Look at the image below, its a screenshot of a Google news page. The 3 news articles highlighted report the same theft but mention different amounts. Notice on one side of the articles Google in its infinite contextual image placement wisdom shows the photo of gal who is not connected with theft, my advice to the gal sue Google for defamation. 
Cheers,
--Badri--
Disclaimer : I have been requested/ordered/threatened by a few readers to complete this thread I started, Thanks to my laziness and writer's blocks I never got any further on the thread in the last 6 months , But this morning I got up early and decided to rewrite the story in the thread from start to finish. I hope it isn't too bad :-)
The Introduction:
I met her one Monday morning, a chance meeting, a moment of serendipity.
After struggling to shake off my sleep and contemplating a “work from home” I listened to my gut instincts and jumped out of bed, got ready and reached work. I was welcomed at work by a strange aroma… like that of the jasmine flowers that blossomed in our garden, I looked around to see the source of my nostalgia and there she stood.
Long dark hair, blue eyes and outlined lips – It all came together to make a picture of perfection and I continued to capture several photographs with my eyes. All the fables I had heard about people spotting angels suddenly seemed possible.
She was new in the office, she was in my cube surrounded by a few of my team members. I struggled to get glimpses of her through the cracks people made when they moved in and out of the cube, I dawdled to my cube and with great difficulty ‘casually’ sat at my seat and tried my best to ignore her.
“Hi, are you Badri” I came up with a start. Her voice was just like her - sublime and melifluous. The aroma of jasmines in full bloom was strong, as she stood close to me. I looked up at her from my seat and after that, I barely heard anything else save a buzzing in my ear. I know she did say something for I could see her lips move but for the life of me, I had no idea what it was. I jerked back to reality when I was conscious that she was looking at me in askance
“Are you Badri, Dinaaz from HR asked me to meet you as part of my Induction, I am Ruchira Sharma, I joined the RnD team today, our meeting was scheduled for 11AM I have been waiting for you”
A vague recollection of an email from Barbara about a new induction crossed my mind. It also struck me that it was close to 12noon. Had I known that it was this apparition I was going to deal with, I believe I may have put a little bit more effort into my 'mood for the day'! A bloody good thing I decided against staying at home and working!
I finally found my voice and just as I opened my mouth . . I croaked! I cleared my throat, opened my mouth croaked again, I cleared my throat again and tried to regain some lost ground by trying to make sense of what I really wanted to tell her.
“Hey really sorry to have kept you waiting, Well, err... Ruchira nice to meet you" I said extending my arm for a handshake. She extended a folded palm and shook hands like a Pomeranian dog would. Hah the soft palm, the smooth skin - My mind went into another blank. I shook her hand for what looked like 20 seconds when she pulled back her hand, we sat down discussed her role, the company and some related stuff for the next 30 minutes. Those 30 min ensured that I was in great mood for the rest of the week.
Getting Closer:
The next 2-3 weeks I ensured that I had lunch everyday, not that I suddenly became health conscious I just wanted to be a part of the group she had lunch with. We exchanged minor jokes as part of the group and I captured more photographs of her in my mind, during those 30 min of lunch all else used to blur from my mind and vision other than her.
I loved the way she kept adjusting a strand of hair that kept falling back in front of her ear, I thought she deliberately left it in front of her ear so that she can push it back while talking to guys like me and make us notice her model like profile, anyways I wasnt complaining.
I met her a few weeks later at the office reception
"Btw Ruchira , about the project you are working on, I read the details, its very interesting, when do you want to discuss it, any time is fine with me, I even work weekends" I rushed through my long sentence, it was important that I let her know I was working the weekend and it was important I liked her project and yes it was important that I said her name.
"Oh but I am going out with my friends this weekend, we were planning to go the select city walk mall. Can we discuss the project on Monday if you don’t mind", she said with all sincerity and professionalism. Sometimes being the boss has it disadvantages , gals don’t sense your emotions.
I took a deep breath , one last attempt , God pls pls pls "Oh ok I generally work weekends from the coffee place at Select city walk, If you are around and free , we can catch up there for a bit and get started on the project, can I have your number please, will call you if I am there".
