The confessions of a clueless mind

Exactly one week from today, we should be done with our first term at the ISB. For most of us, that means going back home for a 5 day break, and a well deserved one at that. A few unlucky ones, like yours truly, will however have to stay back another couple of days to attend the Leadership Development Program. Although the end term exams are just around the corner, I have hardly had the time to study anything at all, thanks to the overload of assignments. Just trying to get these assignments done have been taking up all my time, and then some. The omens have also been forecasting a disaster at the exams. How else would one explain the fact that my economics score, which was well above the average, had 4 marks docked off it for no good reason, relegating me to the average scores? To compound my miseries, I made some uncharacteristic blunders in the Accounting and economics assignments, effectively ending all hopes of ending the term on a decent score. The mid term stats score has been m...

The mid-terms are over! Our very first examination experience at ISB is finally done and dusted. And what a party we had, to celebrate our success ( really? ). The exams themselves did not offer any cause for celebration for most of us, although their culmination certainly did. The statistics exam, which most of us were very skeptical about, turned out to be rather manageable. Economics, on the other hand, was an altogether different experience. Most people had extreme reactions to offer as they walked out of the examination hall. The reactions ranged from “ What the f*** was that about! ” to “ Never since the Digital Signal Processing exam in Engineering have I been screwed this badly in an exam ”. However, as every rule has to have an exception, there were a select few who came out with a wide smile, with the knowledge of having cracked the paper. One such enlightened soul, a sure-fire future Dean’s Lister , happens to live next door. The very fact that he actually knew what “ Lerner...

It’s that week of the year at ISB when everyone gets hyper-active and over-friendly. All of a sudden, you have strangers bumping into you and exchanging pleasantries, before leaving you with a customary “ By the way, I am standing for the GSB president. Please vote for the best guy ”. Like I didn’t know. The part about voting for the best guy, I mean. We have had a candidate proclaiming in his election manifesto that he would ensure 24/7 restaurants in each Student Village if he became the Prez. Pity that’s really not my main criteria for voting a GSB Prez in. He also went on to claim that he would ensure ELPs for every student in the batch. While that is a delicious prospect, it doesn’t seem like a very plausible one, considering that ELPs are not just for the school to decide. As a GSB Prez, one can do a lot. But impressing upon the corporate world to offer ELPs to every student might seem a little too far-fetched for even the best Prez. My advice :” Get real. Don't promise what...

Yesterday I had a near-death experience, and am very grateful to the almighty to be still alive. A seemingly mundane task of boiling milk turned into a deadly experience yesterday afternoon. After turning the gas stove on, I tried to twist the controlling dial towards the minimum flame position. Just as I did that, the controlling dial came apart, along with its spring and the holding screws. The very next moment, a sudden burst of flames rushed out of the hole exposed by the undone controlling dial, and hit me right in the face. Instinctively, I rushed away from the kitchen to open the main door, fearing that the fire might spread rapidly. After a few seconds of waiting at the door, I rushed back to the kitchen since the fire had not yet, as of that moment, spread outside of the kitchen. I could see the flames blazing away, starting to consume the wooden cabinets. Luckily, the gas cylinder was still some distance from the fire, allowing me to quickly shut-down the gas- supply from the...

Last night’s “ Shorts n Skirts ” party ( actually it turned out to be a “ Short Skirts ” party) was a welcome break from the monotony of the week. After subjecting ourselves to immense torture in the name of Marketing, Economics, Statistics and Accounting, not to mention the peer pressure and the various assignments, the party at the mirror pool was just the kind of distraction that all of us needed. Although I turned up late, and remained mostly away from the water games, it wasn’t long before I too was pulled in by GR and gang. And once you’re wet, might as well enjoy it. Everyone seemed to have put their worries and books (not necessarily in that order) behind, and had turned up for a wild time. Alcohol and smoke seemed to emanate from everywhere, and people, even the usually inhibited ones, decided to indulge in one or both the vices. People getting dunked in the shallow pool, and everyone kicking water into the poor dunked soul was the order of the day. Of course, both the dunked...

