Day 511:16th Feb, 2011

I think third day in succession that my sleep got disturbed at dawn. Pretty cold today though, thanks to a fresh bout of rain. The poor blower's post winter break had to be abruptly cancelled :P

The next (and thankfully final) waking pit-stop happened straight at 12.15 noon :-S . No semblance of any afternoon though - it was a tad bit dark and still drizzling. But amazingly beautiful - clean and green in a way only nature does :-)

Typical vella day otherwise - mostly spent sitting in front of my laptop. Resumed gymming though! Was dead tired and wanted to go for a quick dinner, preferably outside. But neither did plans for 'outside' work out, nor did the 'quick' part, as my room was invaded by TG and Sheldon Salhotra for some INDEX budget clarifications. Luckily though - TG agreed to come for dinner to the ever-dependable Brij. Ate right till my oesophagus was full :P

Day 499:4th Feb, 2011

Woah! Seems like someone forgot to tell the fog that winter's over! I woke up pretty early today, at 6.30am the first time. As I stepped out of my room, I saw that the dense blanket of morning fog is back. I hope it does not bring along it's friend - Mr. Cold.

Had made a lot of plans yesterday on what to do today. But eventually, the first thing I did with the extra morning time (apart from breakfast :D) was finish season 1 of Heroes :-S .Couldn't help it, but at least now there is some closure on that front (pls God, don't make me start season 2).

Spent the early part of the evening doing some pending INDEX work. Post that I had one company application which I wanted to finish - 3 HR questions for a major FMCG company. But I had already missed gym since two days, and for sure I knew if I skipped it today, I'll fall out of the habit. And thus the choice was made - I even added a complimentary run around the campus to make up :P

Post (yet another) dinner at Fauzi, my room was raided by INDEX juniors trying to reconcile accounts :D. Now now, that part is going to be fun for them :-P . I have a report to make by tomorrow noon, analyzing the leadership styles of 2 people from the industry. Still deciding whom to choose so I can make optimum use of resources ;-) . Add to that I am feeling all tired and sleepy... may be ... tomorrow morning...

Day 472:8th Jan, 2011 - Oh helL, what the fog?!

Writing in reverse order, reporting the most recent stuff. 

Just came back to my room after a visit to the mess. The weather today has gone big time bonkers. Apparently, the rumor making the rounds is that the temperature today on campus is 0 degrees! I sincerely thought it was a little exaggerated till small crystals of ice actually fell on me while I was walking at night. And the visibility is so poor, one can't see beyond 15 metres at all! I can't even see my hostel entrance from the corridor (just a distance of 15-20 feet). And although one could argue that all you can and should do is crib about this whole thing, many of us now actually seem to enjoy this :D . Experience of a lifetime! :D

Sangharsh has begun! It is the high profile inter IIM (A,B,C,L) sports tournament and this year, is being hosted by our institute. Got to meet my friend from IIM A. They seem to have a nice time witnessing this weather :D

Also, finally got Pachpan to teach me a little bit of fin. Realized I still need to read up quite a bit :-(

PS: Credit to Mesh for the tagline today

Day 469:5th Jan, 2011 - Life in a freezer

A surprise test greeted us today in the FRA class. Luckily for me, it was non-evaluative :D.

But the big thing to write about would definitely be the temperature here! The barometer is hitting rock bottom! I woke up at 6.15 in the morning to check why my heater had stopped working. Only to realise it has not! :-S . It is THAT cold! And the fog too! At 9am, I can't even see Umang (the sports center - easily visible from my balcony usually).