By now I had already walked some 40 steps with her, perhaps she felt connected , she gave me her number and told me that it would be ok to catch up while she was waiting for her friends. I wished her a happy weekend, she wished me a pleasant evening and I watched her leave, it was painful, sad songs were playing in my mind and then suddenly Lionel Ritchie came to the rescue and sang Hello.
A few hours passed by , I couldn’t resist the temptation to hear her voice, I picked up the phone and called her, A beautiful english song which I had heard before but couldn’t recollect from where, was her caller tune, "Helloh...." she greeted and I forgot all that I was going to say, "hellllloh "she said again , stressing now on the l, I recovered, "hi this is Badri just checking you number, sorry if I bothered, good night" . "Thats okkk Baddriii, is this your number" Thank you god, thank you, it felt so good that she said my name in such sweet fashion and for the first time I liked my name, I did have a cool name. "oh ya it is, please feel free to reach me on this whenever u want to", "sure", "good night", "gooood nigggghhtttt" I dont know why her English words had more alphabets than mine but I liked it that way.
The First Dates:
I made sure I ‘ran into her’ at the mall that weekend, she and one of her friends had come to mall early and were waiting for the rest of their gang. And then fate intervened, for once in a positive fashion, her friend got a call and excused herself.
The next 15 minutes were “exotic”, we started speaking about work but then she pointed to some flowers in a flower shop and mentioned how she liked orchids and from then on we just connected.
My mind was taking notes of things she liked and disliked. I didn’t speak a word about my likes or dislikes, I just agreed with her or asked her more questions. I knew the time I had was limited and I had to make the best of it.
Finally when my eyes caught her friend walking toward us , I gathered all my courage and said “Since you like Thai, may be you can join me for dinner after you are done watching the movie, there is this great Thai place near here, you can find me in the Coffee Shop, I will be working there”. I paused …..I was trying to read her emotions, dint she feel excited, did she feel repulsed, she dint say a thing for a few moments and my heart skipped a few beats. “Oh that would be nice, will find you at the Coffee shop ….” She said and smiled, waved good bye and left with her friend.
I started hearing music in my ears, in my mind I had accomplished something very significant, the doors to the dating phase had just been opened.
We had dinner together that night, the candle light, the romantic songs playing at the restaurant and her magnetic looks made it extremely difficult for me to sit on the other side of the table. I felt drugged, I felt ecstatic, I felt miserable, I felt as uncomfortable as one on fire, There was a rush of conflicting emotions but it was out of this world and the only way to describe it would be with poetry and music. It was fabulous.
In spite of me being lost in trance during the dinner my mind heard and registered everything she said, the way she said it, how much her head tilted in which direction when she said it, how her beautiful hands painted through the air when she spoke, it was all music and it felt as if some great musician was orchestrating her best symphony just for me.
The dinner was a success, I say that now because within a month of the dinner we had a few more of these symphonies. We started calling each other a lot, most of our calls was her telling me how she preferred one friend to another, how many soft toys she had, what her day was like, the topics hardly varied but the conversations were always music to my ears. I listened with such diligence, that my professors would have been thrilled had I exhibited half of the same back in my school days.
Things I felt were stupid when I saw heroes do them in movies were fun now in fact I longed to do them , I waited for the phone calls to practice my mimicry, use standard flirt lines , anything that would make her giggle I would do happily and things that made her happy I made sure I did. I spent 2 hours one night, after a long day at work trying to come up with interesting names for her 12 soft toys. In fact I found 3 more names that she liked but dint have toys for, I corrected that deficiency.
Where Are We ? :
We had by now spent a few months knowing each other and a few weeks on the phone talking (I am not kidding), I had moved from being an acquaintance to a friend, to a good friend, to the best friend to the bestest friend. We exchanged smses during work hours now.
In fact if I dint get a few smses every day it became impossible for me to concentrate on work, the day dint formal and I lost my motivation. We had watched half a dozen movies together, dined at a dozen restaurants and exchanged a few gifts (the ratio was me giving 20 to me receiving 2 and no they were not from her lips).
