Interpreter of Maladies
Thursday, October 27, 2005
ShockedThe first shortlists have started coming and no, I don't figure in any of those. The feeling is well...just like what I felt back on college. When I saw the big companies slip by without as much as looking at my CV. Not a nice time to feel down considering that exams are close by. The feeling apart, I was shocked at first. Its like you give a lollypop to a kid and then u slap and take it away. So you make those big balloons of expectations and then someone comes and punctures them. Ya, thats kinda what I feel. When I landed here, all that I expected from this place was a degree, the stamp of an MBA so that I can go back to my company as a consultant. But soon, opinions started playing with my perceptions.....soon I realized I could be whatever I wanted. People told me not to restrict my horizons, to look beyond consulting so I looked and see...where I landed. Some lessons I guess, as always, would be my takeaways from this:
1. I aint perfect. Not actually or on paper
2. I would always be what I am. What people think about me is immaterial to my personality. I cannot change for pleasing the crowd
3. Life has always been able to keep me happy. Limited and constrained but yes, happy. So, my happiness is in my hand. I can make or break it
Forget shortlists. I should just relax. Hope I just get a decent job.
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Not so nice to readThe worst secret about me-I have worked in consulting. Yeah, I have transported globe onto fancy looking slides with intellectual looking graphs, pivot tables what not. For a fact based person as I am, this isn't a real nice point to highlight. The loose globe of my profession always troubled me but no matter how much I tried, it was difficult to change the way consulting works all over the world. At times like these, I used to tell myself, that the heirlooms of the consulting world, the McKinsey and the BCG's...they ain't like this. For a few months, I have also had the pleasure of working in the most tangible and factual industry you can imagine, Steel. Ever tried reading ATLAS SHRUGGED. Readers would know what a life, working in steel is like. The passion and the experience is unparalleled. As my dear friend Braveheart would agree, steel is the best industry to work in. Maybe a little too dirty for the hands but then what the heck..the satisfaction of getting hands dirty to create the shining metal is absolutely WOW. Oh, I diverged- was talking about consulting. So I had these high opinions abt the MCK and BCG of the world. Slowly, alas, they are shattering too. I seriously want a little logic in life. I shrug the thought of a future career in consulting because I have started hating globe from the depths of my heart. What the hell happened to the structured thought, strong logic blah blah !! But then, where would I fit. What would I do. I can't be an I banker coz it needs a top 100 JEE rank, interest in statistics, very intellectual interests. I have none of those things in me. I also fiddled with the thought of trying marketing but I dont think its my piece of cake. I dont have much to boast in terms of people skills. IT-the computer hates me more than I hate it so can't really try my luck there. I am kinda stuck. I am afraid of telling friends and folks that I am planning to go back to steel. That doesn't seem like such a nice aspiration for an IIT-IIM grad...right....so I need to do something respectable enough, with enough money, and lastly which should make me happy. Happiness where art thou :-(
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Mad mad rushI should sit and fiddle through my CV right now but since I dont have the heart to find out any more about myself (read:excavate) or to put the same in a fancy form-I have decided to return to my recluse. Why am I so anti job, anti rush? Why am I not able to enjoy this whole mad rush for summer placements in my B-school like many others? Why do I scorn making CVs, filling forms, dreaming of a high powered internship on Wall Street? Is it something within me or am I too afraid to test waters?
The murky business of marketing myself through a CV has driven me to nuts. Sample this:
"Since birth I wanted to be an I-banker"...yeah, sure, I believe you !! "I have a passion for marketing anything and everything on Planet Earth"....hillarious..buffonery at its best. I shud also write then "I just looove consulting. I have consulted my parents, my friends, my teachers, my dog !!!" dammit. Couple it with the silly formatting and the perils of working on Bill Gate's Word. The margins, the borders, the spacing-its the worst timepass ever. I have looked at my CV long and hard and decided to chuck any thoughts of doing anything more with it. Though its a silly reflection of my inherent talents, my absolutely dazzling personality and my multifaceted capabilities-I'd rather not bore a recruiter to death. If he knows me so much, he'd rather come and ask me to become the CEO of his company.
There is a skit that is staged everyday at my school-for mortals it is called a PPT. Some guys in pricey suits come and speak about their organizations. Some are "full attitude"-you come coz we are the best, and there are others who beg you to consider, give a shot to their companies. People dont listen to what they say. They are busy framing intelligent questions to ask in the talk. So that the guy on the other side would be like "WOW !! that kid is real smart"...this question asking (QA) pressure is so much that you can see constipated faces in the lecture hall, busy whacking their brains to come up with an OOTW (out-of-the-world) question. Creates so much peer pressure on the few innocent others, who, faced with a pressure to QA-blurt out questions like "you have told us all nice things abt ur company, please enligten us with some wekanesses too". Earth-shattering is the feeling I have felt so many times in the past few months. I'd rather wish I'd go back to the low-tech, low-funda engineering college, that I hail from. Where, I used to look for a decent suit, 10 minutes before an interview, coz all my t-shirts were torn from one place or the other. Those beautiful, innocent days. I pity the kids who come straight from college to do an MBA..this would be a helluva ride for them. From their innocent havens they come to this mad mad place where everyone has kept their brains safely locked in vaults at home, and have come here with flashy suits and unwieldy words. There are also some permanent cynics, who would scorn what junta does, would have a comment to make on nething and everything, but inside, closeted in their rooms, would do the very same thing. More than the flashy, mindless people, its these cynic hypocrites, who are in a worse position. Am I also turning into one!!! Who knows !!
Enough of silly, mindless diary stuff. Exams start soon. I'd rather study. Not for grades but because I cam here for this, for doing an MBA. The whole purpose is getting lost in this mad rush, it seems.
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
hibernation overBeen hibernating for months now. Time I got up and write something. Passively I have written a lot in the last three months. Wrote an article for the college magazine, not that I really like it, but researched article rather than general globe was my first experience and I should say it wasn't that bad. Junta complained of the article being too long, not comprehensive enough, painstakingly verbose etc. etc. Would have published it on my blog, just that I'd rather publish writings that I am personally fond of, which brings me to the poem I wrote yesterday. 'Twas raining cats and dogs and me closeted inside my room with the most terrible cold I have had in years, could only write this....(it doesn't make much sense...I watched Remington Steele yesterday and being a Pierce Brosnan fan, this seemed an akmost obvious thing to write :D)
I have often wondered what are the meanings hidden in your eyes
when you smile and you frown
your eyes turn a shade darker than your face;
as if its something sinister inside you
that has come out and taken the shape of your feelings
I know you are evil
you dont mean no harm but thats when you harm the most
when you flirtingly compliment me on the color of my eyes
you are enjoying the blush creeping across my face;
I like looking at you, walking out of my doorway
I love to enjoy the little victory I achieve
with letting you go, not even calling you back;
but then the sadness in your eyes
at being refused the thing you relish
holds me by my arm and I call you back
"would I see you again tomorrow?"
and then the same twitching of your upper lip
the force to restrain when you want to commit
I hate that sardonic, sarcastic smile
which looks at me, laughs and then turns aside
no promise, no words
commitments from you seem too absurd to expect
But awe, fear, a hearty laughter, a broken you,
I would wait to see passion flare in any form in you
that would make it interesting
I would for once believe you are human