The Cold and the Beautiful

One more article from my Euro Trip.

I had pretty much seen all of Jonkoping's attractions in the 2 months I had been there - being a sleepy, small town, this primarily consisted of beautiful women, beautiful lakes and beautiful scenery. Having a small break in my academic schedule, I decided to Boldly Go Where Man Has Seen Snow Before. It was October, and being in southern Sweden, the temperature was irritatingly low, but with no hint of snow. Friends in Germany had ridiculed my lack of snow, while displaying numerous photos of them making snowmen. I was even gloomily told that snowfall was predicted in January, by which time I would be back in India. A brief background - Sweden is like the Arunachal Pradesh of Europe - it just tapers on and on. The snowy, extremely cold bits we read so often in the papers are all in the sparsely-populated north.

I opened the Swedish map, and randomly looked at descriptions of places really, really North. The train time table was opened simultaneously; I had to select a place which would enable me to spend a night on the train, reach there in the morning, and leave that night again by train. (I must add that I possessed inarguably the most essential piece of paper any backpacker worth his hiking boots needed - a Eurail pass. Travel by train was mostly free, and most decisions to go places were dependent on the trains to that place.) I narrowed down my choice to a few places, and finally chose Kiruna.

I left that evening, making a note of train timings, and the places to see. It got dark pretty early, and the train journey was livened up by a group of middle-aged women getting up and singing Happy Birthday to You in loud Swedish (Grattis till er! Grattis till er! Grattis till er, dear Whatzisname! Grattis till er)

What I saw the next morning was truly magical. The landscape was pristine white, the forest of leafless pine trees, which had appeared bleak, forlorn and forbidding, now appeared to be shimmering with light, when draped in white blankets of snow. The air was exceedingly clear and this vista stretched on for miles together. Having lived in hot-hotter-hottest Chennai all my life, it was the first time I was seeing snow. Now, with a cup of coffee in my hand, and snug in the train compartment with the outside landscape to gaze at, I could joyously skim through Raskolnikov's debate to
kill himself. ( Long train journeys with nothing else to do are ideal for wanting to read books one has always wanted to read. Depressing books like Crime and Punishment so aptly fell into this category.)

I reached Kiruna at 1000 AM, and ventured straight out of the station. I rushed to the fresh mound of snow outside, made my first snowball, and 'shot the snowball into the air, it fell to the earth, I knew not where.' I was preparing another snowball to follow its predecessor, when I did know where it had fallen. I was caught white-handed in the act, and profusely apologised to an old gentleman for having pelted his dog with snow.

I shfted operations to another area; after hitting a tree, a stationary car, and a baby in a pram, I decided to ease up on the snowball throwing and decided to tramp about in the snow. The sun was shining above, and it felt mildly pleasant at around 2 degrees( I was wearing six layers of winter clothing - basically every sweater and jacket I possessed) After working out the exuberance of twenty four years of Never Having Seen Snow, and feelingly slightly cold in hands ( normal gloves - after all, a shoestring does not extend to your hands) I headed out to the friendly, neighbourhood tourist office to plan my itinerary. The lady at the counter gave me a map and marked out a walking trail that would take a few hours. She regretfully informed me that it was only the beginning of the winter, so everything was closed, so there would be no Reindeer and no Northern Lights. Drat! I had so wanted to see Rudolf prancing about, with a Red Light on his nose, a green light in the skies above and an amber drink in my hand ( the last mentioned just so's traffic conventions are maintained)

I started walking along the path she had marked, when I saw this middle-aged lady, walking in front, with the professional air of a Nordic Walker. I smiled at her, and that broke the ice between us. She agreed to let me join her in her walk, and agreed to show me the sights. As she quite trustingly unbent, she told me she had lived all her life in the town of Kiruna, her husband worked in the mines nearby and found the 2 degree temperature rather warm. ( These Swedes! Tap Tap Tap) The thought of my seeing snow for the first time was immensely humourous to her, and when she learnt I had worked in the software industry, she was quite respectful.( You do our job so much better, she said)

After a brief tramp through a forest, we came to a hillock where we could view the entire town, where she pointed out Kiruna's sights - a large school where her children studied, a church and ugly black hills in the background which provided the mines that served as the backbone of the town's economy. The entire experience seemed extremely surreal - joining an unknown person on a brisk walk through a snow-clad forest in the Arctic Circle, with the sun shining down.