I juggled around with words such as love and like in our calls but she seemed to be either ignoring the hints or being completely oblivious to them. I moved from gifting her yellow roses to giving her red ones when we met but that dint change her reactions either. I kept wondering if she loved me or just treated me as a good friend but dint have the courage to ask her, I was worried I might ruin the dream I was living.
But then finally one day after a dinner I blurted out
“Ruch(thats what I called her now, we had nicknames for each other) you know I love you right”
“Yes Badru and you are my bestestttttt friend”
The few extra t’s dint make me feel any better, they only scared me more.
“Is that it, only bestest” I said making a sad face
“ohhh…….” She said as if talking to a sad puppy, “don’t you realize how close you are to me ” she said patting me on my cheeks (she had broken the touch barrier before with a few pats on the cheek when she was amused and some hitting when she felt mildly upset)
“No Ruch I don’t" I said, making the sad face again , it seemed to working and I wanted to get the best out of it
She got up and moved to my side of the table, she gently sat down near me, these few moments seemed too long, my heart skipped a million beats, I began to sweat a bit, it was like waiting for exam results, I am sure some part of me was even praying for good results.
She smiled, I had seen that smile before, it was her mischievous smile,
"You are ….." , she paused knowing fully well what I was going through and having her share of fun , "You are ……." She said her smile turning into giggles
"You are my kuchiku, my cutie pie" , she said and then planted a peck on my cheeks :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-)
Disclaimer : I am a devotee of Rajni (thats one step above a fan but one step below a fanatic) I have watched all Rajni movies several times and will end up watching this one (Enthiran) several times. I am also a movie buff and this review is written from the perspective of the buff.
Its admirable that Shankar has attempted something much bigger than whats ever been attempted in Indian Cinema and the output of this attempt is definitely a movie worth watching.
But ....... A problem I see with many who attempt something big is that they get tired before crossing the final mile, in the case of Endhiran , Shankars failing to cross the final mile lets the movie fail on so many grounds.
Let me start with the casting - Aishwarya Rai is only in the movie for eye candy and to help increase sales in north India. Asin would have been a much better fit for two reasons - She looks much more pretty and she can act. Lets face it Aishwarya has always been an horrible actress and when it comes to looks she is getting old.
Then the music department, except for in a couple of movies in all other movies that I can think of ARRs BGM scores are never as good as the songs.In Endhiran the BGM is simply noise at some parts. The songs are way below mark too. The movie could have done without a couple of them e.g. Khilimanjaro
Its safe to say Santhanam's role in the movie has nothing to do with comedy, not many comedy scenes in the movie and none of them really standout.
The editor slept at work and it clearly shows the movie is a big drag at 3 hrs and many of the scenes are totally unnecessary (Spoiler : Why the hell does Rajni have to talk with the Mosquitoes)
Finally the graphics , this is one place where Shankar absolutely failed to run the last mile. Some of the scenes are absolutely amazing. As good as Matrix or Terminator. But some of them are very childish. Spoiler : The Scene ROBO Rajni plays with the kid, the scene with the helicopters etc look so unrealistic that one wonders why Shankar even tries.
Rajni is as always amazing, Chitti the ROBO is wonderful and just because of Thailavar Sun pictures will make all the money they have invested. The graphics and the different story line make the movie a spectacle but frankly I miss Rajnis punch lines, the grand hero introduction , even if its a different movie we are Rajni fans and we expect him to be deified(or may be thats just me).
I am going to watch the movie again tomorrow and the day after but frankly I am very disappointed. May be only because my expectations were very high or may be because Shankars obsession with experiment something big and different prevents him from telling a compelling story.
--Badri--
P.S: In the movies defense , I watched the movie in UP with two north Indian friends who dint realize that Rajni is God, so the electrifying atmosphere in Chennai theatres that make Rajni movies an exhilarating experience was missing, In fact the crowd was so boring, that only 2-3(including me) people in the entire hall whistled during the movie.
