Are we ready for another Uncle Sam?

Introduction

There were things that we all knew. Before getting to the genesis of the whole USA (Under Skirt Adventure) business, let us get our facts right. USA’s current deficit is $14.398 trillion and it has to pay $500 million as interest every day. This debt sharing works out to $121957 per family. No one knows how USA has benchmarked the meaning for a family. A society which is famous for MILF, Naughty America and BangBros, how does one define a family per se?

Hail Uncle Sam

USA has a Debt Ceiling Act through which it can increase its debt cap by passing it in the Congress. Earlier the debt cap was raised to $14 trillion. Since, it has been breached; US is in a mood to increase it by another $3 trillion. The justification of this rise is given by the fact that they can pay back $2.4 trillion of that money, if they raise $3 trillion. It’s like when we have drunk 6 pegs of Vodka already and are on the brink of getting out. Yet, we still want to drink more. Thus we borrow money and drink some more and forget about returning the money when we come back to our normal senses. Guys, get out the Hangover2 soon!

Before stacking up all blame on USA, let us get back to history on how USA became such a powerful country. Founded in 1776 (as was Naughty America!!) a group of docile people pushed out the aborigine Indians and made it a Centre of Excellence. Years passed. After the First World War, a standard for money exchange became the need of the hour. Many companies came up with Gold as an answer, while USA went a step further and fixated a value for Gold in terms of dollar - $35 per ounce of Gold. Things spread slowly and international trade began to be done in Dollars. No one questioned the reason why it has to be done so, because they equated gold to dollars and no one questioned them the rationale behind the quantification. And why didn’t anyone question, was simple enough.

Games they play

Every World Bank President till date has been an American and USA has 17% quota in its Senate. And the minimum vote share required is 85% for any loan to be approved. Why would anyone go against the US, questioning their rationale? Dollar out of US (World Bank, IMF) flow into other countries, while other countries buy U.S Treasury Bonds (US’s euphemism for loans), US dollar starts to fall, while other countries try to protect the dollar. What is US doing?

In 1971, our Watergate hero Richard Nixon came out with a brilliant idea that the dollar will divorce gold. What he meant was dollar was just a currency from thereon with no value to back it up - Simple paper, worse than a Zimbabwean Rand. One incident after another, USA started feeling the pinch. S&P downgraded it from AAA to AA+ (Let us not laugh, we are a bloody BBB-). And the reasons for their rational behavior are as follows:

1.      Unemployment rate was at 9.2%. Approximately 14 million people were unemployed which meant that the government has to spend on Social Security, a concept unheard of in India.

2.     Long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which meant that they had to spend on military expenditure. Is this the reason why their presence in Libya is very limited?

3.     Expenditure on medicare.

4.     With an IQ of 125 (91 is a false news), George W Bush came up with beneficial tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. The years being specific because, in those respective years they went on wars with Afghanistan and Iraq.

5.     Because of all these expenditures, USA is not able to invest in its physical and intellectual infrastructure which is hurting them a lot.

The current US deficit is around $1.3 trillion and everyone is watching on how the situation could improve. The dollar cycle will go on until the world perceives that the dollar has no value and a day will come when someone can take advantage of it. Who would it be?

How is India in a position to take advantage?

We are at 14^th position in terms of exposure to US debt – $41 billion, while our close friend China tops the chart with $1.5 trillion. But the Indian culture of consumption for satisfying needs than for luxury has insulated us very well. We are very protected by our economic culture of spending today’s income for tomorrow’s expense. There are a few countries like PIIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Spain) who are caught in the deficit spiral by spending tomorrow’s money today. Greece actually pledged their “Toll revenue” to get financial aid and the rest is history.

India has some positives to look for such as the decline in oil prices once the dollar depreciates, which will decrease the interest rates; increase in FIIs, etc. While there are a few negatives which include slowdown in FDI, pressure on Rupee to appreciate in turn affecting domestic markets as imports become cheaper, exports taking a blow due to dollar depreciation, we are, still, there to take advantage of the situation. But how? With fasts and incapable governments?