After a while though, it sadly came to an end she regretfully told me that I was not properly dressed for the walk. Was it my unshaven, three-days stubble, the slightly wolfish look that came from eating only fries for breakfast or was it the ugly red backpack filled with clothes, I asked, feeling the brunt of the backpacker's curse on me. Neither, she said, and pointed to my shoes.
Lesson Learnt: Reebok Tennis shoes bought in Chennai are NOT meant to be used for walking through Deep Snow.

I trudged back to the town centre, and after buying a pizza costing as much money as needed to start a pizza joint in Chennai( Goach's Paradox: Why are Scandinavians the most polite people on Earth, when they pay the steepest prices for everything?) I decided to go into the church. Immensely peaceful, with dark wooden panelling, big candles and bright lights that looked quite picturesque. It was around 1400 hours by now, and the town centre was the only place I hadn't been to, so I dutifully went there and learnt quite a bit on the history of Kiruna ( Amazing fact: Due to mining, the entire town is sinking, and they have to transplant it lock, stock, home and school, to another area. Where exactly is still being debated)

Feeling quite confident in my ability to handle a How Well Do You Know Kiruna Quiz on Facebook, I was told to see an icehotel in Jukkasjarvi, a short bus ride away. I took a bus which deposited me near it( It is the same one in Die Another Day). They were still building it, and I could see huge chunks of light blue ice being cut into different pieces and laid on the ground. The water was taken only from certain pure, pristine streams, so any guests who so desired could have the best Ganga snanam possible. Being quite cold now, I made a cursory trip round it and then went inside a brick hotel. The return bus would be back in an hour, and I was advised to go to a church nearby.

I went there, was not surprised to find myself alone and remained inside for quite a while. You might wonder if I had been entranced by the beauty and magnificence of the 18th century church, or captivated by its bright lights and golden candles? Rest assured - I stuck to my tambram roots. It was just that by this time become quite sick of the extremely dark ( at 1630) and the cold ( minus five degrees) and wanted to be somewhere else( Chennai in peak summer looked so inviting) Visions of frost-bite and snowstorms floated in front of me, especially since no one knew where I was. The stupid bus was taking forever, I needed to go to the toilet and desperately wanted a warm drink, and the church was the only shelter around.

The bus finally came, the walk to the station seemed infernally long, especially against the cold wind, and I reached around an hour before the train came. I waited for the train, felt like killing Dostoevsky for rambling on, and resolved never to go to infernally cold places ever again.

When I reached Jonkoping the next day, I banished the thought of cold to the distant recesses of my mind, aided in this process by an expensive Chai Latte. I brought out my Lonely Planet, all eager to plot the next trip...

QFI Quiz Fest

(Slightly IIMA specific post disclaimer)

Have you done any of the following?

Taken a Which-Dorm-Will-You-Be-In Quiz?
Taken a How-Many-Countries-Will-You-Visit-In-Europe Quiz?
Taken a How-Many-Movies-Can-You-Watch-In-A-Day Quiz? (Basically, are you on the threshold of being a jobless tuccha in IIMA?)

Taken a How-Many-Facebook-Quizzes-In-A-Day-Can-You-Take Quiz?
Taken a Which-Facebook-Quiz-Are-You Quiz? ( Hello, PGP3 from IIMA waiting to start working!)