Had a company ppt to attend late evening. Inspired myself to squeeze in a quick gym session before that. Didn't feel too well though. Managed only 3 minutes on the tread mill. Reduced all the other exercises to ensure I would shave, bathe, suit up and still get to the ppt on time. Only to realize the ppt was getting too delayed. And yea, the 'last mover advantage' theory is now more wide-spread. A lot more people were willing to explore that option, even bringing themselves to face the deterring cold outside the classroom. But, jo jeeta wohi sikander ;-) and yes, yours truly managed to ace it again :D

Day 459:26th Dec, 2010 - Miss :-(

Shit shit shit! Once again, I missed Taj breakfast! :-(

And this in spite of all the effort I took to wake myself up. Which included not having my blower switched on in this cold weather. And also drinking water to "build up pressure" :P . I don't know which of these worked, but disastrously I woke up only at 10.15 to a song that runs as "spiderman.. spiderman.. tumne churaya mere dil ka chain"! (Watch the link below at your own risk)

Congrats if you have indeed survived beyond that!

Woke up to realise not everyone had missed the breakfast ;-) . But anyways, I had the Dexter episodes. And a lazy Sunday got off to a murderous start :-P

Luckily, decent lunch in the mess. Mooli parathas, but more importantly they were well made. A couple of more episodes later, made my way to the Brand Management class. Nice prof. Our institute should get more of them to neutralize the location disadvantage. And to that the fact that they finish off their sessions in that one week :D

Days 453,454: 20th-21st Dec, 2010 - Walking the last mile

Wow! Just can't believe the speed with which 5 terms have passed by!

Anyways, the combined post is because I slept off early yesterday, 8.30pm, a little too early infact for helL's standards :D. Not much to do yesterday. Finished off with the registration formalities. Caught up with a few stex-returned batchmates - finally saw the guy who lost half of himself back there! A few others who were back from stex also seemed to have lost weight, except of course for my good friend Kung Fu Panda, who seems to have gained a few more kilos of awesomeness :P + of course it was freezing cold and I had this feeling that excessive exposure to it wouldn't bode well. And hence, I just found a nice excuse to snuggle myself on the bed and get some sleep.

Today morning I attended my first class of the last term. (Even had breakfast after what seems like a zillions years!) Due to the PGP1 exams, we ended up having the class in CR103 - my old classroom. My actual seat was already occupied, so I ended up sitting one row behind. But that didn't stop me from reminiscing about all the super brilliant moments spent in that class - 3 cheers to section B for that! :-) . Then went to Chatur's room to gorge on all those sweets gotten from home. Not to mention the bonus of getting a few chocolates from the stex people nearby :D . And finally saw the movie 'Usual Suspects' - I found it OK.

Had a company ppt in the afternoon. Many more to follow. I guess a good amount of time this term is going to go this way. The funny part today though was that a Pcommer's name was called out and he wasn't there! :P . Had the burger in the mess (newly rechristened as 'Annapoorna') - seems like a 'Warm Welcome' sign with the most popular item.

Meanwhile, TG got his pappu. Spent some time talking about that, a lot more negotiating for the scale of the treat and then a lot more on random bakwaas. Which somehow ended up in the decision that we were not going to eat in the mess. And so we went to the (by now default) Brij ki Rasoi and stuffed ourselves to the max - no one else paid and it became a 'starter to the main treat' ;-)

Also Pachpan, Bala and me were riding triples and we kind of had a 'standstill skid' from the bike at 3.4 :D. Nobody got hurt or anything, but it was uncanny considering I had joked about it just that evening with a couple of other friends! Spoooky no?! :D

Slept off immediately when I came back. But then got up a couple of hours ago. Anyways, too much of pointless browsing done. It's 5.30 am now :-p . Good by helL's standards and have now more than made up for yesterday's early retirement. Time to go to sleep again so I wake up for tomorrow's class. Gn.

Day 438:29th Nov, 2010 - HEPPy

The temperature's dipped tremendously all of a sudden!

But the sudden chill may also be because of the dementor called 'CV Submission'! After a long long time, PGP2s (atleast a majority of them) are actually busy with something. And since we are allowed to have a 2-page CV for our laterals, I have been trying to expand my points and simultaneously retain it's strength and non-globe quotient. That's a really tough job, since we are so used to doing it's exact opposite :D

Just past 6am. And I have optimally used all the time available to keep modifying my CV. Time to sleep. Gn!