We are here to see a promising future when things outside are in a turmoil. There are few countries in the world which can actually turn things around. India being one among them can seize the situation and turn it around completely, if she wishes to!!

(With inputs from Anoop Sherlekar)

First peg of Bombay Life..

Everyone was hooked onto their new laptops. Some were installing software, others skyping and the rest on facebook doing nothing. And that was my n^th call from Suhail to get ready to step out of the campus. When someone asks a question like who will be ranked the last in the class, hardly any hands shoot up. Everyone thinks that they won’t be the last, yet there is someone among them who will come last. Applying the same logic, no one was ready by 8 PM, yet everyone wanted to leave by the same time. In small groups of 3-4, we started for Kanjur Marg station, the nearest to the campus. It was indeed nearest when there is no traffic and one can easily take an auto to reach. But, talk about walking the whole distance, you would find no takers for it. Yet against all odds, 15 out of the 16 pseudo-intellectual kids made to the station by foot (myself, Dhruv, Kartik, Kaashi, Chotu, Parthiv, Nikhil, Boro, Debshree, Reshu, Hemangi, Tanya, Rajeev, Vijay, Suhail and Nisan). Vaibhav was smart enough to reach the station well in advance and paid the penalty by buying extra tickets (None returned the money yet, so eventually he paid for everyone’s travel). To add interesting information, there were a few guys at the station who winked at him, mistaking him to be a member of IITB’s “Saathi”.

The slow train to CST made its way into the second platform of the station. With 45 minutes chit-chat, we reached CST. The kids were so hungry that they did not even spare a stale samosa. They hogged down until the last tiny crumble, while the confusion of who is going where were sorted by big shots. As it happens in all the board room meetings, no conclusion was reached and the whole lot headed to Leopold’s, barring two mariners who went to the Marine Club. And to our surprise, Leopold’s was ready to accommodate a 15-member group without any fuss. Boys in the house were hell bent on getting drunk, while girls in the house just wanted a break out loose.

After placing the initial orders of beer towers, steak pasta, iced tea, burgers and coke, the first toast was raised for the first weekend in a month. The past month was strenuous like never before. The kids felt like the mayonnaise sauce that squeezes itself out of the tightly packed grilled buns. Once the boys started tilting towards the higher side, the dissertation on “how to identify Indians hailing from different parts of India based on a single word “B****C**D”” started. The good thing about being in a delightfully high company is that, one can easily reach a conclusion. It is quite true that great minds work cohesively when the right kind of motivation (beer) is provided.

One can’t keep the Punjabis in the house out for too long, without them singing their favorite numbers. With 7 Punjabis in the house, one has to oblige their wish to sing, even though the Leopold’s’ waiters thought otherwise. Then came the highlighted phase of the song session – we picked up common songs in Hindi and Tamil and thanks to ARR, we had quite a few numbers. Until then 5 beer towers were gulped down by 7 of them and 3 Coke cans by me. With a vote of thanks by “Bhaag DK Bose”, we exited Leopold’s and headed for Nariman Point.

One word – Absolute beauty. Moonlit Arabian Sea, waves crashing the rocks on which we were sitting, talking about places to visit and things to do, each of us actually felt the pulse of the moment. Knowingly or unknowingly we connected back to our past, thinking about our personal best times, sinking in the unrealistic reality of living life the way we always wanted to. The erstwhile Mumbai police came and warded us off as there were indications of high tide and that’s when it started drizzling. Bombay, chicken, beer (read coke), beach and rain with no deadlines to meet – A few of the blissful moments in life. We settled down along the rocky shore singing songs once again, this time with the aid of mobile phones.

Once the mood of the group changed to Back Street Boys, I, Kartik Calling Kartik (Kartik Dua), Debu (Debshree Buttercharjee), Hooda City Centre (Reshu Hooda) and Gullu (Vaibhav Gulati) left for a walk along the shore. Sensing the ramblings in our stomachs, we set out to pay a visit to Haji Ali Juice Centre. Apart from the Queens Necklace, the other roads in Bombay are also studded with lights, buildings and well-lit showrooms of Porche and Aston Martin. Disappointed in finding out that the juice centre to be closed, we headed straight to Shalimar Restaurant in Masjid. After having fulfilling Faloodas, we walked to the Masjid station to catch the first local train back to Kanjur Marg. En route, we discussed about why Bombay never sleeps (barbers were busy shaving at 4 am), existence of God, aliens and a lot other trivial stuffs. We reached the campus by 0515 am and hit our beds and for the first time in a month we had no idea of when to wake-up to reality. Cheers!!!