Blocked All quizzes on facebook, and refuse to log on for fear of seeing arbit people take arbit quizzes and filling your page with nonsense? ( working professionals)

In other words, does the sight of the word ‘Quiz’ fill you up with strong emotions?
If so, this notice is for you.
If not, its time for you to take the Why-Does-The-Word-Quiz-Not-Fill-You-Up-With-Strong-Emotion Quiz on facebook, and then come back to reading this.

The Quiz Foundation of India Chennai is organizing a quiz fest on June 7. There will be a SpEnt Quiz, on the topics of Sports and Entertainment, and inspired by the ‘Amount-Of-Time-SpEnt-on-Facebook-Quizzing’ Quiz. This will be followed by the QFI Open Quiz, a general quiz, inspired by the answer of ‘Which-Army-Rank-Will-Your-Quiz-Be’ Quiz?
The details are as follows:
Date: 7th of June, 2009 (Sunday)
Venue: Museum Theatre, Egmore, Chennai
Sports and Entertainment Quiz
Quizmaster: Rajen Prabhu
Research Team: Sreeram, Vijay Sarathy, Vinod Ganesh, Krishnamurti Ganesh, Vikram Rajan, Sivakumar V.V.
Timings: Prelims – 10:30 a.m. and Finals – 11:30 a.m.
Team size: Maximum of 2 members
General Quiz
Quizmaster: Vinod Ganesh
Research Team: Krishnamurti Ganesh, Vikram Rajan
Timings: Prelims – 03:30 p.m. and Finals – 05:00 p.m.
Team size: Maximum of 3 members
If, for reasons of IPL team affiliation, you happen to not live in Chennai, I hope you realize now that by living in Chennai, you get to support the Super Kings AND participate in the annual QFI Quiz Fest.

If you are not from IIMA, you are allowed to participate as long as you get an amnesty signed from your board stating that they you will never again take part in any facebook quiz. (Yes, I will start working soon)

Obligatory Questions:

1) American colleges have an annual students directory which have the photo and details of the students. It is officially titled ‘The Photo Address Book’. Being too long a name, what nickname did they give to it?

2) This annual event was started in 1925 by the Louisville Courier-Journal and there have been 78 editions held so far. The event can only be sponsored by daily and weekly newspapers serving English speaking populations all around the world. Which event are we talking about?

Answers:
1) They call it a ‘Facebook’ and this reportedly inspired Zuckerberg to name his website.
2) The Scripps Spelling Bee


So be there!

Variety is the Rice of Life

Effect of having just finished reading Crime and Punishment, and having nothing else to do all day. Written on a lonely, boring day in Sweden ( where I had to cook for myself, since eating out was insanely expensive; no net or tv in the room either)

He spent ages agonizing in bed, whether he would gain anything by waking up promptly at eight. Was the hot water bath, which was available only early in the morning, worth the long hours spent in the mid-morning with nothing to do? After a quick weighing of the pros and cons, he decided against waking up, and got up at a more respectable ten in the morning.
It was a bright, sunny day, but he knew from instinct that it would be really cold outside. After a depressing breakfast of corn-flakes, which taken on a daily basis, seemed to taste more of wood shavings than anything else, he turned to VS Naipaul's 'A House for Mr. Biswas.', the only book available at that time. His mood turned even more somber as he realized the protagonist was leading an incredibly sad life, and things would keep going downhill for him. The book was put down with a thud, but taken up after five minutes thinking had reasoned out that there was nothing else to do.

When the book was dropped a second time, he decided to turn his energies towards cooking, where he hoped fate would be kinder to him. A mental check-list of the items present followed, and he decided to make up with determination and will-power what items he missed, rather than risk a trip to the super-market in the sub-zero temperatures outside. The ingredients available were beans, broccoli and rice, and he decided to combine the lot with pulao masala. He had no idea how it would taste, but he was sure it would be edible. Secure in the knowledge that there was nothing else to do, he set about cutting the beans and broccoli with a patience he never knew he possessed. The rice was ready in next to no time, and given the ample time present to him, he decided to both boil and fry the vegetables, a practice he had not followed in cooking until then.

