The Welcome!

"Welcome to Standard Chartered Bank." No, not you, me! Its for me. In case you did not know, I have joined SCB and this has been one statement I have been hearing a lot over the last two weeks. I have heard that sentence so much that now I have started reciting it in sleep and my room mate is scared of me. He doesn't want to talk to me after dinner! Although it does feel nice to be warmly welcomed into a new place, there is a fine line between adequate and overdose. Well that fine line differs from person to person, so lets not read too much into it.

Life has been so far so good, well mostly. I met a lot of new people who joined with me. Almost all of them were very interesting and great people to get along. (This sentence is only for those of the new joiners that will read this blog :P) I did all the fun stuff during induction (you know what I am talking about ;)). One thing that definitely needs mention is the pillows from the hotel we were put up. To call them heavenly is an understatement. Pity that I couldn't smuggle any out of the hotel. Pillow - too big, suitcase - too small, me - too disappointed!

Official life has otherwise been BAU. Oh yeah, we use a hell lot of abbr. ;) You know I have been filling forms, updating details, finishing learning modules, meeting people, getting confused, feeling lost and other such regular stuff. But there is one thing that definitely stood out from the e-learning modules. There was this module on HIV and one particular attribute of HIV actually inspired me. Apparently HIV does not discriminate across country, race, colour, caste, region, not even sexual orientation! It treats everyone equally. How nice! Won't it be great if everyone behaved like that. No, not like HIV, I just mean the non-discriminatory part.

One should NEVER forget that there are ALWAYS two sides to EVERY coin. The second side more often that not turns out to be a pain in the posterior. Do you know the most dangerous thing mankind ever invented after H-bomb and A-bomb? It happens to be the bloody SNOOZE button. My trysts and the resulting troubles with the snooze button can go on and on forever. Then there is this travel part. If you work in Bombay and if your office is in SoBo, then travel to work becomes a separate distinguishable part of your life. Having already dealt in detail about travel in Bomabay here and not wanting to relive the terror through my words, I am moving on to the most notorious culprit - the rains. Actually rains deserve a separate paragraph for themselves.

It has been pouring like hell outside for the last 90 minutes now and only God knows when it will stop. That was pretty much the situation over the last month and that will pretty much be the situation over the next month. Bombay's monsoons are like a lady. Please don't mistake them to be beautiful, elegant and graceful. They are actually highly unpredictable! And when rains team up with winds, they have immense fun at our expense. Umbrellas flip before you can bat an eyelid. Umbrellas don't flip back even after everyone around you have batted their eyelids ten, fifteen times! If you lose grip on your umbrella, you will be made to look like a crazy toddler running after a confused cockraoch. Of course, you can ROFLMAO in case you are not the crazy toddler chasing the confused cockroach. But, Caution: Wet floor, ok? There is more. Even army trained mine field navigatiors can't figure out the placement of pot holes on these submerged roads. Not to mention you have to polish/wash your shoes every time to venture out. You are still wondering how you completely got wet below the belt (!!), even though you had an umbrella. You cannot figure out why that random guy designed the auto such that the driver never gets wet but you always do. Lunch table debates typically revolve around whether you drive through or swim across subways... Jolly good stuff, heh?

Well, thanks to Standard Chartered for making me an International graduate. Ping me on gtalk for further details. Here is to all the international graduates who joined with me (this time no sarcasm, ok?), you are one great bunch of people. Life has been made much easier becaue of all those faceless interactions we everyday have. Thanks folks! Thats all for now. I will keep ranting here as and when I get enough content and motivation. Till then...

Cheers... hic... ;)

P.S - For those of you who have still not discovered Google, BAU means Business As Usual and SoBo means South Bombay!

The Last Quarter

I am back to blogging after a yawning gap. Truly a lot of time has elapsed between my last post and this one. Actually I might have easily forgotten that I had a blog but for those kind hearts that inquired what happened to my blog! I thought nobody read my blog (of course, except myself :P). What with the number of followers increasing but the number of comments decreasing. I guess people just want to show off that they read my blog by clicking the 'follow' button. #awesome But I was wrong. Apparently, people do read this page and more so, someone looks forward to it and someone enjoys these ideas. For all those kind hearts that never forget to remember this blog, a big Thanks! This blog also remembers you! :)

The purpose of me starting to blog is to have a digital account of my life. My blog is a chronological satire on my life itself. The idea is to provide the older me with jokes to laugh at when I eventually run out of them! Naturally, when there is nothing on my blog, there is nothing happening in my life that is even remotely interesting. That was how the last quarter was. A dumb, monotonous, routine oriented, pale 3 months fading away from what was once a pulsating, colorful life. To some extent there was a profound nothingness everywhere. Whatever you find in this post after this sentence is an attempt to capture that nothingness. Please don't take it seriously if there is nothing, absolutely nothing after this in this post!




















