminine name.

I've been considering various names for my little baby. Trinity, Mercedes, Miranda, Soleil, Esmerelda etc etc. Do feel free to drop in your suggestions. And keep reading. :)