Spices were added with gay abandon, as he had still not learnt the proper quantities. Considering he didn't know what to expect at the end of it, he reckoned on adding spices and salt whenever he got bored with things. Which was around every five minutes or so.After about an hour's cooking, the vegetables were finally ready and he mixed everything in the rice cooker, and added pulao masala. On first tasting this dish, he realized he had tasted something similar many, many times before.

After 7 years of school, 4 years of college and 2 years of a software job, where he used to take a lunch box of similar ( but much better) vegetable rice on a daily basis, he realized with a pleasant smile that he had finally discovered how it was prepared.

ps - Mashed pringles chips was used as an appalam substitute.

The blog is dead, Long live the Blog!

Considering this blog is just about dead, I have decided to resuscitate it with a few articles. Given that I've become just so incredibly busy doing absolutely nothing, and given the corresponding sloth associated with it, let me put up a few random articles, that I had started over the last one year, but not posted.
The following article was started during internship in Dubai

This is the story of an epic battle between Iron Mike and me, the scars of which will be present for a very, very long time, especially on the battlefield, which was a formal shirt. At the end of it, both of us were really steamed up over it.

Round 1 - Selection of the battlefield

There was an ironing board in my hotel room, but somehow it seemed really tiny, especially when compared to my shirt.If I spread the shirt fully, it tended to extend beyond the surface. Also, the side stand to hold the Iron didn't seem to be stable enough to hold the iron. After trying various angles and getting board, I chucked the board back into the clothes-stand and decided to use a dining slab made of marble which had more area.
Winner - Krishnamurti

Round 2 - Placing the shirt suitably
I thought I knew the correct way to place a shirt, so that one could iron without further creases. Apparently, I was wrong. I simulated all combinations in order to get a second crease from collar to bottom, passing near the pocket. The shirt was way bulkier and heavier than it should have been. 'Oh shirt!', I thought, as I realized it could not be done. After around 20 minutes, I moderated my ambition. I decided to pleat leave it alone and just iron out all the creases.
Moral of the story : IIMA students do NOT consider placement as the be-all and end-all of life.
Winner - Shirt


Round 3 - The iron is out cold
By the time it took me to place the shirt suitably so that one could iron out the creases, the stoopid iron had gotten cold. So, I had to put the plug on it ( which obviously wasn't nearby). Once I brought it near the shirt, it became cold and lifeless in no time. So, I took it to the plug point, and then back to the dining board. After the third or fourth time this happened, I was really hot and bothered, while the iron remained cool and calm.
Winner - Iron Mike

Round 4 - Actually ironing
After all the preamble, I finally used the iron by brute force. I put the shirt out of the crease, effectively stumping the iron for an answer. Moving the iron up and down, I put my shirt in some semblance of order. Hooray!
Winner - Krishnamurti

At the end of it, A One Hour War resulted in exactly one shirt pressed. I was thoroughly exhausted, and my nerves were frayed. Ah well, looks like I'm making a bad imPression on you with my rusted ironing skills. Who had thought pumping iron was so hard?

2 Bad Jokes

Called MHU's in IIMA jargon.

Joke-in-Law

There is a severe shortage of an essential commodity, say rice, in India.
Hence, the government allocates rice randomly to people. Needless to say,
people are incensed at being allowed to being alloted random quantities of
rice, quite often much below their requirements.The people rice up in protest.
Some decide to take the matter to court. A person decides to go to private
courts to speed up the process.
How would you term the decision that the private court made?

Ans. Arbitration on Arbit Ration

Cricket Joke


It was noticed that Jayawardene won all the matches day-night he captained,
especially in locations where there was substantial moisture in the
evening.
He had a knack of predicting when to bat first, and when to bring on the
spinners when bowling second. Invariably, these predictions would turn the
dewuel in Sri Lanka' favour.
It was dewring one of these tournaments that an ibank recruiter spotted him.
They noticed him making trips to the ground for several evenings before every
match. Realising that he wasn't as dewy-eyed and
innocent as he appeared, they cornered him and said 'Dewde, waddya upto?'. Dew
to this reply, and his past proven success, the headhunter give him an instant
offer. Can dyou tell me what he said?