Dabangg !!! - The best Salman movie ever, inspired by Rajni's Style, Hilarious from first scene to last , fast enough to hold audience attention, Salman Khan finally has one good movie in his kitty. Its a total time pass movie and definitely worth watching.
Note: If you don't like Masala Movies, you wont like this one.
Cheers,
--Badri--
Chicago the Movie:
Watched Chicago the movie yesterday, have been trying to see it for 2-3 yrs now but never got past the first fifteen minutes. Yday though I sat through the whole movie. Very well made I must say and great acting by Rene. But the movie is a peep into the dark side of humanity and the ill effects of Jazz and Drinks.
After I finished watching the movie I wrote this poem, I guess a side effect of the fights I saw in the movie.
The Row :
Will it ease your pain if I show
How much I am hurt because of this row
My fast heart beats and my numb legs
Can stand testimony along with my mind which for peace begs
But what good is it to know that we are both hurt
What do we achieve by finding who to whom was curt
Alas it wasnt meant to be and this is how it ends
May be the roads of life are meant to educate us with these bends
If we manage to maneuver out of this
Perhaps then again we can search for bliss
Now that we know our roads are headed different directions
It is time I guess to do the course corrections
Its easier for me to be the bad one and to take all the blame
Especially if it saves you some of the shame
I am a poet and a poet needs his pain
So I guess from all this fight the pain is my gain
Only because our destinations were different
At this crossing we had to become indifferent
That doesn't mean I cant wish you only the best
For the rest of your journey and all your quest.
Cheers,
--Badri--
While there are several theories such as Aura, Creative Visualization, Butterfly effect , Power of the mind that directly or indirectly state that the state of mind of a person can affect that of others around him.
Even if one doesn't believe in those theories and completely disregards the very ability of a mind to affect another, Its hard to reject real life scenarios where one sees for oneself that the state of others can affect him/her.
I have been noticing for a while now that when people shout near/around me, when they are angry and heated and yell for a while I start feeling weak, even shiver at times(even if the shouting doesn't involve me), I shout to hide my weakness or because I don't know how to respond.
Similarly, when people are very calm around me and sulking, I feel lazy , sleepy. When they are describing some problems with feelings, singing with great joy, reading verses of thiruvasagam often I feel like crying or tears trickle down my eyes, etc.
A more interesting observation is that as I grow older my threshold for shouting, loud noises is rapidly decreasing and I am starting to avoid huge functions, places with lot of crowd, loud pubs and starting to like more casual intellectual discussions(In school and college I preferred heated debates), mild music, silent places, parks etc . Is this because of thermodynamics ? Is this because of just the way we think/feel about these emotions? Or Have I become too soft a person suddenly.
--Badri--
This post is a continuation of my attempt to write a short story in 4 parts, the first part can be found here, if you read the first part and were waiting for the second part, sorry for the delay, between work pressure and football matches, couldn't find much time for Her ;-)
===================================================================================
The meeting on the bus was nothing close to what I planned. In my mind I walked into the bus, our eyes met, she got struck by my charm(I said in my mind) somehow I managed to strike up a conversation and I managed to invite her for a coffee.
What really happened is this, I boarded the bus, the over friendly driver insisted I was in the wrong bus and the bus route dint go anywhere close to where I stayed(The perils of being known), everyone in the bus was staring at me, I managed to silence the driver with some hushed words and took the only seat I got which was some 5 rows behind her.
I had to resort to plan B, it was risky because I hadnt planned it completely yet but I wanted to talk to her today. I got down at her bus stop, she noticed me and smiled, "so what brings you here, the driver was saying this is not where you stay" she said, perhaps she had guessed my intentions, after all I spent the last one hour in the bus watching her.
"Well I had to meet a friend, she lives around here" I used the cheap trick, you are at some place at 10pm to meet a "she" friend and you hope someone whom you have barely met is intrigued by it. She wasn't intrigued, if she was she hid it well with her "Oh ok".
