Phew!

Done with the last exam of my MBA !! (hopefully not my student life yet!) It does feel great and am extremely relieved... feels like a heavy load is lifted off my head suddenly and I have no idea how to spend all my time now! Its definitely parties... .parties and more partiesOne more week left at ISB... with our graduation day planned for the next saturday and I will be out of campus on april 8th :-( I still feel like I just came here a few days back and its already time to leave..... I wish to come back here for the orientation week for the new batch... but again, not all wishes come true...

Being twenty something...

I happen to read this brilliant piece on Quarter life crisis, every year, whenever I turn a year older and it somehow seems to make a lot of sense to me each time I read it! I had posted this last year too and lot of you guys had left comments saying you could associate a lot with it... in case you have missed out reading this, then it is really worth a read!!

"Being twenty something..."

They call it the "Quarter-life Crisis."
It is when you stop going along with the crowd and start realizing that
there are manythings about yourself that you didn't know and may not like.
You start feeling insecure and wonder where you will be in a year or two,
but then get scared because you barely know where you are now.

You start realizing that people are selfish and that, maybe, those friends
that you thought you were so close to aren't exactly the greatest people you
have ever met, and the people you have lost touch with are some of the most important ones. What you don't recognize is that they are realizing that too, and aren't really cold, catty, mean or insincere, but that they are as confused as you.

You look at your job... and it is not even close to what you thought you
would be doing, or maybe you are looking for a job and realizing that you are going to have to start at the bottom and that scares you.

Your opinions have gotten stronger. You see what others are doing and find
yourself judging more than usual because suddenly you realize that you have
certain boundaries in your life and are constantly adding things to your
list of what is acceptable and what isn't. One minute, you are insecure and
then the next, secure. You laugh and cry with the greatest force of your life.

You feel alone and scared and confused. Suddenly, change is the enemy
and you try and cling on to the past with dear life, but soon realize that
the past is drifting further and further away, and there is nothing to do
but stay where you are or move forward.

You get your heart broken and wonder how someone you loved could do such
damage to you. Or you lie in bed and wonder why you can't meet anyone decent
enough that you want to get to know better. Or maybe you love someone but
love someone else too and cannot figure out why you are doing this because
you know that you aren't a bad person. One night stands and random hook ups start to lookcheap. Getting wasted andacting like an idiot starts to look pathetic.

You go through the same emotions and questions over and over, and talk with
your friends about the same topics because you cannot seem to make a decision.

You worry about loans, money, the future and making a life for
yourself... and while winning the race would be
great, right now you'd just like to be a contender!

What you may not realize is that everyone reading this relates to it.
We are in our best of times and our worst of times, trying as hard as we can
to figure this whole thing out.

Memorable moments....

This has been one of the most memorable birthdays I've had and will definitely remain as few of those best moments at ISB. Over the last couple of years it used to be just another day but sharing the occassion with a few friends who matter does make a difference! Having had so much fun over the last 2 days and with exactly 2 weeks left for me to leave this place forever, I'm just drowned in mixed feelings....

Happy b'day!

.... to my dear blog!

It's been a year for today (21st march) since I started blogging and I am glad it has come a long way and survived 1 whole year :) .... I've enjoyed every bit of writing here and I hope this continues for a long time from now! I've got to know so many people through this blog, and its almost become like my identity... many times when I meet someone new and introduce myself, I hear - "Oh you are Pratima! I know you thru' ur blog!" :-)

Cheers!!

Bored to death...

I'm currently sitting in one of the "IT related" classes... with a torturous case discussion. I haven't read the case, I have barely slept last night and to top it all I am dying of hunger!! Never been so bored in my life ever I guess. Term 8 couldnt have gotten worse than this :( Tried to use technology to the maximum to help me survive through this misery... pinged almost everyone on my list on gtalk, connected with "long lost" friends on orkut... exchanged scraps with few other people who were sharing the "state of boredom" with me! And now as a last resort I resort to blogging!! As I look around the class now.. I wish I had a camera here to capture the scene... all eyes hooked to the laptop, with zero interest in doing CP, and the group on stage trying to do the case facilitation are silently praying for the 40 mins slot to pass away asap :) Well... I guess its but natural that all classes seem to be boring in Term 8 and being asked to submit assignments appears to be like a crime punishable by law :)

Cheers!!