Day 434:25th Nov, 2010

It's growing colder each day. And wrapped up in a warm blanket, you just don't feel like waking up :-)

Exactly because of this (and the cushion of attendance that I have saved up), I decided to give today's morning class a skip. And exactly like yesterday. later came to know that the session was officially cancelled :D

Apart from that, nothing special during the day. Have spent a big chunk of it playing this game called 'Crazy Taxi'. It's a light app on FaceBook and it's got me hooked pretty bad!!

Day 422:13th Nov, 2010

Was super chilly inside the classroom too for some reason. Not to mention my own internal running nose problem. And already I have an issue in not being capable of sleeping in a uncomfortable sitting posture. All these powers combined to ensure I couldn't even catch up on a wink of sleep during the lecture.

Anyways, broke all time records today. We launched our last MR project of the season. The final tally now stands at 18! That makes it more than any other INDEX by atleast 25%! \m/

Had an insti party. Got loads of work, but insti parties are not to be avoided. So I thought I'll just go there for 15min or so, hear some loud music and make my way out. The plan went off beautifully except for part 3. And instead of making my way out, I stayed on right till the very end, the part when we have randomly begun sitting in the lights AFTER the music is off, and singing a random bunch of songs :D. Pretty masaledaar party though :-p . Lots of happening stuff on the dance floor :-p . No limit to the things people do (and entertainment they provide to us) when they are a couple (ok, a little more than that) of drinks down ;-) . Finally back in my room. 4.45am. Work postponed to tomorrow :-p

Day 420:11th Nov, 2010

I am somehow a fan of versioning. Through my stint of producing creatives for an event, I always store all my intermediate steps as something_v1 and so on and so forth. After a few draft versions, and taking feedbacks in parallel for those versions, I eventually reach a stage which I call something_final. But never ever has that been the final copy. And so once again, I found myself working on the finally_final copy of the hoarding. Luckily this time, since we didn't have any time and of course, the work would expand only as much as the available time - the hoarding finally was freezed!

Post dinner, Vanki, Pachpan, Kisaan and myself had an impromptu meet / discussion to assess our budget under more "practical terms". Seems like we are in a position to explore some new avenues :)

And suddenly, the worst possible thing has happened - I have caught cold! Nothing irritates me more in life than a running nose! Have taken a tablet and am going to sleep. Lets hope this goes off soon!

Day 409: 31st Oct, 2010 - Design Time still \m/

Some more designing. Spent a little time on coming up with the sweatshirt design. Infact spent more time searching for a decent background template! Everyone was insisting on a plain and simple sweatshirt with universal appeal, and that is exactly what they got.

During our Summers process, we don't have classes, but we haven't technically got holidays. And that is ensured by asking all of us to report to the Placement Office and sign against our pics. And to ensure no frauds, we even have a dedicated person to ensure a one-sign-one-person (right person! :P) process.

We see to be going out for dinner every other day. Once again, Brij got the majority vote due to its proximity advantage. The added drive for TG was that it was a Sunday and kadhi would be available. Or so we thought. Unfortunately though, seems like even on a Sunday, you need to be lucky enough to come on time for the coveted kadhi! Interesting dinner time conversation - a new conspiracy theory called Loose Change, which claims that the entire 9/11 episode was orchestrated by the US! Scary thought.

PS: Must mention my stud quotient. At a time when everyone was clothed in multiple layers of clothes, I went on my bike in just one t-shirt. Tuning my mind.. ;-)

Day 406: 28th Oct, 2010 - Bbrrrrrrrrrr!!

A sudden chill has descended on campus. The temperature on campus is usually a (tangible) few degrees lower than the main city. So much so that a few days back, when I was coming back to campus, it was actually warm outside the gate. And just when I came inside, it was cold! Pretty early onset of this level of temperature though.