The Beginning of an End

The Mayan calendar stops on a particular date in 2012. We are just a few months away if at all there really is anything serious on the cards. Scientific theories such as the magnetic poles shift, increase in solar flares, etc. can give an insight into how true the dreaded date can be. Natural disasters such as Earthquakes, Avalanches, Tsunamis, Floods, Famine, etc. can push us to the last step of human existence. But, nothing will force us to give up on humanity and the life after everyone’s death. That can be caused on to us, only by the US, for the US and of the US. May be that is why Democracy is a widespread tool to tackle the human race. Having said about the tool to tackle us (the people and not the country), another tool to destroy ourselves (probably a better word than US) is the Nuclear arsenal that we carry on our shoulders.

We have problems galore with six billion humans on a single planet. When one goes a few centuries back in time, the frequency of sighting a UFO was a lot higher than what it is now (nearly nil). When one goes a few millenniums back in time, the occurrence of an alien visit is corroborated with the evidences in the form of cave drawings, temples, monuments such as Pyramid, Stonehenge, Nasca plate, etc. which are spread sporadically on different places across the globe. The question is not about whether they really visited us in the past. Hands down they have! But the real question is why did they visit us? Was their race coming to an end? Were they searching for a place to live, sustain and transfer their learning to the untransformed human mind? Were there too many of their species like how we have right now on Earth, that they had to move out? If given the crunch, do we, the Earthly people, have an alternative to go somewhere else?

To defy the logic of the existence of extra-terrestrial life, all we have to do is to think from a bird’s view (or say a space ship’s view). We have nine planets in our Solar System and the closest place where we can find, nearest to the existence of life, is Mars. We don’t know anything about the other planets. Our Solar System is on one of the corners of our Galaxy – Milky Way. How many stars (For starters, Sun is a star) would be there in our Milky Way (approximately 200 billion stars) and how many planets (approximately 50 billion planets)? And imagine how many such Milky Way type galaxies are there in our Universe. And yet, we think we are alone in this Universe? Man has got some nerves!

Firstly we haven’t ascertained that we are the lone beings in our solar system. Secondly, the nearest star to our Earth that is proposed to have planets is at a distance of 10.5 lightyears away. That being, if one travels at the speed of light, one needs 10.5 years to reach that star which has a couple of planets. Finish the assignment there and then head for the next star. And to do all these things, we first need energy systems to propel our ships to travel at the speed of light. Considering human’s lifespan (the elaborated one, that one has in space as well), we need atleast two educated families to travel the ship. The children have to learn the trade from their parents, procreate and their offsprings have to keep on continuing the same for a lifetime and beyond a lifetime to ascertain that we are indeed alone or until we find somebody else.

All this is possible and we can do it to find alternate planet to live on, to do the things that the aliens did for us in the past, to teach them our findings and learning, to attain the Godly image, to make them worship us (some irrationals already do that here on Earth) and to live our extended lives. We, the humans can be aliens for someone else to whom they look up to.

For that we have to do two little things. One being, not to decimate ourselves with the Nuclear warheads pointing at each other. The current Political arrangements encourage a lot to see the “The End”, but will there be anyone to see it in real time. We have to avoid a Nuclear War at all costs lest we destroy ourselves before 2012.  The other being, spending time, energy and money on finding an energy source, may be Nuclear Fusion (taking a cue from our own Sun) to travel through space.

 We have a long way to go before we find a breakthrough and patience is the key. Every finding should be recorded and things have to be made easier for the next generation to carry on from where the current one leaves. If only the secrets of the Pyramids and other prominent structures were recorded, we wouldn’t have had to start from scratch again. Nevertheless, if we don’t pay heed to the first point, we have to start out all over again with the primitive man scraping a piece of wood unless we leave a Mentos behind. Once again, there will be races – F1, MotoGP, Tour de France (if France is found once again) and Stone-Copper-Iron-Nuclear Arms and we will be visited by aliens once again and wait for another 2012 or the Sun to give up. 