Well, I told you there might be nothing, absolutely nothing in this post! The one good (or bad) thing that happened in the last quarter is that I turned 24! I am just getting older not any better, therefore happy! Starting a fresh life in a fresh year. Having bid adios to formal education and all its thrills recently, I am stepping into the longest phase of my life - career. Only time can tell whether times will be exciting or exasperating as they pan out. However they are, we will keep poking fun at them in this blog! And now I truly promise to do it regularly. Happy to be back blogging.

Dear nothingness, RIP! Dear world, here I come to raaak!

Cheers :)

The Un-terview!

Hypocrites. Who? Us. Yes, you heard it right. It is all of us I am talking about. Think about it, don’t we do a lot of things according to an unwritten credo? Nobody knows why, nobody asks why and nobody wants to know why. We all just follow what we are told we are ‘supposed’ to do. Let me restrict myself to just one ritual we all (well, mostly) must have gone through, campus interviews. So now how many of you are smiling at your computer screens? Lies, cold blooded lies, aren’t you thinking? Yeah, me too, same feeling.

One thing I could never understand is how we were able to get away with all those lies. Everyone knows it. I know it. You know it. Everybody who ever gave an interview knew it. Everyone who will give interviews will come to know of it. Even the HR who took your interview knew it. I know I have shared my blog link on my linkedin profile. So the future HR who might recruit me might come across this. And even he knows it! Then how do we get away with it? Is it some sort of a capitalist conspiracy? Do they select the guy who lies most convincingly and with conviction? The girl anyways gets selected, she doesn’t have to lie. Chivalry, apparently! Now shall we stop calling it interview and refer to it more appropriately as un-terview?

Being the humourist, creativist and couragist I am (comedian, creator and bold dint go well together!), I started thinking how it would be if I decide to talk in an interview after taking an oath on the Bhagavad Gita. Well, find the transcript of the fictitious interview below. Warning – The transcript is fictitious. I advice you not to use it in any space other than pointless lunch table conversations. Rest is up to your risk taking capabilities. At least, I am not gonna use it.

In the transcript below, Q denotes the question posed and A denotes the answer to be given. Lets start.

Q – Why did you choose to do MBA?
A – There is no better and safer way to become rich!

Q – Why did you come to this college?
A – Well, this was my best admit card! (This was my only admit card!)

Q – Why do you want to join our company?
A – I am finding it really irritating to cough up a new idea for every company (especially when I have multiple interviews on the same day.)

Q – What are your short term and long term goals?
A – Short term – To get this job. Long term – To get a job in a profile and company I want to!

Q – Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
A – Yes, I can’t even see whether I will get through this interview or not but I will be able to see five years into the future. Perfectly valid question!

Alternate answer, choose between the two based on your courage and humor levels.
Q – Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
A – Happily married with one kid and another on its way.
Sub-Q – No, no, I meant something ambitious.
Sub-A – What I just said was pretty ambitious!

This seems more like it. Can somebody do this? Whoever does this will be my undisputed corporate hero. Lets wait for him!

Cheers

P.S1 - I wrote this blog on April 1. Join the dots if you are smart, move on to PS2 if you are not!

P.S2 - Sarcasm is not a dead art, yet!

The 'H' factor

Dear people reading this, people not reading this, Barrack Obama, the pretty girl that travles with me in the same bus everyday, Lalit Modi, the unsuspecting Gorilla in the African forests, and everybody in general, my name is Vasanth Kumar and my patience is running out.

You must be wondering what went so wrong with me that I had to suddenly come out and proclaim my name. I had to. I am fed up of (almost) everyone spelling my name wrongly. For heavens sake, my name is not Vasant, its Vasanth. This is a trend I have observed especially in north India. Yeah I know, being a domicile of Tamil Nadu, the rest of India is north for me. But I still find solace by using 'north India' in the conventional sense. I don't understand what is wrong with them. What do you call that that comes after ninth? It is tenth. Not tent. Nint is not even a word! You get my point? This is how the English language is supposed to work.

Forget the esoteric nuances (?!?) of the English language. Can't you people respect somebody's name? Can't you see the e mail signature and just copy the name written there? Or are you simple oblivious to the letter 'H' when used in such connotation? Disrespecting somebody's name is as serious as disrespecting that somebody itself. When will you learn that? The worst part with this behaviour is the look on their faces as if they are completely innocent and the fault is mine to have had such a wierd name! I don't know how I am supposed to explain it to them that this is not how the rest of English speaking world (what? where does it exist?) percieves the 'H' factor. I am growing tired, really tired of this. Please spare my name!

I have nothing against north India (again) or north Indians (AGAIN!), its just that I feel like biting your head off when you misspell my name... whoever you may be, even that unsuspecting Gorilla in the African forests!

No cheers this time...

