The confessions of a clueless mind

The Year: 2020. The Venue: San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Occasion: World Cup Instant Cricket Finals. Guatemala Vs Samoa. An exciting final awaits the 100,000 screaming audiences and the millions watching on their television screens at home. People of all ages and races have come together, putting their differences and hatred for each other aside, for this momentous occasion. As the cheering grows louder, the two captains take the field. The Guatemalan skipper, in his bright magenta outfit, appears extremely confident of his chances, although the dressing room is full of nervous men in Magenta, biting at their fingernails fearing the backlash from the fanatic supporters back home should they end up losing the finals. At the other end, the Samoan dressing room is unusually quiet, with all the players, dressed in their traditional leaf-skirt and head-gear attire, bowing down in front of their Chief Shaman as he continues to chant a silent prayer to a Pagan God.  The Samoan captain, ...

This term I decided to humor myself a bit, and enrolled for a course called " Creativity, Innovation and Design ", CID in short. From what I saw in the first class, it seems like a fun course, unlike most other courses in a B-school curriculum. Our first assignment was to write a 55-word story. The word count restriction, at first, sounded ridiculous. But as I started thinking about it, I realized this had to be like a 3 panel comic strip. And Calvin and Hobbes was a classic example of how the most memorable stories are written in the fewest of words. With some heavy inspiration from Calvin's Spaceman Spiff alter-ego, here's what I conjured: The great escape “ We are taking you to Planet Kroz as proof that intelligent life exists on Earth ,” the alien chief glorked in perfectly accented English, tentacles awkwardly clicking and scrolling through the online “ Krozzian–English Translation Manual ”. As he moved to close the Explorer window, his cuticular eyes fell on m...

The life of a software professional is full of insecurities. When you start out with your career, it is all about getting into the most reputed MNC. If a college-mate with lesser academic credentials that you got into a better company, with a higher pay, you'll have sleepless nights. Insecurities. A couple of years later, when you realize that academic credentials have very little to do with who ends up in which company and earns what salary, the angst at being underpaid subsides. The comfort of being part of "the" most famous IT company provides consolation for all the under-achievement. The next goal is to go to the US, and live there for a few years. When you finally manage to do that, it gives you a new high in your career. You are sitting in the US, and sending mails to all your batch-mates, who had gone past you in terms of salaries and achievements. " Sup guys, how is our India these days? I am missing it badly, although USA is a pretty neat place to live in ...

NOTE: In adherence with the Honor Code rules at ISB, the author acknowledges that this post was originally published a year ago on his now defunct blog. The post is being republished as an open acknowledgement of his " Writer's Block ". The protagonist in this story is an old friend, who I shall refer to as R. Mister R had shown signs of his greatness at a very early age, and has now gone on to vindicate us with his lofty achievements. This incident that I will recount here, is one such proof of the great man that R would grow up to be. It happened one evening, about 8 years ago. We were all in our college, most of us being students of Engineering. Being budding engineers with a penchant for Science and all things related to it, yours truly and his good friend D were engrossed in a highly scientific conversation about scientific marvels, and unexplained phenomenon. I was narrating interesting anecdotes about another friend of mine who had claimed in school to have spotte...

A special thanks to the two women who define my very existence. The mother and the wife . It's amazing how easy it is to take them for granted, just because they don't mind. Or even if they did, it doesn't matter since they will still continue to love us anyways. It's funny how we know that we take them for granted, and yet don't do anything to change it. But Men, being intelligent species, realized that sooner than later, it was inevitable that women would rebel. There was only so much that they would take, and once that limit was crossed, they would make life miserable for their men. At this point, a genius among the male species spoke. " How about setting aside one day in a year to appreciate the women of this world? That way they will also feel special, even if it's for only one day in a year ". Men being men, a few of them had apprehensions. " That leaves us with only 364 days of bossing around in a year. Aren't you asking too much from u...

It happened when I was in std 8th. Mom had been transferred to a far off place, and couldnt impress upon her superiors to move her back to Bangalore. Dad had, therefore, inherited the kitchen. Food would mostly be alright, but there were times when Dad would outdo himself, and cook a fantasy dinner that we thought should stay only in fantasies. But since brother and I were kids with a paltry pocket money of Rs.50 per month, which would mostly be spent on the first weekend after receiving it, we had to force ourselves to like everything that Dad cooked. It was only later that I realised that going hungry is a lot less harmful than eating bad food. One fateful evening, Dad decided to cook something exotic. I dont remember what it was, but it smelled like volcanic ash. And it tasted just as hot. Since we dont hail from Andhra, and we dont even have any remote ancestral links with Andhra Pradesh, the gene for digesing spicy food was never inherited. Not even the recessive variety. But Dad ...

P.S. This post was written on Feb 15th, but has been posted on Feb 20th. It was Valentine's Day yesterday. And I managed to pick up a rose for my wife just before I went home at 930 PM. Luckily for me, she didn’t seem too upset by my late ways. In fact, it appears that she has given up on me. That was my V-day. But the rest of the country seems to have woken up to love in a really big way. The V-day festivities begin in early February, and linger on till the end of the month. Barista and Cafe Coffee Day outlets seem to be in a competition to outdo each other in ushering in the spirit of St.Valentine . Last weekend, the waiter at Barista tried every clichéd trick in his book of marketing to sell my friend and me one of those mushy stuffed teddy toys to gift our girlfriends on Valentine's Day. We put up a brave front, and refused him every single time. But he kept coming back with more and better offers. Due to his insisting, my friend decided to buy it for his girlfriend . A...