Special Times

Apparently getting married is not easy. I have witnessed so many cases of people struggling, parents opposing, breakdowns happening and what not. But then there are many positive results too. I guess everyone just loves the drama. Case in point is Varun's wedding. It took more than three years to get all approvals. Kind of like the Government of India, eh? 

I wasn't roped in for one choreographed dance, it was three! There were practice sessions galore but they were more of drinking and entertainment sessions than anything else. That showed on the stage when the sequence which had ALL of us turned out to be a complete disaster. The other two were still alright.

But in the larger scheme of things, that didn't matter at all. 

In the past week I got to meet all the people who had made life comfortable when it was socially at one of the worst junctures. When I had no friends in my own class or college. When I didn't seem to get along with anyone. When I looked forward to the one hour in a maddeningly crowded bus just so that I could have a good time. Yes, it was the U Special gang of 2004-06. And their extended circle of niceness. 

Anjor - the mysterious entertainer

Ankita - the sweet, harmless one

Tarun - the best man

Yutika - incredible combination of kind and funny

Maria - my newest bud!

Sushmit - he lives in a land far away but Twitter bridges borders

Satyam - obnoxious no more; situational humour is still his thing

Hemant - he seems to have come of age

I would have liked to spend time with Avni too. But that didn't happen. 

My parents were extremely kind. I stayed out late on consecutive nights and they were okay with that. 

I must mention that the formal events were complete eye candy fests. I don't remember the last time I saw so many good looking men under one roof. Need I say more? Actually I must. I got a lot of male attention and suddenly being single was like the cool factor working for me. It was flattering. More on flattery in another post. 

Unfortunately we don't have any pictures together and this is the best Tarun managed on a practice night

I skipped dinner to get mehendi. Some kind hearts fed me afterwards

Did I mention we all got drunk at the cocktail?

Cannot express how much I loved being a part of the whole process with all these people

 

The happy man!

A trend that got established at this wedding is that I always find a moment to cry out of sheer happiness for the couple. Done it at too many weddings now. 

In the last month two more weddings got fixed. I knew it was going to be an entertaining year. 

Pictures courtesy - Hari (oh!, thisssss is Hari!)

Nostalgia, eh?

Over the past two weeks I have had the word 'miss' flash on my Facebook and Gtalk a gazillion times. People are expressing the sentiment about college getting over via their status updates and new photo albums. Me, something somewhere has died. Or maybe I am too busy feeling other emotions to have space for that sentiment. God knows!

But hardly a week out of college, and I have a point to associate the 'miss' word with too. The marketing classes, what else! I just finished watching Lessons in Marketing on CNBC TV18, a show where the top 12 B-schools of India fight it out in front of some of the best in the industry, for the best of rewards. It was nothing different from sitting in marketing classes back in college - analysing each recommendation that the presenting team makes, having an opinion of our own for everything, and actually feeling every single bit of the total process!

People on the show today might have been from the best schools in India, but I saw for myself that they are nothing different or better than some of us who do not qualify to be in the same league because of some stupid reasons, luck for one. They did not seem to have studied anything different from what we did, and their ideas were nothing out of the world either. It was exactly the same as I experienced over the past two years - some absolutely brilliant ideas, and some that were laughable. Nothing different. Just a matter of a tag.

And while as of today nothing seems to be working in my favour, I know I will even it out in the years to come. And the gods of marketing management and marketing research, Dr. V.V.R. Sastry and Dr. Prantosh Banerjee respectively, will remain just what they are! Them, and their classes, I miss.

P.S. - In the post written on March 17th, there was a horrible typo that was pointed out by a friend. I am still not over it. Did not want to change it there 'coz it would have then flashed on your readers again. But yes, it was not 'heals'. I meant 'heels'.

Thanks! :)

Trivial Evolution

I lent out three pieces of clothing for a party that even I am attending. I! The casual dresser.
Make way, people! Times are changing! :P

Screw It!

I made an effort to look good to feel good today. Good hair day and my super-sexed black-rimmed glasses from the past added to it. So, mentally, I feel better.

Yesterday, while I was at the hospital, a revolution began in college. This time it was more than words. The man I hate is almost out of here thanks to the unity of the batch. The news will be officially confirmed in a batch meeting at 10:00 p.m. It finally feels good to be here.

Somebody offered me a good job today. Just that it isn't directly related to what I am looking at. I need to figure how to handle this 'tactfully'.

The colour status movement on Facebook is much much bigger than I thought it was. I read the word 'cyber-flashing' for it somewhere! But it's good to be part of it. Google it if you don't know what I am talking about. :-)

The rest is all ok. You can hope to read more about my struggle to find a job over the coming months.