Vasanth Kumar K

P.S - For those who still don't get the drift, I am trying to stir a controversy against north Indians (oh come on...) by blaming them for their magical talent. Spread the word, make me famous. I see myself giving interviews to 24x7 news channels. Make it happen.

P.S2 - If I REALLY become famous (half hour interviews in at least two national news channels), I will sign autographs for free to all those who comment on this blog. Hurry, offer valid till stocks last!

The curious case of my fellow human's brain!

Again, no blog for two months. I prefer to blame it on my tight schedule rather than on my lack of motivation :) Well, now I have motivation on my right hand and time on my left hand (I wear watch on my left hand :P), I decided to do this thing - write random things in the hope that it will come across random people's monitors when they are randomly searching the web for random items!

The last sentence was completely random. Anyways, getting to back to my story, the curious case of my fellow human's brain. We have all been told humans are blessed with a special something called sixth sense. Might be. But the problem is most of my fellow humans refuse to even accede that they have it! (No, no, not you. The rest of 'em!) Unlike that genius Calvin opting to ignore common sense, our friends ignore their sixth sense inadverdently. One leadership guru once said, "Don't ask why, ask why not". As usual, we listened only to the first half of his speech (slept through the rest) and followed it diligently. We never ask why. We never conteplate why we do stuff. We never realise we appear plain stupid in the eyes of who ask that dangerous question, why! Let me quote a few instances.

The scene is set in an airport where I am waiting for my boarding call. The aunty with my microphone finally announces my flight is ready for boarding. Immediatley everybody picks up their luggage, go stand in the long queue in front of the boarding gate. It is ok if a coupe of ladies do it, but smart gentlemen in suits doing it is just hilarious. No offence ladies. I don't mean you are dumb, I just mean it appears dumber when men do the same thing as you! Now, I have my boarding pass with my seat number printed on that. Its not like if I go late, I might see an adamant kid sitting in my window seat refusing to get up. (Even if it happens, you anyways get to see nothing after take off!) Now that I have a boarding pass, the airlines cannot operate the flight without me on board. They have to find me and throw me in. So why can't I use it as a privilege? Why should I go stand in a queue for 15 minutes carrying my luggage waiting for them to open the gates? When these people do it, it gives me a feeling that they are waiting to board a B.E.S.T. bust at Andheri bus stop, not an aircraft! Why?

This is one scene I watch everyday. Mumbai, central railway line, train compartment. From the outside it seems damn crowded, from the inside it appears half empty! Yeah, these commuters pick the most strategic position to crowd - the passage between the doors on both sides of the compartment. It causes great inconvenience to other passengers alighting and boarding the trains but they never seem to care. These are not the bunch of blithe college kids hanging on the foot board for some fresh air. I would know them, I was one of them. These are family men, mothers, grown ups, all regular commuters. They just stand there, they don't care if there is space to stand inside the compartment, they don't care if there are vacant seats in the compartment. I have to wrestle my way everyday to get off at my station. There are also other kind of people, the ones who come and stand in between seats even when the compartment is half empty. Dude, did you drop your brains when trying to board the train? Why?

There is a theory that we are living in a 'Matrix' style simulation of some extraordinarily smart aliens. Seems right! The above mentioned are just some flaws in their 'code'. Areas were intelligencce was forgotten to be programmed into the omnipotent (what?) human brain. May be the aliens' testing department is not as competent as the one at my office!

The more I think about it, the more similarity I find in humans' outlook towards brains and money. For instance, we always think we need more of both. We always think our neighbour has more of both. Even if we were given copious amounts of both we would simply misuse them and waste them. At the back of our minds we know, if not used both gets wasted and we never cared to change our outlook towards both of them! I rest my case here. Don't ask why.

Cheers!  :) 

P.S - It seems if I don't blog for a long time, I compensate by writing a long post!

...and we are done !

The last time I had to write a similar post I started it with, 'all good times come to an end'. But now I am starting with, 'all best times come to an end as well'. Its done. The blissful stay at a slice of heaven on earth, NITIE, is just about to end. Now I feel like that F1 car that rammed into a wall! Lost, confused, sad, out of shape and out of comfort zone. WTF!

You tend to notice that you are growing up when you start losing stuff. People lose youth, people lose free time, people lose freedom, people lose brains, and some people lose hair! Now I have lost one thing that I have had since my very early days of childhood, formal education. It feels really awkward. No more waking up late, no more bunking classes, no more classes, no more hostel rooms, no more getting dad's sign in report card. But on the flip side, no more attending useless classes for attendance, no more insane writing for 3 hours in the name of exams, no more assignments, no more homework.