21 days exactly from today... I would have an MBA feather on my cap :) Can't believe that the ISB life will all be over soon! All of us are already feeling so nostalgic about things here and me and my dear quaddies have been clicking pics like crazy! Finally .. almost at the end of the year I get to post this snap here on my blog - These 2 gals, my "quad mates" who have made my stay here at ISB a real fun, coz of which I dont feel like leaving this place!! We've had some of the best times together in the last 5 months and this post is dedicated to them! :)


A self snap taken as we set out to explore the ISB campus :)

"Stay hungry; Stay foolish"

This was the line with which Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple and Pixar Animation, ended his speech for the students of Stanford, during their graduation. I had read this speech in 2005 but had never really heard it. Saw the video in today's LLWL class and it seemed as interesting and inspirational as it did, when I had read it the first time.
Here's the video (buffer it before viewing)If u havent heard or read it before then u are really missing something!!!






The 3 key things to note from this speech which I will remember always!

• "...you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever"
• "You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle."
• "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary"

Stay hungry... stay foolish!!

CnH - 2

My cousin "Su" saw my previous post of CnH and mailed me this strip... one more REALLY AWESOME piece by calvin :) ... couldnt stop myself from putting it up here!!

Click on the pic to read it clearly

CnH

Damn cute!! ROTF everytime i read it :) Calvin's expression in the end is priceless!

Click on the picture to read it clearly

Apocalypto... awesome!

Well... after 1 week of hard core partying followed by 1 week of Flu.... I am again heading back to normal!! I think it was nature's way of telling me that I badly needed some rest and I was forced to take a lot of it over the last few days :)

So...tonight was again a movie time. The same gang of 6-7 people got the projector and watched this AWESOME movie - APOCALYPTO by Mel Gibson. Lot of people may not really like this movie and its not been rated extremely well either, but all of us just loved it! This is a mythic action adventure movie which is set in the backdrop of Mayan civilization, the language in the entire movie is also Mayan - so you need to concentrate on those sub-titles!! An extremely G H O R Y movie, never watched something like this before, and I almost felt like throwing up in the middle of the movie, coz I ensured that i didnt close my eyes anytime!! Initial part of the movie is very slow and you keep wondering why the hell are you watching it (poor "C" got cursed a few times for having recommended this movie :) But if you can force yourself to sit thru the first 45 mins or so... trust me its gonna be worth a watch!!! It could be made less violent by not showing such scenes which are really not meant for weak-hearted people like me!! The movie doesnt require it but still... Mel Gibson chose to go his way! Whatever it is... i still got up that courage in me to start watching such movies... and at the end of it - really enjoyed!!

P.S: Just a suggestion - dont watch this movie alone!

A screenshot from the movie...



People are still continuing to watch another movie - Blood Diamond now (Its 4.30AM) but I guess I better get some sleep if i want to get fit again soon!

Odyssey....

.... is a very famous Greek Novel written by "Homer" of The Illiad fame and am sure all of us would have heard of this at some point or the other in life. I got to read an abridged version of this novel few days back... as part of the course work of "Leadership Lessons through world literature" - a course that i have opted for in this term. I am glad that I chose this course coz Prof. Rajeshwar Upadhyay is just AWESOME!!!!!!!!! The amount of knowledge that he has and the kind of parallels that he draws while talking about each of these literary works, is way beyond commendation! Through this course we get to read some of the great works written in ancient times and draw some leadership lessons through the characters involved. Some of the books included are Ramayana, Odyssey, Oedipus Rex, Abhijnana Shakuntalam, Don Quixote, Julius Ceaser, Zarathustra.. et al. I am glad that at least now I am getting to read some ancient mythology :)

The recent reads were Odyssey and a play called Oedipus Rex by Sophocles. Odyssey has a modern flair to it and a complex but interesting plot structure. Oedipus Rex is a story entirely about fate. In this play, according to fate Oedipus would kill his father and marry his mother. Oedipus gets to know about this and tries his best to not let this happen.....without realizing that every action of his is getting him entagled in the meshes of fate! Very well written...