"Btw Ruchira , about the project, I read the details, its very interesting, when do you want to discuss it, any time is fine with me, I even work weekends" I rushed through my long sentence, it was important that I let her know I was working the weekend and it was important I liked her project and yes it was important that I said her name.
"Oh but I am going out with my friends this weekend, we were planning to go the select city walk mall. Can we discuss the project on monday if you dont mind", she said with all sincerity and professionalism. Damn you gal cant you sense my emotions.
I took a deep breath , one last attempt , God pls pls pls "Oh ok I generally work weekends from the coffee place at Select city walk, If you are around and free , we can catch up there for a bit and get started on the project, can I have your number please, will call you if I am there".
By now I had already walked some 40 steps with her, perhaps she felt connected , she gave me her number and told me that it would be ok to catch up while she was waiting for her friends. I wished her good night, she wished me a pleasant evening with my friend and I watched her leave, it was painful, sad songs were playing in my mind and then suddenly Lionel Ritchie came to the rescue and sang Hello.
I picked up the phone and called her, A beautiful english song which I had heard before but couldnt recollect from where, was her caller tune, "Helloh...." she greeted and I forgot all that I was going to say, "hellllloh "she said again , stressing now on the l, I recovered, "hi this is badri just checking you number, sorry if I bothered, good night" . "Thats okkk Baddriii, is this your number" Thank you god, thank you she said my name in such sweet fashion and for the first time I liked my name, I did have a cool name. "oh ya it is, please feel free to reach me on this whenever u want to", "sure", "good night", "gooood nigggghhtttt" I dont know why her english words had more alphabets than mine but I liked it that way.
The next day morning was busy I had to assign work to my team in the morning staus updates, "So Navin what are you busy with" I asked still lost in thoughts of Ruchira but wanting to chug along at work, "Nothing much just the new project proposal, anything important I must look at". Nothing much, just the new project proposal, this guy was going to be the reason why I was going to get fired, the new project proposal was the only important thing my team was working on, "Hmm,,, I was wondering if you could help me with something, its for a competition, the lines go something like this "....." I need to get some details about the song, like OST where it appeared, the lyrics etc, you get the point" I asked in a bossy but help seeking way. "Who is the gal dude" he smirked , Now he gets smart, when I ask him about the proposal he is dumb god save my team, "no one important man just a friend" I said with a serious face trying to make him think it was really no one important. "Sure will bounce you the details ASAP" he said while leaving the room, he came back for a bit, smiled and said "All the best boss", I suddenly liked him now, I smiled, I had to remember to give him good ratings in the next appraisal what a nice kid.
I called the concierge kid, he was famous for being the babe magnet at work, "Shashank, can you please come to my cube for a sec , need some help". I asked him about select city walk, places of interest there, gifts to take for a gal whom you are meeting "casually for the first time", he was very helpful.
Navin replied with the data he had gathered about the song, It gave me a few ideas for a conversation. I called and made reservation at one of the best hotels in the mall. I ordered a bouquet of 3 red roses and a few roses of other colors, I was all set.Tomorrow was going to be a wonderful day...
Disclaimer : I call them Write-Ups, you can choose to call them Short stories if you want. But anyways the point is its been a long while since I wrote one that sounded ok and that was way back in 2005. The last one I wrote was incomplete and largely garbled but even that was 6 months ago. So I figured it was time to get over the writers block , so here is my "attempt" at another write-up. I plan to write this in four parts(Please bear with me :-)) and this is the first of those four parts
====================================================================================
Her - Part 1:
"No it will never work" that was the first thought that crossed my mind when I decided to approach her. She had just entered my office floor and was talking to some of my colleagues. I had never met her before. But something in me told me I had to go talk to her. But something else said "Look at her and look at you, she is so pretty , so good looking , forget it she is way above your league". But luck had different plans for us. She walked up to me and said "xxxxxxxxxxx". Well I couldnt hear what she was telling me, I was so overwhelmed by the fact that she approached me when I was planning to approach her that my mind went blank, well almost.