Ans. "Dew diligence is the secret of my success"

Does the flap of a butterfly’s wing in LKP set off a blizzard of rock in RJM?

Yesterday, while idly walking the lawns of LKP, an MBA student was struck by a brilliant thought. He decided to describe the behavior of people who descended upon Ahmedabad every year and like all MBA students are wont to do, he decided to create a model of his own. The parameters he used were enthu, enthu, enthu, skill, creativity, energy and the ability to crack short MANAC quizzes (the last mentioned just to ensure the MBA S. himself would fit in the model). Inspired by the names of other models, he wanted to come up with a super pseud name and thus chose the refreshingly-original-and-blindingly-radical name of Chaos Theory.

To check whether Chaos Theory actually fit into real life Chaos Practicals, he decided to observe the proceedings from afar. First up were the dances. These were vibrant, full of color and brilliant to watch; the dancers energetic; literally scorching the stage with their dance moves. In fact, the only feature missing was that the dances didn’t depict whether the dancers could crack short MANAC quizzes or not. Deciding to give his model a second shot, he decided to fit the fashion parade into his framework. However, the fashion parade provided so many models to keep track of that our MBA S. was totally lost in a 2-by-2 matrix of his own dreams. Among the many he did notice, Madame Butterfly occupied his attention the most, her head still as she paced the stage and her wings flapping ever so silently. This model seemed to predict a major impact on future events, and he realized he would just have to wait and watch.

Later that night, his worst fears came true, and the butterfly effect was proved beyond all doubt.The flapping had resulted in a tornado which developed into cataclysmic proportions. The blizzard of rock had everybody in the auditorium head-banging to their head’s content. There was enthu, enthu, enthu, skill, etc etc. The MBA S. noticed with delight that his model seemed to work on almost all parameters.(On a lighter note, he noticed that one of the bands had taken the name Blizzard very seriously and played the song, Hail, Hail, Hail and Kill).
He headed back to his room, deciding to give his model two more days of real life practice before proclaiming it to all and sundry. Would our brave MBA S.
be proved right? Or would the forces of Nashure drive his theory into the ground? Stay tuned tomorrow, same butterfly-time same butterfly-channel!


PS - part of an article I had written for the newsletter of Chaos
Chaos - our cultural fest
RJM - An ultra-pseud auditorium
LKP - best open-air theatre in the world!
MANAC - see post below

MANiACal

“Let there be liabilities!” With this cryptic statement, our MANAC professor asked us to continue with the case. This was the third class, and until this my understanding of the rudimentary concepts had been proper. (Yes! Hard to believe but I can still can proclaim loudly from the rooftops - there was a time – exactly 2 sessions - when I understood MANAC!) . After this, well, … Let’s just say I went deeply into the red in the grade sheet.

MANAC stands for Man Can’t, though some benighted souls seem to be believe that it stands for Managerial Accounting. Like wisdom teeth and Australian victories, some things in life just can't be avoided.

Since there are must be people out there who voluntarily flirt with danger, the following Dummies Guide to MANAC is for them.

1) T-Account :IOU's kept with canteen primarily to pay for the copious amounts of beverage students drink is called a t-account.

2) Balance-Sheets: The remaining paper left in the printer after taking all the printouts you need.

3) Current Liability: Unpaid electricity bills of yours.

4) Current Assets: Do I need to elaborate more on this?

5) Income statement: The salary slip one used to get at the end of the month while working, leaving one with a pleasurable sense of having achieved something.

6) Liabilities: Your capacity to tell untruths so that the 2 sides balance.

