Author: SK

he was the “common man” of IIMB. common dog, rather. like the pug in the hutch ad, wherever you go he would follow. he has made his presence felt by shaking a leg and a tail at L^2 parties. he has attended many a class, and has even slept through some of the more boring ones. he has followed us around all over campus, but never out of it. he has stood by, watching, as we played wing cricket. he has been there at every pizza order-in, waiting patiently for the leftovers and crumbs – sometimes he’s been rewarded with a whole piece.

and yeah, if you say that the most important thing in an IIM is placements, our man even attends PPTs. he made himself comfortable on the floor of auditorium during the Merrill Lynch PPT, leading to a wisecrack from the presenter (something to the effect that junior represents the average associate at ML – all of them work like dogs or somethings).

just like gundu rao, the mess staff, the walls and the trees, junior will remain a fixture at IIMB. hopefully. for there was an attempt to clear the campus of dogs a couple of months ago.

this is my first blog from my new firm. it’s a fairly small office, with no fixed seating. we are expected to be away at client sites most of the time so it’s ok. we don’t have a loo of our own, but share it with a few other firms in the same building.

the interesting thing I noticed in this loo was the huge barriers that have been erected between adjacent urinals. So high that you can’t even figure out who it is next to you! Quite a contrast to, say, my office in London where I interned, where there were absolutely no barriers between urinals! Would be a really pissing-off experience when your boss would come and stand next to you.

One problem which I’ve always worried about is about designing the optimal urinal division (by minimizing the size of the stone slab required to separate). For one, it is different for different age groups. For example in a school, where most users will be young boys, the walls can be lower than in other places. Also, another problem would be to whether put more stone above (near the people’s faces) or below (near the center of gravity). Then there is the other dimension (the length of the slab sticking out of the wall). The thickness of the slab depends on the material used, and that also needs to be taken into consideration.

One should also take into account the cultural differences, and openness of society. In more open societies, a smaller slab can be used, and in some cases (like in my old office in London) totally dispensed with. In places like India, where people feel more insecure, it is better to have larger slabs.

I think I could do a BTech project on this.

For the record, several years ago, had remarked that urinals are like exam halls – prudence demands that you leave one slot vacant between adjacent users!

Reached here earlier this afternoon. Plane was 20 mins. late. Food onboard was bad so just had a bowl of cucumbers 🙁 feeling hungry now.

My company had sent a taxi to the station so getting to the hotel wasn’t tough. And i’ve been booked in a sea-facing room on the 5th floor. view is cool. initially felt giddy though.

First pertinent observation – phone calls seem more expensive in Mumbai than in Bangalore. a local call from GSM to GSM is Re. 1 in b’lore while it is Rs 2 here

More later

And before i forget, i’m leaving for goa for training on tuesday. Will be there till saturday. Hope to have fun…

Tomorrow I’ll be leaving Bangalore for the second time. I’m off to Mumbai tomorrow.

And I’m going to miss Bangalore terribly, even though I know I’ll keep coming back frequently, and plan to return for good in at max 10 years or so… And this time I’m not sure if I’ll be able to run back every other weeknd, like i did when i was in Madras…

Anyways, bombay sounds exciting, so let’s see…

Two days back, I wondered if the Arsenal-Villareal match would be worth watching. Given the way Villareal had played last week, it was very likely that Arsenal would bottle them up and would pump in another goal or two to settle the issue.

Instead, I thought I should conserve my sleep on that day so that I could watch the more appetizing Barca-Milan match instead. These were two really strong clubs, I thought, so the match should be more interesting than the Arsenal-Villareal match. How wrong I was!

The Arsenal-Villareal match turned out to be one hell of an entertainer, with sublime Latin American passing pitted against dour European (I dare not say English ? Campbell was (and that too was only because of Senderos? injury) the only Brit on display) defending. The statistics showed that around 60% of the possession was with Villareal, but I think it would?ve been more.

The Villareal brand of football was a treat to watch. Mostly one (or two) touch, short and accurate passing, unrelenting pressure, and heavy buildup along the midfield. What impressed me most about Villareal?s game was that they never cleared the ball! They never kicked the ball without there being someone to receive it. Even in front of their own goalmouth, they preferred to take the ball out through short passes. Superb stuff!

Credit should also be given to Arsenal?s defending, especially Gilberto and Toure. The chief reason Villareal wasn?t able to penetrate Arsenal?s D too much was that both Riquelme and Forlan were completely tied down and put out of the game. In their absence, and with Franco being woefully out of touch, it was no surprise Villareal couldn?t penetrate too much, and on the few occasions Javi Venta exploited the weak Arsenal left-back, France somehow managed to not put it in.

90 minutes of amazing soccer, and not once did I feel sleepy through the course of the match. Contrast this to yesterday?s largely insipid Barca-Milan match where I drifted off to sleep every 10 minutes or so. Milan never seemed to be in the game, with Barca totally dominating them in the midfield. Don?t recall more than a couple of occasions when Milan threatened, with most of the action happening in their own half where Dida, for a change, was superb.

Four great clubs. Two games. Identical score-lines. And yet so different. Looking forward to the final on the 17th. Somehow I think Gunners will win that one.

PS: Milan was the only non-yellow team in the semis. Villareal wear yellow, and both Arsenal and Barca have yellow away jerseys! And Aruabbarena (Villareal left-back) is a really nice name to pronounce, just like Jotapata or Wasim Akram!

Given that my job requires me to wear formals for work daily, I’ve been trying to increase my collection of formal shirts. One small problem though – my arms are too long for my body, at least the shirtmakers seem to tell me that.

The basic problme is that my size shirts aren’t long enough to cover my arms. They end somewhere close to my watch making it look really really ugly! And shirts with longer arms are available in the more casual brands. I mean excalibur fits me but not arrow. Allen Solly fits me but not Louie Phillippe! And I need shirst that can be worn inside my suit!!

Giving up..

In order to find someone for myself and not go through the arranged marriage market, I?ve kinda started my search. The lazy bum I am, I?m using the hill-climbing algorithm. Think I have hit a local optimum. And jumping the gun being my habit, I tell my mom about it before I confirm it with the woman in question.

Anyways, mom is not happy with my search methodology and says that I?m not searching thoroughly enough, she now wants me to take a few more years and use simulated annealing or something that complicated so as to ?not simply settle for local optima?.

Have been having really arbit and funny dreams of late. Two weeks ago, a certain somebody had written poetry for me. A day after that, my dad had admonished me for my excessively long phone calls ? this particular dream came true a couple of days after that!

Last week I dreamt that I had gone to the market with my father and was carrying a bagful of watermelons. I?m crossing the road to reach our car, when a watermelon slips out of the bag and falls on to the road. A passing car then runs over the fallen watermelon, completely crushing it and leaving the entire road in a mess. And then dad blasts me for it!

This partly came true when I was holding a bagful of tender coconuts the other day and had to cross the road with it to reach my aunt?s house. And while I?m crossing a coconut almost falls out of the bag. And my mom who?s accompanying me is about to scream at me. And I skillfully manage to catch the falling coconut while still balancing the bag of the rest of the coconuts. And I?m sure if I had dropped the coconut, the car which ran over it wouldn?t have been able to crush it!

This morning?s dream was the scariest. I dreamt that I receive a letter from my employer that they are currently overstaffed, and that they are laying me off ? a week before I am supposed to join. Reminds me of the IT bust in 2002 when several reputed software companies did that ? pick graduates from campuses and then lay them off even before it starts! Sincerely hope this dream doesn?t come true!