Read Odyssey here

Read Oedipus Rex here

Holi @ ISB

After a really really long time I celebrated holi again today! The last I played was sometime in school... and never really got a chance after that. There was a nice party organized at ISB... with all the essentials - colors, bhang, vodka, beer, food et al.. Holi on a campus is really different I must say!! It started around 10AM and I guess it went on till about 4PM or so. I was a bit late in going there coz a bunch of us slept at around 6AM watching a Kannada horror movie last nite :-) The mirror pool was already full of color water and people were beyond recognition, covered in all kinds of colors. Before I could realize I was in the pool and drenched in colors :) It was a really colorful sight and a happy mood out there. Being a South Indian, I never knew holi could be so much fun!! Am really going to miss this occassion next year!!

Few pics taken by people... (I didnt take my camera out there thankfully! )

Happy Holi!!

Nishabd

My Rating for this: ***1/2 out of 5

Watched this movie called 'Nishabd', which was released just today, but we still managed to get tickets for the evening show. I had no clue what this movie was all about but had seen the posters of it here and there thru which I had figured that it was quite a bold subject to be made as a movie - very unconventional. It's about a 60 year old man (Amitabh Bachchan) who falls in love with a 18 year old girl, who is his daughter's friend (Jiya Khan), who comes to stay with them on a short vacation. Amitabh's acting is commendable as usual - HE IS JUST SUPERB!!. He has carried out this role in an awesome way and I dont think anyone else would be able to do justice to this strong character that well! Jiya as a newcomer has done a decent job but not a noteworthy performance. I think the emphasis has been more towards her beauty than her acting and it seemed very artificial to me, most of the time. The whole movie rests on Amitabh's shoulders. Without him it wud have been just another box office flop!

The movie has a strong story line and a bold concept but I felt that it still needed some more effort to build the intensity of the relationship between amitabh's character and Jiya so that the climax seemed more powerful. The ending is not very clear and i guess the director wanted it to be so in order to leave it to the discretion of the audience. It does leave you with a lot of emotions with high intensity and you can give way to your imaginations and criticisms of what has happened in the story and what might probably happen from then on, the rights and wrongs, etc. Just as the title suggests, the movie did leave me "spellbound" at the end, not coz it was great but well... i am still trying to figure out the reasons! I didnt feel it was something outstanding - definitely not to RGV's standards but it sure does have an awesome cinematography - the tea estate locations are just breathtaking, not to forget the background music of course - hats off to the music directors!!

After the movie, we went to this place called 'Chutneys' for dinner. I had heard a lot about this place since I came to Hyd but never had a chance to go there. I just LOVED the food there, may be coz I was missing the south indian food too much but still... I felt it was too good and all of us hogged like there is no tomorrow! Waiting to explore the city more.....

HP mania

What happens when there are 4 people planning to watch a movie and 3 of them are crazy Harry Potter fans? Yeah, u guessed it right! The 4th person (me) has no choice but to watch the movie with them! Last night 4 of us planned a long movie marathon, since there are no classes today. So after a lot of debate the whole day, I convinced people to start with 'Sarkar'. I personally feel this is a really well made movie, with outstanding performances (obviously keeping aside the Godfather comparison). Since the crowd was not in a mood for serious kinda movies, half way thru the movie, the obvious choice was Harry Potter! I have never ever touched this book in my life and have zero knowledge about the whole plot.... but..... that doesnt stop anything... At 12 in the midnight, I was explained the entire background and story, right from scratch (dont miss the enthusiasm part here :) ) and we screened back to back of HP - Socerer's Stone and Chamber of Secrets. 12.00 to 6AM!!! Thanks to SM for having given me a scene by scene explanation that i could follow the story really well! I must agree that it was fun... though am still not a big fan of it... but i would definitely love to watch the rest of the movies in this series soon!