7) Bad debt: Some people struggle to solve acccounting problems. They spend ages and ages and just when they think they’ve nailed it, they notice a negative balance of $1,00,00,000 in the liabilities( refer above) column. They suffer major heart attacks and sometimes even expire. This is known as a ‘bad debt’.

8) Profit and Loss Statement: When you are cold called by the professor, and are at a loss to state what the profit is.

9) Operating Lease, Finance Lease, Please Lease Me: I have no idea what these are so the lease said the better.

10) Capital: This is the most obvious figure that comes in the balance sheet. Or does it come in cash flow statement? Wherever it comes, as every second standard school kid knows, this is New Delhi.

Now that the ground rules are laid, let’s get down to the serious business. In any T-account, you have to put various values in the left and various values in the right. People who can’t differentiate between left and right, don’t fret. Even the people who can differentiate between R and L are not sure if they are right, so don't feel left behind.

My suggestion is to do what I normally do. Close your eyes and arbitrarily put the value whichever side you want. Look at it this way, you have only a 50% chance of getting it wrong.

One normally has never ever balanced a balance sheet. and doesn't think one can. Is fairly sure nobody can either. People get pure lucky.'Tis a fact of life that one cant balance a sheet without becoming mentally imbalanced.

Then there are the oh-too-often 'surprise' MANAC quizzes. These have a very nice feature- being incredibly short, one's misery ends quickly. Calculators are considered very essential. This is mainly to time the quiz. By the time you open the calculator, the quiz is over so the only thing to do is to close it again. Till the next quiz.

Now, that you have understood the intricacies of balance-sheets, cash-flows and p & l statements, feel free to go ahead and do some accounting. Please do inform me if you can balance balance-sheets, cash cash flows and profit and loss profit and loss statements. If you can fill a minute with sixty seconds worth of accounts done, then you will be a man, my son!

PS - This post is both to vent my existenstial angst and an opportunity to make the worst pj's ever.

The Case of the Billion Bolts

I walked in through the door. I noticed the dame sitting tall and upright against the chair. She stiffly shook my hand and asked me to sit. She asked me to tell her about myself. Ah, these dames. Never trust anybody!

“My name is Wim Wian. What people call me is something else. I’m an IIMA student. It says so on PGP1 List of Students.”

The last thing I wanted to solve this morning was a case, but the dame immediately started on it. Dames always bring trouble and my sixth sense told me this one was going to full of it. The wind from the air conditioner suddenly seemed to blow cooler and I pulled my coat tighter round me as she started the reading out the case.

“Estimate the number of bolts in the United States”

What? Was she for real? Did she expect me to solve this case? It was another baffling case and I thought she expected too much out of me. Why did this dame want to know anyway?

I reviewed the facts.

a) This was a bolt from the blue.

b) Bolts are used for various purposes.

c) There is a country named United States.

d) She was bolting mad.

e) She was a mental case.

I started thinking about what bolts were used for. What were they used for anyway? I reached inside my coat and felt for my weapon. My heart went cold as I realized the inner pocket was empty. I felt I had lost my right hand. Alas, I had forgotten to bring my trusty Casio FX-260 calculator.

I needed a clue and a drink. Wordlessly she handed me a glass of water and motioned me to begin. This dame needed answers, and fast.

I started explaining what I thought about the case. Bolts are used for a number of purposes. I started listing them out. I then went on estimate the number of bolts present in an average house. My voice droned on and on, with the case facts being stated in as many different ways as possible. The dame let me speak, interrupting me with a question now and then.

As I continued speaking, I realized that she wasn’t interested in answers. She just wanted to watch me think! She was a real close one, this dame. Deciding to play on, I kept on speaking as long as possible.

Then suddenly the answer hit me. The pieces all fit together. This was obviously a ‘numbers’ racket.I blurted out the answer ‘One Billion’. She gave a grim nod and seemed satisfied with that. She handed me back my file and I went out closing the door.

Case closed.

PS - Having recently participated in the summers placement process, the above is a fictional 1930's Private Eye spoof on the case interview conducted by consulting firms.