Her eyes dark and deep, her skin unblemished and pink and her glowing lips moving up and down to reveal her beautifully lined up white sparkling teeth flooded my mind with images of her. It was like my mind was a high speed camera taking tens of thousands of photographs. My eyes were so overworked that my other senses had to momentarily shutdown.
"Excuse me, are you Badri?" she interupted my photography session with by increasing her voice and by change of expression that made her eyes looks bigger. "Cute" I blurted out what my mind was thinking. "Whattt..." she reacted with a lot of emphasis on the t.
"I said true, ,meaning true I am Badri" I said trying to manage the situation. "Well I am Ruchira from the RND department and I was told you can help with a project I am working on, could you please let me know of a good time that we can meet up, I have a lot of questions to ask" she said adjusting a thin strand of hair which I thought was deliberately left in front of her ear so that she can push it back while talking to guys like me and make us notice her model like profile, anyways I wasnt complaining.
"Well, err... Hi Ruchira nice to meet you" I said extending my arm for a handshake. She extended a folded palm and shook hands like a Pomeranian dog would. Hah the soft palm, the smooth skin - My mind went into another blank. I shook her hand for what looked like 20 seconds when she pulled back her hand and said "Same here so when can we meet".
This was my chance, I had to say the right words and something good could happen, think Badri think ..... "Can you please give me your number I will call you back when I am free, I am kinda busy right now" I said quickly pressing windows key + D on my laptop to hide the freecell window. "Oh ok, my number is on the LDAP do give me a call when you are free, thanks" she said and smiled. I nodded, she thanked me again and left.
God bless the RND guys I said in a hushed tone and opened up the employee directory to search for her. Ruchira Sharma , born 21st Feb 1989, Marital status Single, Address : XXXXX , Ph. NO xxxxx. There were advantages of having admin access to some portals. You just could see more information than others could.
I saw that she took the office bus route 31 to go home. Of course I stayed 30kms in the other direction from her place but like so many other times before when I had met good looking gals, this time too my mind was telling me that she was the one and this was my chance. So I called the transport team and booked a seat on route 31 , her destination was today mine.
To be continued.....
--Badri--
Disclaimer: I have not used this service nor am I sure about how it works. Also I do not work for them(make money from them) directly or indirectly.
An year a close friend of mine from ISB started this venture to help ISB aspirants with their application to the school. From my conversations with him and from my conversations with a few candidates who used the service I understand that the venture is pretty good and has helped a few candidates successfully get ISB admits. So if you are an ISB aspirant and are looking for some guidance you might want to checkout
www.thinkisb.com
Cheers,
--Badri--
One of the best things that Google does when there is a GMail service outage is that it gives users detailed technical info about what is causing the problem. 
cheers,
--Badri--
Wanted to commemorate the first anniversary of my passing out of ISB with a blog post titled "The true worth of an ISB MBA one year into the market" but my first principle of blogging (Do not blog unless you have something interesting to blog about) that I seldom adhere to kicked in and I missed the anniversary date of Apr 5th 2010. But now that the force of the principle has worn off and I am really sleepy I think I can drop my guards and start my ramblings so here we go ......
I have always thought that school is where you learn to assimilate a lot of data about various domains. Its just a test of you retention skills and of course your ability to reproduce what you learnt. But as you go higher somewhere around high school we start learning a little bit about applying what we learnt. In an undergraduate unfortunately at least where I went too you assimilate more data about another domain which you were previously unaware of, you can think of this as specializing too a little bit of applying what you learnt in school but with more focus on a particular domain. Yes there are practicals that test your application skills in UG but then they are more a test of pleasing the prof and reproducing what was taught by the prof who himself/herself knew very little about the subject, as it was taught to you.
Masters again is specialization , learn more about one domain and retain as much as possible , you also get to apply a bit from all that you have learnt before and a bit from what you are learning now but then no great shakes. Was ISB any different , I dont think so.