However, what's heating up the campus is that the Summer Placement season is ON. I seem to be hearing that new decimal systems are being introduced now, what with Day 0, Day 0.5 etc. proving to be insufficient to describe the latest scenarios. And the more it happens, the more I think it's all a farce. The short-lists that you are going to get, the filtering that is going to happen, the final selections, all of that is going to be quite random! And almost 99% of that has zero correlation with your ability and the final kind of work you are going to do. But I know for a fact 2 days into this, a lot of people are going to break down. It's almost a pseudo-caste system. And I strongly think a better alternative needs to be put in place.

Went to Pizzaport for dinner. (I don't seem to be eating in the mess at all these days!) The new thing we tried this time was the dry manchurian. And I must say it tasted pretty good! We originally had plans to take a "sizzling-brownie" diversion at CCD on our way back, but considering the way we raised funds for our pizzas, we had to have a change of plans :D

Day 402: 24th Oct, 2010

Now although I had had a preliminary glance through quite a bit of the PPTs that had been uploaded, I knew for sure that I wouldn't remember anything if I didn't get a chance to revise it. Also needed to read a few handouts. With this intention, I set myself the target of waking up early. I didn't miss this target by much. However, today was one of those days when I was destined to have a slight stomach upset early in the morning and consequently all my grand plans went haywire. Just saw a little bit of some new theory and ran off to the exam. Paid the price of not going through the stuff once again. Also had a mini sense of deja vu when we got a very similar question as was in the EPA exam. Had a small conversation immediately after the paper, which resulted in an ..appointment of sorts :-P .. which I did not honour, mainly 'coz I wasn't sure where it would lead :D

In the afternoon, meddled around a little bit more with my handset. Have been trying various permutations and combination to find more details, i.e. the circumstances under which it does / does not conk off. And what I have learnt till now is that the phone seems to be working fine in the Offline Mode. In fact, even after the SIM has been inserted, the phone continues to be ON only when it is being used in that mode. 

Even while I was fiddling around with my handset, an urgent plan to watch Jhootha Hi Sahi at 5pm at Wave was hatched at 4.10pm. A really bad and unfortunate moment.. the movie must be amongst the worst I have seen! Pachpan's almost in a mood where he wants to start a blog, exclusively to categorically give the choicest abuses to this movie!

Back to the campus; had dinner in the mess. 2nd consecutive Sunday dinner in the mess! Must be a record of sorts in the 2nd year :-p . Back to my room, I was still trying to explore some new tests for my handset when randomly Vanki and Kisaan made me go all the way to 3.4, just for their "celebration"! It has started to turn really chilly outside, need to keep my pair of gloves ready at all times.

A proper "genuine" post this one ;-) . After quite some time I believe! Somehow managed to finish this post..  in between juggling with shayari-jugalbandi with Kisaan :-p . Going to get some early sleep. At 01:00 hours, bon nuit!

Day 377: 29th Sep, 2010 - Two things are in

Two things are in.

One of those is Varchasva - IIM Lucknow's Cultural & Sports Fest! Now a fest is a real gala time. Sports freaks get to play a lot. The cultural enthusiasts have many competitions where they can participate. These are the obvious advantages. However the slightly hidden benefits are privy to all the couples who are away from each other. This becomes a great time to get your other half on campus, and we are often confused who the new people on campus are :-p. Adding to this confusion will be the influx of students from other colleges, and somehow, the girls in other campuses are always more beautiful! :-p

And the other, of course, is the one that is here to last for quite some time. Yes, am talking about the "cold". Presently, it is a little more than a pleasant chill. But very soon, it's going to become all devilish and freeze the hell outta us. Aww well, but we all know no one can ever do that :-)

Days 358,359: 10th-11th Sep, 2010 - Taj Mahal :: check!

So often I have cribbed here about not using my weekends to go on short trips. Well, just as I saw a billion plans bite the dust (once again, and as usual!), the trend changed. Came to know of this group who were going to Agra, and tagged along with them :D . Wasn't feeling too well, but I couldn't let that stop me this time.

So this spot decision happened at 3.30pm and at 3.45, I was on my way to catch the UPSRTC bus. Was really lucky to get a seat in the same bus as my friends, a guy who came in 5 seconds later (when I was waiting for my ticket print) didn't get the seat! Mine was the last it seems - super - providence does seem to have interfered!

