I’ve got many disjointed things to talk about and I’m not sure where to start. Eenie..Meenie..Miney..Mo...

Got it. Made a trip to Newcastle yesterday and realised a few things.
1/ My presence was completely unnecessary and I could have as well vegetated here in Ipswich rather than fly out, have two airport meals, nod my head like the thingamabob on the dashboard, participate in a conversation that made utterly no sense and come home dead tired.
2/ BT values the MBA degree a lot, and they hire about 50 MBA graduates each year. *Mental note – can try this option.*
3/ Business (&useless) trips are a great way to find out more about your super-bosses. Like mine loves wine. Is fanatical about golf. Is divorced but seeing someone he newly met. Adores Spain. Wants to do community service.
4/ I realised that if you have an issue, there’s no substitute to a face-to-face meeting. My team (i.e. the project that I’m working on) had some issues with another, and we were neither getting any cooperation from them, nor were we making any headway. It took all of two f-t-f meetings to clear the foul air, gain trust and secure co-operation.

Next, I’m worried about how I’m going to finance my MBA. There’s the collateral-free loan that’s offered by IESE but it covers only the tuition expenses. What do I do about the living expenses?? I don’t fancy touching my savings, and I’m not about to ask my parents for money (that’d be just plain wrong). The only option seems to be to take yet another bank loan to cover my living expenses, and two loans on my head give me very little leeway to take risks. Plus there’s very little that I can do from here. I need to go back to India and see if I can get that stuff sorted out.

Finally, I am through with at least two of the 10 most important things on my To-Do-List-In-UK, one of them being meeting my ex-manager Mike, who also happened to be my recommender. Funnily enough, both he and my super-boss were of the opinion that they always preferred to have only those Indians on their team who had travelled & worked abroad before. The reasoning? That the experience taught them the importance of saying No, as against Indians who hadn’t worked abroad and who fell into the trap of either saying Yes to everything and thereby either failing to deliver, saying Yes to their managers because it was not in the Indian culture to argue with managers (huh??) or having to work their asses off for 90 hours a week to deliver what they had promised. I really don’t know where they got them from. May be I ought to talk to some more people and find out if that’s the general opinion.

It's been a working-week since I first landed in Ipswich, and already I have mixed feelings. On the bright side, I have a boss that I seem to like, get along with(that's the second time in three years - where are all these nice bosses springing up from?), and look up to(he has a PhD in Nuclear Physics, and although that doesn't make him perfect, I respect his knowledge) so I don't have any work related complaints for now. Plus, although I haven't been able to meet any of my friends, I know that it's only a matter of time before that happens.

On the flip side, things really need to be spruced up around here. There's none of that hustle-bustle that I am so used to in Mumbai and previously in London, and everything seems to move around in slow-motion. If this goes on for a while, I'm gonna have to take up meditation to catch-up with these lot. On second thoughts, that doesn't seem like such a bad idea!

I have exactly 9 more hours before I board my flight to Heathrow, and I had promised myself that I'd make a post to break my mini-hiatus, so I'm taking the easy way out and posting an image of my to-be alma mater: IESE. I've never had a chance to visit the school in person (I had my interview via telephone) but from what I've heard, it's beautiful. See for youself -


IESE Business School 

Not exactly sure if I'll be able to make a short trip to Barca during the month or so that I'll be in the UK, but if I get a chance, you bet I'm gonna take it. Although, it looks increasingly difficult as from what I've just learnt, a Spanish tourist visa application takes over 2 months to get processed. That, and the fact that I'll be stuck in (sunny?) Ipswich, a nondescript little village south-east of London, where people pass their time by watching birds fly and trees grow, makes this a trip *really* worthwhile (note the sarcasm).

Ok, I realise I might be hurting a lot of sentiments here (especially if someone from there's reading this), but come on! I hate to be unusually critical, but Ipswich isn't exactly the centre of the universe (at least they have Nando's). On the bright side, I hope to meet, apart from some very close friends,some of the guys in the UK who have also received an admit and are going to attend school with me in September. That, should be fun.

A few pics from the bash... I'm still working on the rest, so hold your horses!


 

Two things jolted me out of my post-party-pre-hangover state yesterday. The first was when I read that the Y chromosome was on a decline and that in environ 225000 years from now, the male species would be extinct. Not that any of us will be around to witness that, but the possibilities are immense!

“Imagine the sale of dildos”, chips in my friend. Now, I’m nowhere close to an expert on either sex toys or genetics, so pardon my ignorance when I say, WTF?!! Would females mutate i.e. turn hermaphrodites to fill in the gap? Would we be able to replicate sperm? Clearly, if you are gonna be working 225000 years from now, BioTech is the place to be!

The second thing that jolted me was, well, more surprising than the first one. Sonia Gandhi was elected as the NDTV Indian of the Year. Now I’m not about to waste any lines on my political stance, but the news is a biggie considering Sonia Gandhi was born Sonia Maino, an Italian wedded into the illustrious (?) Gandhi family. It’s surprising because when it comes to accepting an “outsider” into the family, Indians are generally a suspicious lot. Even more astounding is the fact that the most votes in favour of Ms. Gandhi came from the rural population, the poor, illiterate folk and not the educated, socially aware, broad minded (so to speak) lot.

And whether or not she deserves to be made Indian of the Year over and above the other stalwarts in the line up is the subject matter for a different post, I’m just glad that Ms. Gandhi’s perseverance finally seems to have paid off (she could’ve just gone back to Italy after her husband was assassinated), and that we, as Indians, have yet another Indian to call our own.

I don’t think there’s anything more obvious than the subject of a blog post on the 1st of Jan – it’s got to be a New Year’s Post!! Well, last year a bunch of us attended one of these high-end parties (not to mention that we paid the equivalent of the monthly wages of an entire cross-section of the population in my country – and no, I’m not proud of it) only to find out that not only was it badly organised, they even ran out of food! Plus the music, which was supposed to be a crowd-puller, was strictly ok. We did end up having fun (hey, it’s the company that matters) but it was a kilometre away from “Perfect”.

We decided to make this year slightly different, more low-key and more chilled out than the last. So, throw in a smattering of close friends, pick an empty house (my parents’), dollops of mouth watering food, plenty of alcohol, some music and lots of laughter, and you end up with a memorable party! (Pics to follow soon)

Alright, enough about that. Its funny how everything seems good in retrospect and 2005 has been no different. Like each year, I have my set of New Year Resolutions, most of which sound so high-and-mighty that they’ve been on the list since... umm, 1985. There’s the standard addition of a few more this year too, some of which I plan to seriously work on in 2006. I have, however, been successful in crossing a major one out, so I can breathe easy. For now.

Finally the last thing before I sign off is to wish a Happy New Year to everyone who’s reading this. God Bless!