Genesis of a habit

One fine day in July 2009, we all decided to give the CAT, that year. Oh yeah! The (un)Common Admission Test that one, born in India, gives to fulfill one’s as well as one’s parents’ dream, not to dare to think beyond the IIMs. Five of us set ourselves to tame the CAT and get ourselves released from the pressure-filled Aluminium smelter. To bell the CAT, one had to be thorough with the concepts and, in the process, give a lot of mock tests, which, in turn, makes a mockery out of one’s self-respect. Concepts were at the back of our palms and we had the self-belief that concepts can be created out of thin air, like the lies that we create, while reporting to our managers at the end of our shifts. The only hitch was giving the mock tests as that required us to register ourselves with one of the premier coaching institutions. Spot one coaching institute in the whole of Jharsuguda, let alone a premier institute, and there will be torrential rains in Thar Desert.

After a bit of research and a lot of money out of our bank accounts, we made the brave decision to register ourselves with TIME, Rourkela, which was 134 km from Jharsuguda, on the ‘Diary Milk Silk’ road SH10. It was a Sunday, and a supposed off for the five of us. I was apprehensive to ride a bike for that much a distance as it was raining cats, dogs and tigers. I took the pillion seat in the Pulsar 200 behind Narayan, with Manish and Pratap on the Hunk, while Abir was the loner with the Pulsar 150. The raincoats were robust, and we never got wet inside until we stopped for our breakfast at a dhabha, some 30 km from Jharsuguda. With some hot Badas (Vada in South India) in our tummies, we reached Rourkela after two and a half hours.

Circling around Rourkela, with its sharp cuts, twists and turns, we finally reached the centre. To our amazement, we learnt that Abir had already enrolled for the course (which he revealed then) and our view of him changed from the innocent chap who drove in the rain without a raincoat, to the traitor who was already on his way to the IIMs. There was a mock test in the process and except Abir, none were eligible to take it as we had enrolled just then. We questioned our commitment in travelling 134 km every Sunday to take up the mock tests, but when we thought about our plight in the plant, we readily convinced ourselves that distance should not be an issue. The TIME-center person happily pocketed the money and told us that all we needed was an internet connection; that we could indeed take the tests from back home. And the reason being; CAT was to go online from that year. What a relief! Within a few seconds, money transferred hands and we were on our way to the IIMs.

Jharsuguda being a place without a proper theatre, we took balcony tickets in a theatre in Rourkela for a stupid movie “Shortcut”. Like the name of the movie, we took a shortcut half way through it and made our way to Moksha – the bar. Joined by a friend, Nitin, from SAIL, we had a nice time and it was five in the evening when we started back. Pratap was in no mood to ride and that was my cue to take reins of the Hunk. I did ride on that smooth road during our onward journey for a few kilometers, but, a whole of 134 km with Manish (he didn’t know to ride a bike then although he owns a Karizma now) as the pillion was an exasperating thought. It was fearsome, yet I enjoyed more than I thought I would. With a slight drizzle and the serene silhouette of the mountains, the ride was refreshing. The ride enchanted me and made me relax the nerves of a long ride.

As expected I didn’t make the cut in CAT ’09, although it was one of my best performances. And, as expected, Abir and Manish didn’t even bother to give the exam. And, as unexpected, Pratap cleared it and made it to IIM Lucknow. And then I understood why there was “Luck” in Lucknow.

The trip made a deep impact on me. Not because of the drive to bell the CAT, but the drive on the highways. Wasting no time, I bought a Royal Enfield Thunderbird and was on the same road “n” number of times to go for a coffee at the nearest Café Coffee Day. Biking, that started as a necessity, turned into a passion and became a habit. And 134 km was just a start to the life of biking thrills and frills as I was back on the road again and again..