Corporate Culture

It’s a phase where I am getting bogged down by the legacy of a brand that I carry with myself wherever I go. I thought I washed it out when I joined my present college, but turns out I was wrong. I know I can be enthused by this fact and use it to my advantage, but right now I’m somehow not in a position to do that, and it quite sucks.

___

This is the fifth office that I am in. And I have had enough number of people around me to talk about their offices as well. I think if I say that I want to work in a place where the ultimate management is not in Indian hands, it would not be a baseless statement. There is a difference in culture that trickles down. I don’t like working in non-clean, low on decorum, high decibel level kind of places.

___

I have felt pressure in and realised incompetence of my college on various occasions, but I have always accepted things the way they are. It takes a lot for this college to frustrate me with its system because I was prepared to face whatever shit they dole out. I do comment and crib, but that’s more like a routine thing and playing along with everyone else around. But today, I am bloody pissed. I hate this director, and I hate him! He might like to believe he is a workaholic, and people might like to believe that he has a strong network, but the fucker thinks that the world can function on his whims. Someone tell him he is wrong. He is one of the people I will get back at one day in life. He is making me succumb to things that I strongly oppose, and I will so not let him get away with it. Whenever my day comes.

___

On a lighter note...

I am the only woman on my floor in this office. And it is not exciting at all. I think something in me is dying.

Jargon rules in this industry. I’m going to have a tough time. Minutes of a meeting are referred to as service report. Bledy.

P.S. – I got more piercings in my ears. One of them is hurting. But I’m happy.

The Old Gang

In July '07, there was a post here about two friends who made it to Delhi School of Economics. I am happy to inform that they're both placed now with PWC and Citi and will be rich very soon. :D
Belonging to the same 'group', another two will be joining Titan and Genpact soon. Three are with Ernst & Young, Indian Express and the Jaypee Group. Neha and I are the only ones left. And we're both quite far from a job right now. :)

This feels real cool!

A Diary Entry

The day has come when I have started longing for college. I long for those moments. Today, I got one of my last few shots at it. It’s literally a countdown now. Collected the admit card today, will write five exams over the next month. Five days. One week after the last exam, a lot of us are ‘joining’ another place. Felt weird talking about that today. Vidur has always been “I-don’t-know-what-I-am-doing-next” in the past three years. And really, he does not know even an hour before a movie timing whether he is going for it or not. And today he was telling me how he is going to be trading in commodities in the world market. Jay was talking about how he’s gonna have a tough time travelling in the city heat without any conveyance provided by his ‘employers’. Felt like a grown-up. And the first day of college has just passed by, hasn’t it?

“Oh, you’re talking about that guy from DPS Noida? What’s his name again?”

It’s been three years.

So, two friends’ birthdays fall in the coming week and there HAD to be fun. There was a surprise planned. Loads of surprise presents with a significant memory attached to each, surprise cakes, surprise entries by friends who weren’t supposed to be around....and a lot of FUN. Lots of genuine, warm, big hugs. Lot of happy smiley faces. Loads of laughter – laughter that must have made that not-nice Chinese restaurant people wonder who these maniacs are and will they ever order or not! There were the birthday songs, there were the routine jokes, there were Neha Steps. And the film was rolling. There I realised that I love being behind the camera just as much as being in front of it. And it is not easy coming in front once you take hold of the camera unless you go – “main bhiiiii” which is what I had to do today. And then too, it was just my profile for a tiny 5-second thing. Damn! But I have voice. All over the videos! :D

It turned out to be even more special for the birthday boy and the birthday girl who could not stop grinning. Even after everybody left for home. I guess those smiles are worth the sunburn that others got over the past few days looking for presents. Kudos to V and Ami for roaming the streets of Kamala Nagar the way they did!

Oh, one of the compliments that I can never get enough of is about the weight that I have lost. It’s always an incredible feeling when somebody notices and tells you the same. And when someone goes – “no really, you have lost lots and lots of weight”, even if it is not true, it feels awesome. You won’t know what I am talking about if you haven’t experienced it but you can share my joy if you wish to. :P

But then you come back home, switch the TV on and see prime time CNN IBN showing a story where the Sindhi panchayat in Bhopal has banned girls from using cellphones, wearing scarves and riding two-wheelers because one Sindhi girl married a Muslim man, and are left speechless for a moment and then on an abusing spree for the next fifteen minutes. Following that you see their viewer feedback poll divided at almost 50% each for a YES and NO to the question – is this moral policing?. And then you really do not know what to think. Half the nation! You could curse a Bajrang Dal or an RSS but half the people of the country? Ok, half the respondents but even then isn’t it shocking enough? It saddens me.

I come back to my room. The PC is still on. I had watched Snippets - a documentary on college by two girls of the other economics section of my batch - a while back. That probably was the motivation for the opening paragraph of this entry. Again, you might not understand the impact that it had if you have not seen it but it is as if the moments and thoughts of the last three years have been put together in those twenty minutes. It’s an incredible piece of work!