Everybody has gone through college. Everybody knows how it feels to get out of college. So I will stay out of the touchy-feely stuff here. My kith and kin have always asked me what was my biggest value add in MBA. I've always maintained a modest, 'I don't know', and its true. I seriuosly don't know. But I am sure about one thing, the experience here was worth screwing 18 months of my life. Seriously I never imagined I would get to share my plate with a Delhi-ite, share my glass with a Odiyan, party with a Punjabi, get drunk and blabber to a Marathi manoos, teach Hindi to a mallu, watch a goult movie in Mumbai with a confused Kannadiga, get bumps from gals for my birthday and many more! I am definitely much more sophisticated and refined than what I was. I guess that was the biggest value add.

Well, even a thousand pages wouln't suffice to describe the 600 odd days spent here. But even in a sky sprinkled with sparkling starry moments, some stars do sparkle brighter than the others. The crazy room mate, legendary 422, awesome 4th floor, overwhelming tam gang, kickass fourth hostel gang, rocking PMG, dangerous baba's office, pond, night outs, maddu mess, insane parties, nescafe, ten people sitting in a dinner table meant for four and things like these can even stand the test of amnesia. I have friends from all parts of India! The humble fact that I am carrying more than 32 GB of photos out of this place sums it up!

It would be sheer betrayal if I don't mention Prerana here. If Prerana'08 redefined the concept of hardwork and responsibility, Prerana'09 redefined the concept of struggle, setback and stress. Prerana is not an event, its an institution unto itself. The most meaningful thing I've been a part of in NITIE has to be Prerana, not even the MBA. Prerana taught us a lot of things which cannot be put in words. Although what takes the cake is the scientific art of handling the dragon! NITIE rocks, Prerana double rocks!!

I am emotional, I am sleep deprived, I have nothing to do, I am leaving this place is less than 36 hours, I feel like writing about NITIE for hours. I rather choose to end this post here as it is wrong to try and fit every emotion into words. No human language is capable of doing that. It would only distort those emotions. Let them be unsaid and better remembered. I minced my brain really hard to come up with a simple sentence to explain it all and I think I succeeded. All those of you who cared and shared, thou shalt never be forgotten!

Pepole going through this blog, kindly take out a minute to comment. That would remain as a proof that our lives were intertwined at some portion of the space time continuum!

Cheers

P.S - Things are really changing. After a really long time, I am going to sleep before midnight!

P.P.S - On second thought, certain things never change. I am yet to submit assignments worth 80 marks! NITIE rocks, in past, present and future!

BEST... Or is it?

The first time I landed in Mumbai, my friend said "We will go by BEST bus". The moment I saw the bus, I said "Good one bro! :)". He replied, "Dude! That was not supposed to be a joke". Oh!

This one falls under the category of 'unintenionally funny'. You think of some cool thing, give it an awesome name but in the end it falls flat, even funny. Mumbai's BEST, is one classic example. I don't blame them either. When you gotta manage such a huge city, you tend to miss out somewhere. Some aspect, some area, some system, some random thing doesn't get the attention and it stays a part of prestigious history. Now lets take a look at why BEST buses are not the best (not even close :P)

First impression... was a worst impression. Even my school bus sports better style damn it. Painted red, absolutely cuboidal, looking like straight out of a museum...! When rest of India is going for low floor, air suspension, ergonomic seats, bright colors, our friends at Mumbai never felt the need for all those. I guess these buses are a part of their tradition. You might catch an enthusiastic guide say someday, "You see the Taj, it is older than the Gateway of India. You see that bus, it is older than the Taj" :D

I lost myself in the beauty of the bus as it crossed me. Suddenly I realized I had a bus to catch and... WTF! There is no route number at the back! Are we supposed to randomly run behind buses, overtake them, check the route, and then climb onto them? Are Mumbaikars such good athletes? Or is this some sort of practical joke? Just imagine how it will feel if you finally overtake a bus, but its not the one you want and the driver grins at you and says, "Gotcha!" When I enquired about it further an effervescent college kid said, "The route number is there on the left side of the bus". So what dude, I cannot overtake the bus from the left. Traffic rules don't permit it you know. :)

Somehow I got onto a bus and one look inside told me that the bus might actually be older than the Taj. When I purchase my ticket comes the next surprise. Everything on the ticket is printed in Hindi, even the numbers! Beleive me when I say its been 17 months in Mumbai and I still have trouble deciphering numbers in Hindi. I've used the word decipher in the previous sentence intentionally. I suggest carrying a number catalogue with you to help you out. But there was more. The price printed on my ticker was Rs. 6.86. Seriously, six rupees eighty six paise. Do you guys really live in prehistoric era? Thankfully there was no 'Please tender exact change' board put up in the bus :)

Not that Mumbai is otherwise perfect or for that matter any city is perfect. They all have lots of scope for improvement. But what got me going was the name given to these buses, BEST. Although these buses go a long long way everyday, they still have to go a long way before they can become what they are called, BEST.

Cheers  :)

P.S - BEST stands for Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport!