MDI Unplugged! - Part Three

The canteen

Sharmaji - And his archaic menu

The hangout spots - Jus outside the canteen (L-R) Mani, Kakkar, Raj & Mansur

Hangout spot - Part Two: Nescafe

Nescafe - This outlet has witnessed high attrition in the past few months. Chotu, Gopal, Babloo, another guy who lasted 2 days and off late Amar.

Finally the Auditorium - The place of a million openhouses, meetings, addresses and wot not.

MDI Unplugged! - Part Four

The passage from the library to the audi

One part of the quadrangle formed between the library, and the U shaped Scholars Block

A top view of the Library and the quadrangle
The reading rooms

The upper floor of the library - Rack and racks of books

The library building from the lawns

Packing and Cleaning Woes

Its that time of the year when you have to pack, clean and check out of Change Masters. And boy believe me it aint as easy as you think. I have discovered new things during Operation Cleanup.

First of which is that there have been many clothes that I have not used at all during my stay here. Next, I make a lot of notes. I seem to have a lot of spare sheets with arbit scribblings all over the damn place. I have hardly read the newspapers that I have subscribed too in the last 8 months.

And finally as economics would have it, we have spawned an industry. The packing and logistics industry has got a fillip from the sudents leaving MDI. Such has been the exodus rate that the front of Change Masters looks like a railway station. Apart from that the massive packing has lead the raddi wala outside campus to be the most sought after man. Over the past two days had you been trading in cardboard cartons, you would have made an 200% gain on your investments. So much for the value addition at BSchool and the thrill of 30% annual gains by the Sensex!

All said and done I am far away from completing my packing. The room almost looks empty. The college sounds have died down. The last of those left here are brooding on not being able to go home. The rest are partying knowing that once the summers start there wont be time left to scratch their butts. Me ... I thought of taking a few pictures around campus. Will upload them asap.

Bye bye time

For all practical purposes the Term is over. Exams are over almost, except for this paper on Strategic Management, which, if you have read my previous posts on the subject) will tell you what a waste of time it is. So here we are at the end of a year of BSchool and all I am set to go home. Have been feeling really homesick for the past 3 weeks and have been waiting for this time to come. Now that its finally arrived it makes me happy and sad. Happy coz I'll be seeing everyone again. Sad coz it brings back some really sad memories. But lets not get into all that right now :)

So what will I be doing for the summers in Bombay? For starters I'll be interning with the Aditya Birla Group at their Management Centre in the Corporate Strategy and Business Development Cell. The very name sounds exciting and I'm looking forward to doing some really good work there. Hopefully get a Pre-Placement Offer (PPO). ABG has been growing agressively for the past few years as they try to 'Take India to the World'. KMB has infused a lot of young blood into the group. And as they plan to become a $15bn organisation there will be a lot of challenging opportunities.

Enuf of the gyaan. Bottom line is Im going home. Im gonna have fun.

The truth about BSchool placements

There has been a hype in the media over the recent placement season of India's top Bschools. Each and every insitute worth its name has been posting average salaries and wot not. Now lemme tell you what all this hype and hoopla is about. And having spent a year at one of India's leading Bschools and having been a part of the process I think my words will have some credibility to them.

• BSchool average salaries that have been posted in the media are only a ploy to attract the best students. Rather in Bschool speak, its for grabbing the marketshare of the students.
• Sometimes only 5% of the batch gets the average salary that is quoted. And these guys get it because they have international placements and the exchange rate is the prime culprit. At Purchasing power parity (another post for this!) they will be again below the average salary
• Most of the batch (50% plus) at any Indian BSchool, even the IIMs will give an arm and a leg for a post tax cash in hand figure of 30k p.m. And before you gasp lemme tell you that Rs.30,000 p.m. in hand post tax is a lot of money for people with even 2 years of work experience. I dont know whether you expect to be worth your weight in gold after 2 years of acads but then dont have great expectations from an MBA.
• The cash component, and then non cash perks, and some more factor of safety by the institute plus deferred bonuses and a whole lot of stuff is added up to give you those near million rupee salaries that have been doing the rounds in the media. The biggest culprit here is the joining bonus which is usually recovered if you leave the firm within 3 years. So this figure hikes up the CTC by upto Rs.70,000.
• Even for those $150,000+ figures quoted by the IIMs, the in-hand component would be in the region of $60,000-$80,000. So chill, its just the exchange rate stupid.
• Yes there are a few Indian corporates that truly give you huge salaries. The post tax from these guys works out to Rs.45,000-Rs.50,000. But then there are only 3-5 such companies. And their total intake is just 2-3 people per company.

I hope I have given you a low down of what happens during Bschool placements. I admit there are a few guys who make it big. But then they are a few just like I said.

Rang Barse

It was Holi. The Festival of colours. It was probably the most decent Holi celebration I have witnessed till date with very restrained throw of colours and water, very unlike the Mumbai style of oil paints, acids, urine and the like. No 'bhaiya plastics' as is the case with Mumbai. Just plain water and for a change we had an NGO, the SNS Foundation, which provided us with herbal powders. The powders were of a good quality and scented again unlike the chemicals laced with lead and other toxic substances that we get in Mumbai.

L-R: Harshit, Tamagna, Jis, Me (time stamp) and Samir

We were then invited to 'Daddu's' place, our dear Director, Dr. Pritam Singh. We had sweets and then proceeded to the lawns behind the library where we had another round of sweets and 'thandai'.

L-R: Uday, Shantanu, Abhishek, Achyut, Sarvo, Me (time stamp again!) and Avdesh

And of course 'Holi' here is never complete without 'Bhaang'. Most of us being first timers and having had a rather crappy experience the last time Bhaang was served during 'Lohri', consumed the drink in copious amounts. Little that we knew that this time around the Bhaang was unadulterted and pure.

The laughing fit! : Ronnie, Me and Raghav in the foreground

So that made many of us laugh our way back to our rooms. Massive bouts of sleeping later, many of us were still under the spell. There has been a unanimous demand for only bhaang at the next MDI party!

The forgetten nick

Last night while chatting with Anna, Nikunj and Rups after a long time was reminded of a nick that Nicks had coined many years ago at VJ. 'Max' was what they called me much before the 'Gordy' that Rups coined. Though later Gordy went on to become the nick that I was associated with from the second year onwards and later on here at MDI, Max remains the name that only Nicks and Anna use. It was a very nostalgic moment when they both used it during the chat, and I was immediately transported to the Eden Gardens (a patch of garden) in front of the Textile and Structural dept. at VJ. It was like we were there under the tree once again chatting like old times. I immediately changed the nick on my IP messenger (The local campus LAN messenger) and updated the status on Yahoo too!

The origins of Max probably go back to the day I was christened. Other than my family and a few close friends no one knows that my full name is 'Gordon Maxmillan DSouza' which was some years later distorted by the Maharashtra Govt., Dept of Education to include Dad's name as is the practice in India, where the fathers name is appended to wards name. And so was entered in the school records 'D'Souza Gordon Gerald'. (Surname First, Name and then Father's Name said the clerk sitting at the admin office! in that order) The name has stuck. Coz when I was apping to engineering college and then after that to MDI, I had to keep it the same as the name that appeared on my school records.

Why Maxmillan?
Maxmillan Kolbe was a Polish priest who chose to be killed in the place of a fellow Pole during the holocaust years in the World War II at one of the many concentration camps. Ultimately many years later on the 10th of October 1982, Fr. Maxmillan Kolbe was canonized by Pope John Paul II. And on that same day, same year I was born. So my parents thought it fit to name me after the great man.

Maxmillan has never seen any official records thanks to the Indian Govt. and most probably I'll leave it at that. I have always preferred to just enter all offical records with just Gordon DSouza. But I like Max. Feels like a part of me is pure and unaduleterated.

Pt. Hari Prasad Chaurasiya

Today the MDI Chapter of SPIC MACAY organised a performance by Padmabhushan Pt. Hari Prasad Chaurasia at our campus. Panditji is known internationally as an acclaimed artiste of the Bansuri (basically a flute). He belongs to the Maihar Gharana of Hindustani music, has dabbled in fusion and has had a stint in films too!

In much younger times

Panditji started off by playing the afternoon ragas. He said that he rarely gets to play the afty ragas at SPIC MACAY events. He then went on play a few Holi tunes. Well I don't remember the technical names of the pieces because I'm zero at Classical Indian Music. But whatever it was it, I had a great time especially during the jugalbandi with Pandit Vijay Ghate.

The performance

Later we all volunteers got an opportunity to be photographed with Panditji. Must say that he is a very sweet chap, very witty and a jovial gent. Much unlike previous artistes who came last time

Padmabhushan Pandit HariPrasad Chaurasia and Me

Have realised one thing after the event. I do not know anything about Indian Culture. I do not have any tastes in anything about our culture. And I have decided that I'm going to rectify that. Thanks SPIC MACAY!

Behind the HBS curtain

Today for our class on Strategic Management our course instructor Dr. Amit Kapoor (co-instructor with Micheal E Porter at HBS), showed us a video of a classroom discussion at HBS on the Volvo trucks case (Volvo Trucks(A) : Penetrating the US market, Prof Orjan Sorwell and others). The class formed part of the course on 'Microeconomics of Competitiveness' and was facilitated by Porter himself.

It was an insightful peek into what happens at arguably one of the top B-Schools in the world. The discussion was well structured by the legend. He explored the locational strategies, the global network, the comparision between Europe and US, the reasons for entering the US, etc. At the end the discussion did produce some quality inputs. But almost all inputs were almost prompted by Porter and a few others were from some really experienced people in the class.

More than a video on a case analysis the clip proved to be a big confidence booster for me. Today I broke the myth of excellence that surrounds prestigious B-Schools outside India. (I already busted my belief on the IIMs much earlier :) ) The image that an average person has on B-Schools like Harvard and the likes is that the people who make it to these institutions are undoubtedly the best in terms of business acumen, insights, and opinions that any student body can offer. However, after listening to some of the views, it became apparent that we here at MDI (maybe I could add top Indian B-Schools) have much better class dicussions, talk more sense and less jargon, and also come to the point faster with less prodding or prompting from faculty.

Well to put some thing in their favour, they listened, and were disciplined in their approach; as in, no one cross talks when another makes a point. (Probably because they were being taped! or because 50% of the grade is towards quality class participation. And we were told that there is an aide who takes notes on the class contributions). I agree that here the major grouse is that students sleep in front of the instructor, don't prepare well, etc. But apart for a strong alumni network I can't see reason for Harvard to be better than any top Indian BSchool. I know that this statement may look blasphemous to many but I have my reasons.

Getting into a top BSchool is more difficult than HBS.
These institutions get the top 2% of India's brightest minds (thats 2,500-3,000 from the top 10 BSchools)
Most of them possess extremely strong analytical skills since they have good engineering backgrounds.
More than 50% of students have previous work experience.
And now this video proves that these guys in HBS are no great shakes.

All said and done, I am really proud of being in MDI and proud to be Indian. It's no wonder that people around the world consider us a smart and intelligent people. Sounds extremely jingoistic, but I don't care!

And so they went ... lock, stock and placed!!!

Today was the Convocation ceremony of our senior batch. And they went out in style. Sunil Bharti Mittal of the Bharti Group was the Guest of Honour. Wondered what it would feel like next year when I would be leaving this place? Another thing was that Placements 2006 was officially released. And like the standard litany of the various magazines and newspapers that would scream the statistics here is for those who will not get to read it. The report says that the average salary is Rs9.1 lakhs and some more details which are of no importance. Don't ask me how they calculate the average. Rumour has it though that the guy drafting the report got up at 9:10 this morning ;)

The Class of 2006. Aren't they a happy lot!

Of jammed drains!

Came across this interesting mail. PFA the attachment!

(click to enlarge)

Durham Univ surely has some problems on their hands! (pun intended)

Rishikesh

With two days to kill four of us decided to head for the Garhwal Himalayas. There was a simulataneous trip organised by Summation, a new club on campus. However we trusted Pranesh's oranising skills to land us back and forth with relevant fun for less than half the cost. So there were we, Mansur, Pradeep, Pranesh and me by ourselves to Rishikesh.

Me, Mansur, Pranesh, Pradeep
A long bus ride later we were at the banks of the Ganga. The morning air with the river flowing past in force ... wonderful sight.

Then we were off to Shivpuri to begin our adventure sports. On the way we saw some of our brethren

Taking in the youthful Ganga on a beautiful Saturday morning. When you breathe in the air out here you can feel the cleansing in your lungs!

And then we took off... The expedition party with our guide Manoj and Sukhram from 'Dreamland Adventures'.

After rowing for about 8 kms we decided to take a break at a river beach. Unfortunately, we didn't realise till the pic was taken that Mansur and Pradeep were in their undies! Pranesh with the usual ciggie and me standing on the rock

The raft. And the Ganga valley in the background. The scene reminded me of the journey by Aragon in the Lord of the Rings

The Ganga valley calm, beautiful & serene
And thereafter to a sumptous meal, unlimited for 20 bucks
Siesta time!

And so it was! 24 hrs and 850 bucks later we were back in college. A trip worth it to the last penny. Desparately wanted to go out for a long time and this was the perfect opportunity. We plan to go on many such trips. I have become culturally bankrupt since coming here. Perfect time to start it!

Economic parallels through the eyes of a frustrated stomach

If you have read the last post on Rajma, you may understand my frustrations with the Mess. All the items on the Menu that are attempted by the staff meet a disastrous end. The idli is not porous (its this brittle round hardened paste), dosas have crazy shapes (oblong??), uttapams are half burnt, rajma sucks, the sabzee is not that great either, chicken is uncooked, and they probably slaughter the mutton in the curry (no other way to explain the bits of bone mixed with the curry!). Sharmaji's canteen (no way related to our Secy!) is not great either. This poor bugger has been making only salty burgers and plain paranthas since the time he began his career at MDI. And needless to say, the quality of that too is nowhere near edible standards.

But life is a zero sum game, or so it seems from the interesting events that have been taking place outside the college gates. While we have lost, a group of stalls have gained. Let me tell you how.

There are numerous call centres in and around MDI. All these call centres have night canteens, typically a cross between a road side stall and a dhaba. Arcus and GE are the two places majority of the people order from. All that people order from such places are either paranthas or Maggi.(The sales of the latter have shot up ever since MDI started the PGPM programme). It was high time that the GE guy made a wise decision to set up shop opposite our gate for 12 hrs a day.

In no time, two weeks to be precise, our GE guy decides that his busines has reached inflection point. He increases the labour employed and makes it a 24x7 place. I dont know how he manages his resources but he seems to have the place up and running all the time. Go at 3 am to his stall and you can see sleepy kids rolling paranthas and stirring Maggi. The GE guy makes on average 100+ plates of Maggi a day, not counting the paranthas and the chais

After about 2-3 weeks of intensive operations, the guy at the adjoining stall realises that he too can make a few extra bucks if he increases business hours. And so we have the old man all wrapped up serving things like tea, which he differentiated from his competitor by adding ginger and introduces a new product, bread pakoda. Unfortunately its only the low margin tea that sells well. The pakoda bombs in the market.

In the meantime, Sharmaji at the canteen complains. He emotionally appeals to us to patronise his offerings. His business has fallen drastically with the marginal propensity to spend increasing but no piece of the action coming his way. But he refuses to change his menu.

And then we have a samaritan (not our social service club) among us who through the medium of an anonymous email id informs us of the dangers of eating at a place like GE. He questions the sources and quality of ingredients. Sharma picks up the scent and validates the arguements.

The whole excercise reminds me of our economy. GE is the MNC, the guy next stall is the local competitor, Sharmaji is the PSU and the anon id is the Nationalist Swadeshi. It so blatantly replicates all that we see in the papers day in day out. The MNC works superefficiently employing cheap labour, the Indian competitor responds with half baked strategies, the PSU complains and instigates the jingoistic nationalist who throw a massive tantrum on how foreigners are selling us cheap. In the whole melee, we the consumers benefit and our tummies grow at 8.1% per annum. Pretty interesting thought this!

Rajma

Rajma is the staple diet of a ManDevIan. Almost everyday we are fed this ubiquitious cereal. And I wouldn't mind if it was well prepared. But the fare that the Nepali cook dishes out (not an attack on his culinary skills!) is a combination of masala, water and boiled rajma; which is probably added to the masala-water solution. Back home Mom makes this really tangy rajma curry, and its a delicacy. We who make up the DSouza stamachs (my Dad coined this term!) devour it as soon as it hits the plate.

Requests for variations result in the addition of water so that the colour of the curry changes. And it doesnt help because when I pour a helping onto my rice, the water disappears through the grains of rice and all that is left at the top of the heap is the freshly boiled rajma. Being added last in the cooking process and not having sufficient soaking time, it is as dry as the Thar desert.

Also known as Red Kidney Beans in other parts of the world, Rajma is a nutritious cereal. Unfortunately all it has achieved in MDI is to increase the flatulence index before it makes a long winding journey through the depths of the bowels of the 300 odd PG student fraternity at Change Masters and Odessey Hostel. Numerous attempts to the Hostel and Mess Secy to remove the cereal from the menu have been futile (not a question mark on benevolent Nitin Sharma) but the cereal seems to have some relation to being what we call in economics a 'public good' in this part of the country. What 'aalu' is to the people of the Gangetic plains, 'rice' to the people of the South, Sugar and sugar derivatives to Gujarat; 'Rajma' seems to be to the Punjabi and Haryanvi folk.

I am stuck with this cereal for the next one year atleast. Luckily I'll be home for the summers and so I can safely deduct 2 months of suffering. I can imagine myself, all round and portly when I return for the senior year. Mansi who was in ABG last year as a summer intern has told me that the food there is good. Add that to Mom's cooking, and I can see a major weight gain in June.

Meanawhile Shasvat Lakhanpal seems to like lil Red Kidney Beans. Apparently the stuff cooked here seem to digest in his stomach. My gut still has to get used to it!

Strategy = Academic Masturbation

In a BSchool there are 'basic' courses (those that are supposed to give you some vague idea of the choas that goes on inside an organisation) and then there are 'Strategy' courses. These courses are pure academic masturbation. (Credit: Rugved Dhumale for the term) You shag your mind and feel happy about it. Probably one of the most oft used words in the corporate world and disliked by students purely because it promises so much when you first hear about it, and disapoints badly when you go about the subject.

Basically anything that you do can be labelled as strategy. Here are some exmaples:

You fire 1/3rd your workforce. That's a strategy to rationalise your manpower and hence raionalise your cost.

You introduce a new product. That's a defensive or offensive strategy with your competitor depending on whether he's on your ass or you on his.

You upgrade your IT system. Thats another strategy to provide value to your business.

You overprice and do some branding or bunkum like it. Another of those 'value providing' bullshit strategies. (My personal opinion is that this 'value' thingie was thought of by some frustrated MBA who had deadlines to meet and to save his performance based variable component part of his salary came up with this five letter word which means nothing but shouts into your eardrums)

You redeisgn your logo. Another marketing strategy. (Other than making the logo creator feel good about himself, I don't think consumers / customers give two hoots about the look of the logo.

I could go on... the point I'm trying to make is this. We MBA's believe all the stuff that's being told to us. We blindly agree that two random events that take place actually have a causal relationship between them. I'm not trying to deride Strategy here. I'm not trying to say that firms have no strategy. What I am against is the blatant use of the word 'Strategy' to justify and explain everything.

Strategy boils down to one thing. Foresight. Can you visualise what's gonna happen tomorrow. If you can, great! Next step is can you foresee whether your business can sustain itself tomorrow. You can, even better!! Now can you foresee what alternatives you have, what resources you have, what permutations and combinations you can carry out with your resources and grow your business. If you can, you are probably in an elite class. Very few people in this world actually can do that. That's strategy. Or rather in simpler terms 'foresight'

Unfortunately, I'm not learning that in my strategy course. All I do is study the past. I analyse cases without knowing the context. And I have a professor who has no clue what he's talking about. He has standard replies to questions that perplex him, 'I'll get back to you in a moment' before he heads off to another raised hand. Needless to say, that moment never comes. Another brilliant manouvering line he uses is 'They (the case under discussion) did something very interesting' (Time something interesting happened here). Of late he's been outsourcing his work to another johnny who is even more clueless. I have never met a more jobless person than this guy who sends mails on 'Excellence in submissions'. This is what Guru Bhobe feels about this nut.

But no I'm an MBA. It's my prerogative to use fancy terms, do fancy (supposedly) work, expect fancy salaries, blah. And I'm gonna make the world feel I know more than they all collectively know. Just coz I got three seemingly 'strategic' letters appended to my name. And no ones wiser!

Sonia trivia

Came across some interesting facts about Sonia Gandhi, the President of the Indian National Congress. Apparently it seems that she is the 8th person of foreign origin and the 3rd woman of foreign origin to hold the post of India's oldest political party. Check up her website.

Just some interesting trivia I thought I'd share ...

Sutta na mila ...

Some months ago there was an interesting song doing the rounds in the hostel. The tradition is to pass on interesting songs like these and then everyone plays it full blast ... some fun

I almost forgot 'Sutta na mila' till I came across this blog.

So for those of you (esp. my friends in the US!) who'd like to sample this new offering from this Paki band 'Zeest'. The song is about a smoker who doesnt get to smoke in peace. His sutta (ciggie in Hindi) is taken away by his Dad, abhored by his girlfriend, then wife, etc. The song is famous for its Bhenc**d, Maa-c**d lyrics.

The song is available at the following link.

And for the benefit of those who wanna sing along.

Doston mein baitha main sutta pee raha
Abba ne mujhe sutta peete dekh liya
Ghar jab pahuncha to danda ho gaya
BC sutta, sutta na mila.
BC sutta, mujhe sutta na mila.
BC sutta, sutta na mila.
BC sutta, mujhe sutta na mila.
BC sutta, sutta na mila.

College mein gaya mujhe pyar ho gaya,
Usne bhi mujhse mera sutta cheen liya
Sadkon pe ghooma main tanha reh gaya
BC sutta, sutta na mila.
BC sutta, mujhe sutta na mila.
BC sutta, sutta na mila.
BC sutta, mujhe sutta na mila.
BC sutta, sutta na mila.

Shaadi hui main husband ban gaya
Raat bhar thoka main thak ke gir gaya
Khushiyon ki khatir mera sutta chin gaya, BC sutta.

BC sutta, mujhe sutta na mila.
BC sutta, sutta na mila.
BC sutta, mujhe sutta na mila.
BC sutta, sutta na mila.

BC MC, BC MC BC MC.
BC MC, BC MC BC MC.
BC MC, BC MC BC MC.
BC MC, BC MC BC MC

How to ride a bike - Part Two

Ignore all that was said in the previous post. To learn how to ride a bike you need to do one thing.

Fall off it
and ....
Today I did just that.

Was riding with Mansur on the pillion. And reached the end of the road and had to take a turn. Unfortunately I couldn't find the brake and by the time I found it, it was too late.

Minor scratches and banged head and a finger sprain. But the learning is immense. DO NOT PANIC.

Waiting to get that crazy baby between my legs once again!!!

How to ride a bike - Part One

Me and Ramesh have found a new passtime. We ride into the night as the road takes us. When we feel that it is enough we turn back. It is on these arbit trips that I have learnt how to ride a bike.

Turn the key
Unlock
Make sure the side stand is up
Neutral gear
Kick-start
If doesn't start
then decompress with clutch and kick till it starts ;)
Change gear to 1st
Increase throttle and slowly release clutch (the most difficult thing !!!)
put foot on brake and you are on your way!!!

I did well... I started and took the bike upto 30 kmph. Felt good.

All i need is some practice and a license.

Degenaration

An interesting thought was shared by my Strategy professor, Dr. Amit Kapoor. He said that it was perceived that the IQ of an MBA student actually fell during the course of the programme. Though he mentioned some study done by some psychos (who apparently had no better work to do... a live example of this topic!!!) and though it may actually seem wierd, the truth is ... hold your breath ... Its TRUE.

Lemme tell you my testimony...
Before coming to MDI I used to comb the Economic Times everyday. Each article was stripped bare. Each editorial was analysed from all possible angles.
I used to finish the BusinessWorld mag the day I bought it. Outlook Money had the similar fate. Frontline, the most difficult mag to read because of the high vocabulary took longer to finish. I ate, drank and digested the news.
I followed the markets daily. I almost knew the price of all scrips in my portfolio on a daily basis.
I read. Novels, Articles, papers. I always had some or the other book in my hand.
I went out with friends. (Long walks with Audrey was a daily pleasure!) I socialised. Travelled. etc.
After coming to MDI, I can count the number of days I have read the paper on my fingers. The fate of the paper lies under my bed where many of them lie wasted.
I haven't read a single biz mag cover to cover. Of course I've counted the occasional glance into an interesting headline. But the first few lines, introductory paragraph was all there was to it.
I dont even know the price I bought some of my stocks (Though since Unnati happened I have taken some interest!)
Books. I issue them. I return them. Reading them is not on the list.
Going out. Well that reminds me, its been a long time since I went out.

Why do these things happen. Isn't B School supposed to make you a better informed, better organised, better professional and provide value addition. Almost all my friends who have come here agree that there were much better off before coming to a BSkool. All I have learnt here is a few terms (which would make no sense to those above or below you anyways), how to 'sound' sophisticated, how to maro gyaan, how to work my way through the backdoor. Did I pay 5.14 lakh rupees to go through this, and lose two good years of earnings.

Also its funnier still when freshly minted MBAs, expect skyhigh salaries. I dunno whether we would sincerely hire at that what students expect if I was on the other side of the hiring table! Prolly I would love to make a jackass of him.

That brings me to the next point. What am I doing here? Well ... a victim of necessity (to rise up the ladder ... and 'differentiate' myself from the billion plus people that we are) and marketing by newspapers, magazines and BSkools themselves. My expectations before coming here was that I would learn from the rich and diverse experience of my batchmates, that everyone around me would give different angles to analyse management problems (and trust me there are many), that our renowned faculty would give insights into fundaes rather than just qoute management gurus verbatim.... Sheesh I could go on ......!!! @#%$#^%$&

SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME I CAN APPLY THE SHIT I AM STUDYING .....
Eagerly waiting for the summer internship to start ... before I go into negative IQ !!!!