I dont blame the school for my being clueless, But the moment you figure out its only a test of retention and presenting whats retained in exams the brain just refuses to work harder than its required to (at least mine does) and you go through the curriculum taking the shortcuts without learning a thing. I experimented with the subjects I liked a lot and scored B grades in them. Soon I learnt that retain, render and appease prof in class to score A was the way to go, and it was easier and more rewarding(grade wise) to do than to try to apply what you are learning and score B. Its a one year course and irrespective of what they day grades do matter so to finish with the 3.5 on 4 that I did I had no choice but to sacrifice learning and resort to retaining.
But as soon I entered the job market I found my worst nightmares come true. Senior managers like one quality and just one quality more than all others in their subordinates - The ability to think of a good experiment to conduct, define the approach, conduct the experiment, analyze the results and make a pertinent conclusion. Why was that a nightmare two reasons i) It dint require me to be a MBA I could have that even when I was in UG ii) It was analysis and application and my 12+4+1 years of education laid more stress on retention.
I was going to write off my ISB as a sunk cost while all the case studies I did kicked in and started helping me. Even though the Class Participation, Study group and the short duration had taken their toll on my learning from the case studies, the case studies had taught me an important thing - how to analyze a problem in a structured way , how to look at a problem from different angles and how to test your conclusions. The time I spent with a study group consisting of people from different skill sets helped too, it taught me how to present my ideas in such a way that people would buy it. And finally being a graduate from the 12th best B-School in the World made me more confident about myself.
So am I saying ISB was totally worth it. Not really , if you can solve 100s of case studies by yourself, read a few management books or science books and learn how to analyze problems, find a group of friends to exchange and test your ideas with and find confidence within yourself I dont see why ISB is necessary.
Of course there is the case that you are being part of an institution that selects only an 'elite' few, the fact that you had good experience, acads and GMAT score to get an admit there and the fact that you worked you as$ off to succeed there, could send really good signals to an employer who might be considering hire you. But thats the bane of the market today, employers select for the fancy degree and not the underlying qualities because a good degree acts as a good filter, especially when talent is easy to find.
So to summarize was ISB worth it - yes it was it taught me skills that I would have never learnt by myself either due to laziness or lack of exposure,
Could it have been better - yes I felt there were more tests of retention than case studies and applications and the one year format made things harder to absorb, there was more adsorption than assimilation.
Would I recommend people do an MBA - not really if you can figure out how to analyze problems, break them into small easily conquerable pieces, work the internet to find solutions for these pieces, present your solutions and findings in an impressive way to others you are good as long as your employer realizes your worth. If thats not happening then you might need a MBA for signaling reasons. And if you need a MBA ISB rocks, even though the one year makes learning difficult I am convinced from my interactions with MBAs from other B-schools in India that one learns way more in ISB than in any other B-school in India (as long as you are looking for a general MBA, I dont know about specializations such as finance and marketing)
Cheers,
--Badri--
"When Sachin Tendulkar travelled to Pakistan to face one of the finest bowling attacks ever assembled in cricket, Michael Schumacher was yet to race a F1 car, Lance Armstrong had never been to the Tour de France, Diego Maradona was still the captain of a world champion Argentina team, Pete Sampras had never won a Grand Slam. When Tendulkar embarked on a glorious career taming Imran and company, Roger Federer was a name unheard of; Lionel Messi was in his nappies, Usain Bolt was an unknown kid in the Jamaican backwaters. The Berlin Wall was still intact, USSR was one big, big country, Dr Manmohan Singh was yet to "open" the Nehruvian economy. It seems while Time was having his toll on every individual on the face of this planet, he excused one man. Time stands frozen in front of Sachin Tendulkar. We have had champions, we have had legends, but we have never had another Sachin Tendulkar and we never will."
Good Music, Feel good light first half, extra boring extra long confused second half, great chemistry between Simbhu and Trisha, for some strange reasons Trisha looks good, Overall its an ok movie , but sitting through it can bore you to death.
P.S: Simbhu MUST stop trying to speak in English , watch the movie and you will know why
--Badri--
"Madras is the best city in the Universe" I used to say whenever people told me it was hot, there was acute water scarcity or that the autowalas were all crooks. I loved the city and was always proud to be from TamilNadu. In spite of the fact that I dont have words to describe it , TamilNadu is just different.