Fast at Fault

India has never invaded any country in the past 10000 years. It has been invaded by many countries, individuals, kings, paupers, you and me. Startling, isn’t it? When did you and I invade our own country? Let me just recall what I learnt in History. I learnt it because all that my History school teacher did was to spit on the first benchers when she delivered a lecture (Another main reason why I was a back-bencher). As far as I can remember, the Pandavas and Kauravas fought with each other for the kingdom. Although clear facts are not established if they came from somewhere or they belonged there. If one has to go into the past that is even before Mahabharata, there are these Ancient Aliens invasion, which theoretically proves the invasion.

Now, coming to known facts, there was this Alexander dude, who sooner or later succumbed to Indian melodramatic emotions and returned back. The movie-name starrer Ghazini, his mate Ghouri, et al. raided the then Bharat. Then came lots of other dynasties and along with them came from Mongolia, the Babar with his Mughal Empire. Not to take anything away from the Europeans, the Brits, French, Portuguese and their entourage, they made their presence felt. We have come a long way from all those things, and then we have the Chinese and Pakistani invasion.

In Pakistani terms, it is India’s invasion, proving our premise wrong. But, Pakistanis are never correct. They said, they didn’t have Osama-bin-Laden, but they had him safely guarded. They said they had nothing to do with Mumbai attacks, but, upcoming evidences show otherwise. The only thing that they said which came true was that they said that they won’t allow Sachin to hit his 100^th century against them. That came true despite dropping 6 chances and we solely have ourselves to blame for this mishap. Talking about China, since they feel that people from our North Eastern states resemble them in physical features, it’s their birthright to have a share of Arunachal Pradesh, as of now. We don’t have invasion problems from our other neighbouring countries such as Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, but, if you and I can invade our country so well, they too will be soon drawn to the temptation.

For long now, we have had this corruption thing going on. I personally feel that it dates back even before those 10000 years of anti-invasion policy that we hold close to our heart. Then why crib about it now? Insensitive question to be asked, but, we have poor policies that encourage corruption. Let me site you an example from my own life. I bought my bike in Orissa where I registered under the “OR” code and paid Road Taxes worth Rs. 5000. It turned out that I had to shift base to Tamil Nadu. Now, I need to re-register the same bike under the code “TN” and pay an additional Road Tax of Rs. 5000. We are a country and everytime I move my base station, I need to pay more cash. Since, I already paid a lumpsome, why should I not pay only a handful and get done with the formalities? Why unnecessary hassles? I lose out more than what I can possibly earn. What is the shortcut here when a traffic cop holds you? No prizes for guessing, yet, we throw blatant tantrums against corruption.

It was just a small-scale example bolstering the argument on policies. Taking a cue from “Atlas Shrugged”, all the policy-makers think that there is no way to rule innocent people. The only power any government has is the power to take on criminals. When there aren’t enough criminals, they make laws and policies to make some. Our government declares so many things as crime that it becomes impossible to live without breaking laws. When we break laws we are susceptible to be corrupt. And that is how you and I invade our own country. We need policy changes, the root-cause of all corrupt, not a bill to bring the corrupt to the face the law, which again is corrupt. We need to stop invading our own country to stop others from invading. As long as we don’t address the base question, we will be invaded by countries, individuals, kings, paupers, you and me.

Bong-ed

Trichy was as hot as it can get in the month of June; second only to the May. And thankfully, I wasn’t available at Trichy during May. The first day of counselling was smooth as I was one of the early visitors at NIT, Trichy and I made my choices that very first day. As expected, the campus was barren. I saw absolutely no girls as far as the horizon could curve. One could reach the end of the world, yet not find a single female species. I slowly started to realize the pulse of the sulking engineering life looming ahead. The next day, the results of counselling were announced and I had got into NIT Durgapur for Metallurgical Engineering. Heck! Where was that place now? And Metallurgy? What is that?

With a few like-minded would-be engineers around, I learnt that Durgapur and Metallurgy went hand-in-hand, like cigarette and smoke. I was first taken back by the unusual simile, but later on understood the pun intended. Discussing more on Bengali culture, food and Durgapur as a place; one particular information annulled every other drawback I had been hearing about the college. Bong girls. Their flamboyant attitude, innate beauty and contemporary elegance were nicely backed up with practical examples like the Sen Girls – Sushmita, Reema, Ria, Konkona, et al. I happened to have been inspired by a Tamil chick-flick called JJ, which was about a guy (hero played by R. Madhavan) searching for his love (heroine played by some beautiful female Bong actor) shot in Bengal. The magnificence of Kolkata scenes had enthralled me right then.

Until then I was of the opinion that the train to Kolkata travelled over the Howrah Bridge. On the contrary, I was gladly welcomed by the reality that one can even walk on the same, throw a couple of coins into River Hoogly and can have a look of the new Suspension Bridge across the river. All through my journey from Kolkata to Durgapur, I was intimidated by the Raxaul-bound crowd of Mithila Express. I was an independent bird, with wings of liberty. With a new-found fellow fresher in Sreenu, who was skeptical about ragging in the institute, I finally reached the place which had the scented aroma of iron ore and coal barracks.

I boarded the bus to the college which is known as R.E College in the local slang. I hadn’t sat in a public service bus (although run by private companies) as small as this and found it comparable to a matchbox on wheels. I was also astonished to note that there were no separate seat reservations for female passengers as one can find in TN buses. To my surprise, a beautiful Bong girl in a pink salwar, the most beautiful girl I have ever seen in my life, sat beside me. For a moment, I thought, this could not be true and to trust my fortune, instead of pinching myself, I pinched her by mistake. An angry grin, yes, an angry grin came across and I lauded myself for making Durgapur as the right choice.

If this was the case with luck when one lands for the first time in a city, I congratulated myself on how lucky things can get, thereon. To my utter dismay, which I came to discover much later, neither did I find that girl again in Durgapur, nor did I find that expected quality of beauty in Bong girls, in my four years’ stay sans the 1-2-3 pact that I had with Abi. Not knowing how abysmal my fortune would run, I started the journey in the Prantika-bound matchbox with an exciting career in heart and sleazy dreams in mind.

  

Mario to the Rescue

Mario with the help of his brother Luigi reached Mumbai. He has some work to do now. After travelling all these seven stages he finally landed in Stage Eight. He travelled all these stages because he didn’t use time warp in the worlds 1-2 and 5-2. Such a waste of time and energy he thought to himself. But, his idea was very clear now. All the princesses that he had saved earlier were bogus ones and the real princess was hidden in the castle guarded by the dragons of all the dragons.

Having lots of castles in the Mumbai region, it was a very difficult task for Mario to shortlist the one castle and carry out the rescue operations. He thought of acquiring the CIA’s help in zeroing in on the castle to attack, but, then it struck him that Mumbai is bigger than Abbottabad. Although, India and Pakistan are on par in displaying their negligence on some foreign terror/US Navy Seals attacks, yet Indians atleast have guilt of shame. They have a pseudo-strong media to question them in the form Arnab Goswami, Karan Thappar, Pranab Roy, et al. in comparison to Pakistan. They are there to rip the politicians’ rears. So, Mario was convinced that he can’t take external help, but have to seek the intelligence expertise of Islander and the Contra brothers.

With much planning in the boardrooms of Powai, Mario and his intelligent army trickled their option down to the castle in Bandra. With CCTV’s footages, they learned that the house was guarded by not one, but, three main dragons of 3G nature. One-Two-Three. They were fast, furious and insanely lame. Mario learned more that they were popularly infamous in the country for their recent advertisements in the country. The common people wanted to kill themselves for watching those ads and the menace was increasingly disastrous.

Mario wanted to free the princess not for the fact that he had a liking for her, but, he wanted her to save her from the clutches of the 3G dragons. The 3G dragons moved in the city as a common man or common men in the avatar of the only stupid Bachchan.

Mario set out on his mission. No helicopters, but, he needed only Chilly Mushroom and CauliFLOWER Manchurians to gain height and firepower. He went into the Bandra castle. Minute by minute he was tested by the stupid Bachchan. He eliminated one-two and later NO IDEA how, he eliminated the third. He did a double favor to the people of the country and also to the princess Rai Bachchan by eliminating the 3G Bachchan and the people of the country lived happily ever after.

Appy Fizz time :)

Every damn day was difficult with a daunting task ahead of me. The whole world who knew what I was after, called me a fool, lunatic and an insanely crazy person. I was in a very nice position with a fat pay-package is an MNC, when I thought that enough was enough. I called it a day after two years of hard-work and abruptly stopped my ascendency. What I set out next was a crazy idea if you are an Indian and know about the way it works here. The only best thing about India is that, when you go out in the battlefield, fighting for your most prized possession, with nothing in hand, you find yourself in a corner, with millions of better people in the same battlefield, eyeing the same prized possession.

Day in and Day out, I assiduously prepared for the D-day. One of my successful brothers once told me that the one who has never failed, can never taste success. On January 12^th, I failed. I failed because of Statistical errors or whatever reasons they were. My preparations were good, I gave my best and yet I failed. I failed miserably in the section which was my percentile booster in the previous editions. It was as if the world was mocking at me. I didn’t sleep for many subsequent days. May be I slept because of fatigue. Again, it was one of the toughest periods of my life. I pushed myself to the extent that I convinced myself saying that the worst was yet to come and with this in mind, I kept pushing myself forward.

Hard-work pays, but, only in instalments and never can you have all at once. The subsequent exams were disasters followed by calamities. For the first time in my life, I was unsure about myself. To the outside world and the social media I was known as the adventure-man, travelling far-off places with no intentions in mind. But, deep down inside, I was coming to terms with my failures, with a huge question of “What’s next?”

By God’s grace and I must say that by God’s grace, I cleared a couple of exams. Though not convincingly, I was ready to take up anything that I can lay my hands upon. On a beautiful Friday, SJMSoM gave me a call. I knew that it was my only chance to make it up for the lost ground and I told my dear one that I will make it, if they just gave me a call. Just one call and I will cover up my shoddy performances. To gain practice, I gave 6 real-time interviews before my panacea. I used up all my experience of bad interviews in the one that mattered the most. I gave it, and once I came outside the interview hall, I knew for myself that I nailed it. Exactly a month later, the results came on 27^th April and the final verdict was not different from what was expected. I stand to face the world of achieved something, but, a lot of hard-work was done by my family (mom, Subha, Sharanya) and friends (Sangeet, Abir, Alok, PPK, Adi, Shweta, Monica, Praveen sir) to keep me standing against a strong current across my face.

My IQ increased by 3 points, I learnt to smile a lot, I learnt to be serious in life, I became mentally stronger and most importantly, I learnt to deal with failures and not to accept defeat until I finally lost out and invariably, I learnt to celebrate life…….

Appreciate the journey, because it is always better than the destination.

Sutta..

The cigarette was in my mouth. The urge to light it in front of her near the Prof. Canteen made me realize the importance that the cigarette gained over her. The cotton bud was tasteless, yet so soft. It took me back to the “Heat Transfer” class when my professor gave a problem to calculate the time taken for a cigarette to extinguish, while the tip is 810ºC with pre-determined values of latent heat of tobacco and length of the cigarette. The question carried on the onus of plotting the graph with MATLAB on varying lengths as well. Nevertheless, the one in my hand was the first one, out of my money. Two and a half bucks for a Navy Cut and the clear-cut path to cancer was sitting tightly between my lips. I lighted the match stick. It went out in a flash with the help of a strong breeze. I didn’t know the art of lighting a cigarette and I already was in my pre-final year. Struggling again, I tried, but, in vain. With ample shame, I asked the guy of the couple-next-bush to light it for me. He happily agreed and there went my first sutta into the bush and never came back - My first and the last cigarette.   

Moral of the story: Never share three things in life: Underwear, girlfriend and first sutta.

A night-out at IIM-Lucknow..

The bus from Kanpur dragged its bit out. The place I had to get down was Aal-Baal. Or that is what I got of the name, Alambagh. Lucknow was just 84 km from Kanpur and yet it takes two hours to reach the place. It was a bumpy ride and I could reason out why Uttar Pradesh is still in the BIMARU list. The rail connectivity between two important cities of the state was good, but the trains are never on time. Road connectivity was haywire. I saw railways crossings, like the ones in Bhurkhamunda village in Orissa, in NH25 connecting Kanpur and Lucknow. Construction of flyovers was on, but Gammon India would need their time to construct, maintain and collect their toll taxes.

