Night Outs

Another night out. 4th in a row.

I've forgotten, when was the last time that I slept at a proper time. As far as I remember, in last one and half month, only one night I slept at 8 in the evening. Most of the other nights I sleep only after sunrise (after 5:20 am).

Again, I've realized that without any fail, if its an off day at college, I sleep after well past 8 am, only to get up after 3 pm and hence miss my lunch.

Somebody told me today, that for every night that one doesnot sleeps, he actually looses one day from his life.

If true, this certainly is not a good news for me. I've already lost many days and don't know how many more days I'm going to loose, in case I've to pass CFA level-II.

Only 60 more days to go. I gotta be reading ...!!!

Sleepy tour of Pagsanjan fall (Laguna)

SSAR officers and specially our overseas student president had announced Pagsanjan fall tour well in advance. Going by the signatures on sign up sheet, it was expected that more than 50-60 students would join this tour.
The result for our quanti papers came on 14th evening, and with this came jubiliation for some and disappointment for some. All the enthu for laguna visit kinda disappeared in one go.

As I wasn't feling very elated after seeing my result, I was also not sure myself if I wanted to come. Then came Sandeep, with a plausible logic that probably this is the only chance that most of our batchmates are going together on a trip, so I shud definately come. Many of us six floorites acceded to this logic and decided to get up early in the morning so that to be on time for our trip starting 07:00 am.

However, most of us were up till late in the morning. In fact I cud not sleep all night. This reflected in most of us sleeping all through the trip.

After 4 hrs long bus jorney, when we reached our first stop, river view resort, from where we had to take small boats (Kayak), I was so tired I decided to stay in resort only and take rest. Preetam Chandra and Saurabh arya also decided to stay with me. After taking some rest in the resort, we went to see an exhibition in the city.

We finally came back 10:00 in the evening only to sleep till very late the following morning :)

My first stage performance

When I chose learning guitar as my walkabout I'd never thought that I'll perform on stage. As deliverable, I'd said that I'll perform in front of class only.

In fact, we weren't ourselves sure, till this morning, that we are going to perform during the international week's cultural night. However, the organizers confirmed to us by 15:00 hrs today, that they have included a performance from us in their list. Myself and my HBO walkabout partner, Preetam Chandra, were both happy and scared at the same time. none of us had ever performed anything in front of an audience. We were nervous because we knew that we have not got enough time to practice together. In the hindsight, I think we did good by sleeping few hours before our performance as it certainly helped in calming us a bit.
In the end, it was good to know that almost everyone liked our performance & appreciated it more when they came to know that we had less than 6 weeks time to learn from the scratch.
In he video here, Myself and Preetam (Me on right) are playing Instrumental version of "Can't help falling in love" by Elvis presley.

Out of Control

"Yeh Ishq nahin aasaan, bas itana hi samajh lijiye,
Ik aag ka dariya hai, aur doob ke jana hai" [Bashir Bader]

Just replace Ishq with "LIFE" and it describes exactly how do I'm feeling lately. It seems as if I've got caught in a 'whirlpool'. I'm moving constantly, but not moving ahead. The worst part is, if I don't come out of it fast, I'll certainly drown :(.
At times, it feels I misjudged my capabilities. I should have listened to my well wisher's advice and should not have got myself engaged in so many different activities. But I did exactly that, and now I'll have to somehow find ways on my own to come out of this "Chakravyooh".

For the time being, the fact remains that these days I'm not able to decide where and how to utilize my time for maximum, or for that matter, any output. Before I can come to a decision, time passes by, further aggravating my problems.

There is a brighter side of the story too. My analysis of current situation has made me realize that its my time wasting habit which is at the core of problem. If only I can get over it, it'll not be too long before I regain control of my life.
Whatever, I'm eagerly looking forward to my week long mid sem break, starting this weekend.

Old Memories

Just other day, I was talking with my wifey and she said all my posts on this blog are centered towards AIM and MBA. I should try to expand my horizon. I think she is quite right, but ...
May be I need not worry.. with time I'll grow up and start thinking something interesting too ;). Whatever...

It was a mail from yahoo, announcing that they are going to close down the yahoo photos server. This mail prompted me to download my old photographs of my engineering college days, from yahoo photos and save it somewhere safely. Which I did as soon as I can :).
While browsing my Lappy today, I came across this folder and ...voila... all the memories started pouring again and again like an avalanche.
I'm pasting some of the pics here, starting from first year (1998), till class of 2002 night. I hope some of my friends from IITG will one day come across these pics and will thank me for reviving old memories. Memories which are certainly some of the most cherished ones. Of days, when we made friends for lifetime.

ISB in Top 20

Don't think I'm free these days. In fact, I'm not. Its 2:30 am and I've to complete MC's presentation and also have to read 02 cases before I go to sleep. But then it does not happen everyday that an Indian MBA school gets a rank in the world's top 20(http://rankings.ft.com/global-mba-rankings).
I've always believed that ISB's biggest strength is its Institutional marketing team. Sure they also have great infrastructure, excellent visiting faculty base, quality students and deep pockets. But these factors alone can not explain (at least to me) their meteoric rise to fame in only 5-6 years of their inception.
I may sound cynical in criticising ISB's achievement, but in my opinion this time their marketing team has faltered. They are taking a huge risk by choosing to walk on this thin rope. Probably they should have waited for a few more years, before pushing hard for this result. Sure, it's a big achievement and would bring them instant fame and publicity. But what about the risk when they are not able to meet the expectations? Are they ready to meet majority of incoming students expectation of getting a salary hike of 129%. I don't think they are their yet.

Healthy Competition

"They glanced at one another like tigers taking measure of a menacing new rival.".......... The Class, Eric Segal.
I remember reading this novel some 10 years back. However, This line has since then always remained fresh in my mind. Always.

Today in our HBO lecture this issue came up all of nowhere. Whether we should take our batchmates as partners in our learning process or should we take them as our competitors. Interesting.... right.
Including my proffy, most of my batchmates were arguing for partners. That everyone should assist others in the class. We should try to help each other in overcoming his/her weaknesses.
But does it happens all the time?
I'm not sure about others, but I certainly believe that its my competitive spirit only which has taken me so far. Its hard to believe that most of the time we don't see our batchmates as rivals. In my opinion we do. And there is nothing wrong in it. One hour and 20 minutes which we spend in a class will be most productive only if everyone is trying to outshine others. To give his best.

The only imporant thing must remembering is that competition should be healthy. One should not resort to unehtical means :D.