The bus journey (7 hours) was as usual for me - selfish uncaring passengers who deem it their right to recline their seat right on to my lap, noisy burping males etc etc. What made it characteristically uncomfortable was the freezing levels AC! In any case, I just can't seem to put myself to sleep in a seating position and so remained awake.

One more thing that I just don't seem to do is initiate conversations with people I don't know. (With people I know, I am not so good at sustaining conversations. No wonder I bought a book called 'Emotional Intelligence'. I must stop digressing now!). A young guy next to me however was more enterprising. Turns out he was made for the skies! He was a student of aviation - who had rejected a Civil Engineering seat at BITS Pilani - because flying was what he wanted to do. I must say he rose a few inches above the ground when he took that decision. Learnt quite a few things from him - what they do, their studying methodology, career options, etc etc. 

At 01:00 hours, reached some place in Agra. Stupid bus driver had no clue about anything. Fortunately one passenger on the bus could guide us on where to go and get some decent accommodation. Went to a hotel there, and the fellow didn't seem very interested in giving a room at all. May be because we disturbed him on his nice little nap; but not a great thing to be sleeping on job anyways right? Went to another hotel, guided by a rickshaw driver and got some comparatively cheaper lodging.

The room was pretty decent. We got a couple of extra beds. But then again - the mass murder weapon came into action. The AC came to life, and pretty much did its best to end ours. Tried numerous buttons, but couldn't switch it off. Called the reception and we were instructed to find "a red button behind a cupboard" to turn it off. Obviously, the untraceable button remained just that. Some of us took refuge in blankets to get some rest in the little time we had for us now. Some brave hearts decided to take on the cold. I was in the former group and later came to know that members of the latter group kept going outside the room at intervals to get some warmth :-|

Got an Omni to take us around the next day. Visited Fatehpur Sikhri, Agra Red Fort and Taj Mahal. I liked the places in the same order :D . Interesting incident at the Taj Mahal. We reached the entrance only to find a loooooooooooooooooooong queue of people waiting to get in. And where there is a problem, there are our jugaadu touts. For some not-so-less money, they promised to get us in through a "VIP entrance" immediately. The queue was pretty lengthy, and so we agreed. What they did was take us to another perfectly legitimate entrance, which probably hardly anyone knows!! The part of no queue was true, but parting of extra dough for a 5 min walk momentarily irritated us. But then again, the guy was just using "information assymetry" to his advantage. 

Meanwhile, I still didn't have a ticket back :-P . At 7pm, I booked a WAITING tatkal ticket on the same train. Reached the station to find out (not unexpectedly) that it hadn't got confirmed. So there I was - stranded without a ticket. But hopes do not die in India so easily :D . Managed to make "thoda sa adjustment" with the TTE and get a place with my friends. Slept on the floor, that was not so bothersome. But, once again, the murder weapon swept into action - the killer AC!! I have no clue how other passengers could sleep through that! I spent the last hour and half OUT of the compartment. That turned out to be pretty awesome too, as the sun was just rising and the orange hues fell on vast expanses of green :) What wouldn't a city-dweller give for such a glimpse.

Back to campus. 7am. Time for covering up lost sleep. Good night :)

Day 277: 13th Jun, 2010

One of my aims on campus was that in these 2 years, I wanted to train myself for a marathon. Right now, only my nose seems to have taken it seriously :-p .. Really irritated by this running nose! It is also delaying my Umang (gym+swimming) plans! (NOT an excuse)

Apart from that, it was a pretty chill Sunday. In fact didn't really feel very Sunday-ish as the other days have also been really light :-p

Had a HUGE sandstorm late night-ish. Room's full sand covered now :-| . Super winds blowing. Doors banging wildly all over - of course then people had the good sense to latch it. In fact, the winds were such that I had to apply some might and push to get the door open! ..Weather's pleasant though! :)

Day 276: 12th Jun, 2010

It's kinda weird when you start making yourself feel "productive" after trying repeatedly and finally getting a 100+ continuous rebounds of a TT ball against the wall. But that's the great sense of achievement with which I started the day today.

We had to take a case write-up to our Prom Strat class today. Arbitrarily, ma'am caught this one guy. Who picked up someone else's write-up and went on stage and did manage to speak 'something'. One year of MBA, if not anything else, does help you learn to come up with impromptu bullshit. 

Pretty slow day after that. Became suddenly obsessed with 'Bhaja Govindam'. Was listening to a short version recited by MS. (Not that I am very much into music etc., got the link from a friend's blog). But it was nice and soulful, and the lyrics are profound and deep. Don't think the advice will last for long though. I tend to make my own philosophy for things \m/ , ones which change as per convenience :D

Played some TT today. I enjoyed it. Though I again didn't play as well as I can / should ! Read a little bit of 'Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish' by Rashmi Bansal. The 3-4 stories I read were interesting, but not exactly inspiring. Though ample scope to draw learnings from each of them.

Learnt from Shomu how to operate the washing machine. My first clothes washing stint in this hostel :D.

Have also fallen victim to a running nose. Nothing is more irritating than that ! Going to take a tablet and put myself to sleep.

Day 248: 9th Mar, 2010

Well now, I am myself bored about writing about my sleepiness but what to do - my circadian cycle's totally gone bonkers. 

I slept off at 7.30 in the evening, woke up at around 11.30. I called up a friend to check if the INDEX meet was still going on. I was asked to come, only so that they got the sadistic pleasure of wrapping up the meet within a minute of my arrival. I shall have my revenge :D

No wonder it's 6am now and I am wide awake. And what have I been doing? There is a high speculation of a 'surprise' ADA quiz tomorrow. And I am trying to study. (the input variable though would be statistically insignificant). 10 slides in the past 3 hours. Not that I went very deep into the subject matter, on the contrary, I strayed myself into the usual random browsing territory. Came across this nice speech by J.K.Rowling at Harvard, as also reading random news, as also bargaining for stuff from seniors :D . Got myself a mattress and curtains today from Swetha, in addition to the two racks from Shady :D

'Nuf said.. I am just going to crash myself into the bed now. That was a part of the plan even as I began this post ;-) . Oh man... the first rays of the sun have come down!

PS: It's suddenly pretty cold here. The Chill before the Warm!

Day 202: 22nd Jan, 2010 - Parikrama!

Just when we thought the cold would go away, it's back! And worse than what it was! Damn cold day today. Dense fog from around 8pm itself!

Today's lectures were painfully slow, even with the novel. Worked on another small INDEX notice after class. (NB was kinda empty!) Had a meeting in the evening.

Day 1 of manfest today! We INDEXians then went to watch HellRaiser - the rock show/competition. That was OK. Had cheese burst domino's pizza. That was superb! :D . After that we had a show by Parikrama. That was AWESOME! Super energetic! A great start to day#1.

Back in the confines of my room.. listening to a couple of parikrama songs. No lectures tomorrow. So no tension of waking up :D . Am making use of this by randomly listening to a lot of songs now. It's almost 4.15 am. Guess I'll go to sleep now, awaiting another good event tomorrow!

Day 201: 21st Jan, 2010 - Zero Visibility!

Unlike yesterday, lots of classes today. Half the MIS class was spent in random gyaan. Passed the remaining lecture hours with Kane and Abel.

Immediately after class, had to leave for some urgent work - going to a couple of schools and handing over their trophies. (Riza chickened out because of the lathi charge rumour :-p). Didn't even have lunch.

Had the INDEX meeting with seniors - a small doubt clearing session sorta thing. Some useful points there. Worked a bit on a collage for the NB. But then Ops Guru called me to SC's room to tally some transactions. Got a bit delayed in attending Manfest 2010's cake cutting ceremony. Missed the cake!

It's zero visibility state on campus! Impossible to see anything/anyONE even a few metres away! and nobody on campus needs a cigarette to smoke :D