Nevertheless, Aal-Baal came. Oops, Alambagh. It was a crowded market place and reminded me of Chandi Chowk, Delhi. Fighting all odds against the traffic, my friend Pratap finally got there to spot me. Vroom as we went and he showed me the railway station upfront. Trust me; it was one of the most beautiful Mughal architectures. It took my breath away, though my fellow Lucknow-ites where just whizzing past me, oblivious to the marvel, embellishing the place with pan flavoured red juice. As a part of the ritual, I had to pay my visit to Tunday Kababi at Aminabad. I never knew that, kebabs could actually melt. These Tunday kebabs, they did. Before we knew that it was 2000 hrs, 3 plates of kebabs vanished down our throats.

Pratap, then, told me of his plans of visiting the Janpath of Lucknow. On our way to the Janpath, one thing I noticed about Lucknow, reiterated by Pratap, was that the traffic signals at Lucknow do not work. Except the one I found in a busy market area. The signal near Vidhan Sabha did not work and so did the one near the Janpath of Lucknow. When I entered the Dr. Bhimarao Ambedkar Smarak in Gomati Nagar, I realized that it was not Janpath. It was Jannat. Elephant statues adorned the place; the haathi-senas were sculpted with red stone. Not only were there statues, but also bridges, structures, arches and various other portraits. It looked like Central Park of New York, although, my knowledge of the international hangout spot is only through hear-say. But, I felt that was the most justified way of describing Gomati Nagar’s flourished art work display - roads were wider; bridges over River Gomati and at fantastic speed on a motorcycle, the place didn’t look like the clichéd Uttar Pradesh.

We zoomed towards the prestigious Indian Institute of Management. A 15 km ride took us to the magnanimous school of management gurus, the fact being that it never seemed to come, until it really did. Carved out inside a dense forest, a passerby wouldn’t have an iota of knowledge of an IIM in that vicinity. We went in, and just like any other government institute the guards didn’t bother to awaken from their deep slumber. A peek into the ‘evergreen’ campus and I came to know that they do grow Grass which by popular thought was considered relaxing. Not to mention the inmates’ favorite code-word – “3.4” which translates to the 24 hours BSE (Booze Sutta Exchange) that is at 3.4 km from the main gate.  Thanks to constant pestering, Pratap took me to Himanshu Rai’s residence. I wanted to break a glass or two, but there were other serious issues, like the Indian cricket team being slaughtered by chokers, to watch out for.

As we reached Pratap’s hostel room I headed straight for the common room, greeted by just 5 guys watching the high tension match. My question was “Are you nerds kidding me? Five is all the number that you could muster for this livewire drama?” Yet, one cord of similarity between an ordinary Indian and an IIM guy was “Why did Dhoni give that last over to Nehra?” Reasoning with the former question, my logical thought was to believe that these guys weren’t watching the match for obvious reasons: because of their everlasting assignments and quizzes. On the contrary, the real reason was that that it was a Saturday night and thus there was no better thing to do than to attain Moksha.

Every wing had a party zone and every party zone was filled with guys directing gaalis at girls (they had a better word starting with the alphabet “b”), professors, the nine-pointers (euphemism for c**k-suckers) and obviously their untalented friends who made it to IIM-A. The generic widespread frustration among the lot was how close they were to IIM-A, but on the note of grapes being sour, they boasted of a better placement statistics than their considered rival school. I had an awesome night-out and never felt out of place. I never had to introspect on the fact that I could not make it there, despite which we all belonged to the group of souls enjoying similarities in rock music, grabbing pegs of soda and banging our heads.

It was four in the morning when I took an auto-rickshaw to the railway station as my train back to Delhi was at 0525 hrs. It was a journey to remember and quite obviously from my past experiences, the train was late. When the perpetrating train did arrive, I took my seat, with no fellow passengers for company; I settled down to sleep, until I was awakened by a co-passenger in Kanpur.