The verdict is out. Our marketing assignment was a big disaster! After all the hype and hoopla about how we managed to out-think everyone else, the bubble finally burst when the Prof. showed us in today’s class how simple the whole damn thing was, and how totally wrong we were. When we first looked at the case, our initial instinct was to tread the conventional, simple path. And if we had, we would have been bang on. But alas, we outsmarted ourselves by thinking that if the solution looked simple, it couldn’t be right. Talk about taking one’s self too seriously. We sure did. And when we managed to conjure those complicated formulae and those magical numbers, our confidence knew no bounds. Each of us was congratulating the other for masterminding the “ perfect solution ”. Now when I think of it, I feel stupid. But that’s the lesson for us. Complicating matters don’t always yield the right results. Simpler solutions might work just fine . All my group-mates are obviously disappointed at ...

For those of you who have been following WWE (or WWF if you are from the 1990’s), you must have surely wondered at the monster unveiled on Smackdown a few weeks ago. He goes by the screen name of “ The Great Khali ”, and is around 7 feet 2, weighing over 400 pounds. On his WWE debut, he manhandled the resident giant Undertaker , who almost looked like a midget jobber in front of the Great Khali. Now, here’s the interesting bit about the Great Khali. His real name is Dalip Singh , and he is the first Indian citizen to make an impact in the Pro-wrestling world. Dalip was a road construction worker when he was spotted by a senior police officer. Soon, Dalip was in the Police Department, and gradually built his body to match his abnormal height. He wrestled in Japan for a few years, and is a popular name there. His debut in WWE is a matter of pride for all the Indian fans of the WWE. We finally have a huge Indian wrestler, from the land of the legendary Dara Singh , making a name on the ...

Ever since I came to Hyderabad, all my posts have been focused around just one thing- ISB . I do realize that variety is the spice of life, and of late, this blog is devoid of variety. This blog started out as a place for my ramblings about life in general, and ideally, it should remain that way. However, since these days, and for the next 12 months, I may not be having much of a life outside of the hallowed campus of ISB, it has become increasingly difficult to write about anything else. Although we do have parties on weekends, they are mostly within the campus. There are people who go out to the city to sample life outside ISB. However, I haven’t made it out of the campus too many times. For one, going to a pub/disco is outrageously expensive when you don’t have an income, and even more so, when you have the specter of a huge loan hovering around your head. Secondly, being a married man, there is very little incentive to go to the pubs for me apart from getting to hear some good musi...

The bubble seems to have finally burst. All the hype built around the CP factor has finally come unstuck. Apparently irritated by the over-exuberance of students in one of the sections, the professor finally let the cat out of the bag. Excessive CP is unnecessary since it does not affect grades too much. The CP grades for everyone lies there and thereabouts, and excessive CP does not translate to a huge difference in grades. Now, that comes as a huge relief for some of us who are not very aggressive when it comes to cutting the prof’s lecture to pop an arbit question. Putting it in an economist’s jargon, the CP elasticity of Grades is very LOW . Addendum: Apparently CP does matter, and more so during the electives. Since this info came from an alum, there is no doubting it. But atleast, it isn't as bad as the hype built around it.

The first term at ISB has begun. Everybody is busy prepping for the next lecture, and hoping to make that one special point that none of the previous sections did, to score that most-wanted Class Participation point. There are some who come to class bubbling with enthusiasm, having listed down pages and pages of points to make during class, while there are others who seem worried about someone else making that special point that they had so carefully conjured the previous night. In short, the first term has very clearly spelled out the trend for the coming year. Intense competition. And CP ( I shall refer to Class Participation simply as CP from hereon, to ensure some letters on my keyboard don’t suffer irreparable damage ) is a legal tool at ISB that empowers everyone to step on others’ feet to climb up the ladder. As one of my friends very candidly admitted, every single brownie point that you earn by way of CP could decide if you make that shortlist at McKinsey and Co . CP is cert...