The final term begins today and life seems a LOT different at ISB now. Being employed again is definitely a great relief!! Generally the mood on campus is relaxed and most of the people who would just walk by u as if you are invisible, are now ready to start a conversation anywhere u come across on the way! So that shows people have all the time in the world now :) Especially I feel like suddenly a heavy load is lifted from my head and I have no clue what to do for 20 hrs in a day!! My sleep cycle is also screwed up over the last couple of months and I have become nocturnal... so the only good time pass for me as of now is to watch movies and more movies! Times do change... with just 5 weeks more to graduate, now I really feel that the time is too short to enjoy life at ISB... I'm gonna miss it!! (never thought I wud say this!)

Phewww!!!! :)

This post needs no explanation... if u have been tracking my blog off late, it speaks for itself :) :)

Near the finish line..

With the ISPM exam getting over today, term 7 comes to an end, with just one class left for tomorrow. So that leaves just one more term to finish my MBA! This was pretty fast I must say! I still feel like I came back from blore after new year's celebrations and already the term is over with 10 more days remaining for the D-Day! This has been one of the most hectic terms so far, where I have seen all 24hrs of the day (being awake i mean :)) , most of the days! With all this stress, life's pretty fun too... doing mock interviews, trying to stress the interviewee at 12 in the night and getting some sadistic pleasure :) It's fun to be on the other side of the table... hope I get to be there soon!!

18 days to go...

With just 18 days left for the placements week, the stress levels are soaring high all over the campus. I cant see a single soul out in campus after 10 or 11 in the night.. Everyone busy with their own groups cramming with those interview preps! 3 pages of job postings already on the placement portal and people seem to be so freaked out that looks like one is just ready to apply to any damn job thats posted on the site.

The stress has gotten to me also and am sure it will reach its peak soon! When I joined ISB I wanted a "great job" with a "great company" and "awesome compensation". Slowly after getting to know some realities it changed to a "good job" and a "decent role and pay". Now its come down to .. "I need any ONE JOB with a pay more than my last drawn salary"! :) Peer pressure and stress does get to you ... I guess thats the reason most of the people end up shifting jobs within 4-6 months after MBA...

In the last couple of weeks I have been amazed with myself as to how many things I can do in a day! I used to crib about 24 hours being too less but I guess MBA does teach you time management! My schedule has become very monotonous though.. looks somewhat like this
- Wake up to realize there is a class and run
- No pre reads (do some arbit CP in class!)
- Look for new job postings and crib about the work ex requirements (everything seems to be high!)
- Note down the deadlines and work on tweaking the resume (The resume has changed so much that sometimes i wonder if this is really me! If only I could write such a resume before, I would have probably been in Harvard or Stanford I guess! :-)) )
- Attend the PPTs or desperately look for a proxy (coz a few of them are mandatory)
- Enjoy the high tea :)
- Its 10PM and you suddenly realize that there are at least 2 assignments to be submitted in the morning!
- Use effective team management to finish the assignments :)
- Do interview prep for a couple of hours (its already 4AM by now)
- Tweak the resume a little more and apply to any job (if the deadline is close)
- Feel like you have achieved a great deal and hit the bed (around 5 AM)
- Wake up to realize there is a class and run!! (The schedule continues...)

Hmmm.... if only I could do so many things in a day before I came to ISB... well... ............ ..........

Survey!

If you have landed up at my blog somehow (and if you are above 18 years :) ) then please spend your valuable 2 mins to fill this survey!

http://www.zipsurvey.com/LaunchSurvey.aspx?suid=15483&key=FA5EA1C4

This is part of a Brand Plan Research Project that I am doing and your responses will be of great help!!

PS: The survey is open till 21st Jan midnight

Movie time!

When there was an absolute need for a break amidst all the assignments, PrePlacement Talks and the interview preps, we got this cool idea (thanks to Mr. K!) of getting a projector and screening a movie in my quad (on the wall)... it was an awesome experience.. with good speakers, lights off and lots of stuff to munch on from 12 in the midnight... it was as good as a mini theater!! We had lots of visitors too :) Watched 2 movies.. Bas Ek Pal and then Pirates of the Caribbean- The curse of the Black Pearl... Looks like this is gonna happen every weekend from now on!



Here's a sneak preview of the set up!