But today after watching this video
http://bit.ly/7W2hvL
Of an injured cop begging for help and being left unattended by "Ministers" of the state, I am convinced my state has gone to the dogs. Any "human" with some amount of "common sense" would have taken the cop to the nearest hospital in his/her car. The ministers could have also used their influence to arrange for immediate and proper care for the injured. But all they did was call for an ambulance 8 min after seeing the victim in pain and arrange for the victim to be carried to the hospital 20min after they reached the site. WORSE: they said thats the best they could do Fing Morons
"http://bit.ly/78HMXM"
The victiom was a cop, he was attacked by criminals, this man was working for the government, the public, trying to make our lives betters and Ministers whom we voted into power did NOTHING to save this man.
If these two morons are not punished for their FELONY , we can safely conclude that TamilNadu has gone to dogs and is one of the most inhospitable places in the universe.
--Badri--
Disclaimer : Had these flow of thoughts lost night and they sounded good in my head, so wanted to write them down as a story, but as soon as I started writing down the story the thoughts got garbled and this emotional junk alone remained. Read at your own risk!!!
It was surely not love at first sight, I am pretty sure the first time we saw each other we instantly developed a deep hatred for each other. I loathed everything about her , the way she looked the way she treated people, everything.
But slowly things changed , I guess the more you interact with a person the more you start liking them. Its not a liking that comes because you find their traits good, in sync with your expectation but because you know them well enough to ADJUST. I guess thats the magic word, I learnt to ADJUST with her and our relationship improved.
The more time I spent with her, the more I learnt. Nah , she wasnt pedantic, I mean not always, but she had her own unique way of teaching me stuff and I loved it. I loved it cos I was learning and I loved it because I found her form of teaching absorbing.
A few years of association and then cupid's arrows struck. I dont know how it happened. Whenever someone inquired about our relationship I maintained that I just liked hanging out with her and it was nothing serious and I had no plans of settling down. But something changed , I dont know what, but I knew this, that the more time I spent with her the more I started falling for her.
There were others like her who were more beautiful, they even treated me better. They were nicer to me and let me go the way I wanted . She on the other hand used to tease me, irritate me a lot, confuse me, leave me stranded, in spite of all this I loved her. Perhaps I loved her because of all this, I dont know and I dont want to know, the fact is I was in love after a long long time and I was enjoying the feeling. But I was scared.
The previous time I was in love felt great too but sadly it dint last, we are still good friends and it sucks. So I was afraid this one would have an abrupt ending too and we will end up becoming "good friends". Also the last relationship I had ended around the same time I started telling everyone about it without asking her where she was in our relationship. So this time I was silent about my feelings. I dint want anything to disturb the peace I felt, I had only once been in a relationship and I knew fully well that being in love feels way better than being committed.So I wanted to let this feeling linger as long as it could.
Three years ran by and the feeling lingered, I never went past "I loved her" and she never said anything. Also all this while, I never tried to find out how she felt about me, but I presumed she liked me, she got more friendly, she cared more, she showed her frustration when I did things she dint like and I loved that I could frustrate her, her frustrations were beautiful too.
But this time, fate had different plans, even though I maintained silence we got separated, partly because I got attracted, to someone else I thought would be a better match and partly because it wasn't meant to be. Even though I tried to "move on" I rued everyday that I wasn't with her. Slowly the sorrow vanished and was replaced by a void that dint feel anything, dint know what the initial feelings were it just occupied a place in my heart and made me uncomfortable.
9 months after my separation fate arranged for a meeting between us, It was sudden and it was amazing. The moment my eyes saw her, I jumped in joy like a small kid who just received a fire truck(boy kid) as a gift, she just smiled , her most frequently used reaction and the one which I feared the most, for it hid lot more than it revealed. We spent 2 great days together and this time separating ways was easy or so I thought. So we said our good bye, we decided to remain friends and parted ways.
10 hrs after parting ways with her my heartaches, I cant stop thinking about her, I cant stop thinking how happy I felt in her presence, how at peace i was.....
--Badri--
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