There is stuff to write about one of my obsessions but I am thinking I’ll give it another post. Till then, bbye!
:-)

College Sweethearts III

College Sweethearts II

Meet my friends. That's Neha, Jayant, Amiya, Ishani, Vidur, Tarun, Saumya, and I'm there too. These candles were to be placed at a favourite spot in the college campus and none of us had doubts about where to keep them. These stairs are and will forever be called Neha Steps. Of course, there's a story behind that. But yes, three beautiful years spent in this college are officially over.

The friendships will remain...

RJ’s and APJ’s

RJ is a man every person who knows him has an opinion about. Not just an opinion, it’s a case of extreme like or dislike. I’m no different. I’ve liked him extremely, and hated him the same. He taught me in the first two years of college; made me miserable by not letting me pass a single test in the 2 years; and still managed to make me like him at the end of it all.
He has been the latest hot topic on the batch community on Orkut too. Today, he took a special class for us. And I loved every moment of it. I know that through the year there were only a handful of lectures that I paid attention in for this subject. That teacher is just so boring! And I was all ears today. He brought back the killer Micro classes’ feel. For a split second he even made me think that I love Economics and should consider doing an MA. Thank God it was just a split second. Maybe I won’t mind studying Eco if he teaches me every subject but before the impossibility of such a situation may come up, he would just laugh his sarcastic laugh and shoo me away. His favourite sarcasms about low levels of intelligence, not being able to solve 2nd standard Math (partial differentiation) and so forth, (according to him) are all applicable to me. Nonetheless, I totally admire that man. He’s the best teacher I’ve had in the 3 years of college and his sense of humour, however lame at times, does crack me up.

And his was the closing lecture. He started the journey for us and ended it too. Loved, loved, loved it! :-)


APJ of course, is someone everybody in India knows. After the bugger rain stopped, I went to his estate. I’ll have to say that it was a rather boring outing but flowers being the subject here, I shall not dwell too much on the negative bit of it. The Mughal Gardens are open for public in Feb-March every year so I thought I’ll check them out today. Two things I completely loved –

The musical gardens
Patriotic fervour in the air...fountains dancing to the tunes of ‘I love my India’, etc was great!!! Beautiful sight!

Lilies
Sadly, 99.9% of the lilies had still not flowered but whatever I saw was lovely. Now I know that however much I may love roses, my wedding decorations will have lilies. Asiatic ones, if not the Oriental ones! White and orange ones looked sooo cool.

The other flowers were all double their usual size. Looked gigantic but pretty. Dahlias, tulips, poppies, pansies, marigold, the bougainvilleas in pretty purple, and a strange rose called Joey’s Rose. Very pretty!

Also saw a tiny bio-diversity park. Turkeys, peahens, ducks, parakeets, and some more animals. Cute!

Mr President came out to meet the people and I missed him by 2-3 minutes. But that’s ok. I’ll meet him 2 weeks later in my own college. He’s the chief guest for our Annual Day. :D

But I must say, he has a very royal house. Yeah, I know it comes with responsibility but even then! I mean, how do you explain fountains on the roof-top? Now THAT is fancy. I’d feel like a queen if I got such a house to live in.

It was a short outing. Cell phones, cameras, water bottles, etc...nothing is allowed inside. So I could not even take any pictures. But it was a nice break. Liked it.

So RJ’s class and APJ’s house made it a nice day. :-)

(Not) Too Long!

More than 4 days! I don’t like this place at a slow pace. It’s almost like you not taking a bath and it irking YOU the most. Uh...not the best of analogies, that!

Everybody is talking about college getting over. I’m talking about it too, but it has not yet sunken in. Classes are over but since we still have some reason or the other to go to college, I don’t feel anything. Farewell is right here, and I’m just thinking about it as a party. The significance of it is not hitting me. People are clicking pictures and I want to do that too but I am not thinking. I’ve also written for the ‘farewell issue’ of the college journal and still nothing. It’s taking too long! I’m quicker than this at reactions. But nah! Not really bothered by it...I’m busy with a lot of other things.
But yes, the thought of moving away from a lot of friends is unsettling. Some may go to UK and some may go to Chennai. Others, I don’t know where. But I know that most of them will not be in Delhi in a few months from now. Miiiles away from here! But then I don’t know about myself either. I’m working my ass off to move away too.

I just hope everyone’s happy wherever they go. And we keep in touch. I know I’m not lazy when it comes to such things.

Living It

0400 hours: Everybody is tired but in a mood to have fun so the camera begins to roll and so does the madness.
This was while a cousin was in the middle of wedding vows. The rest of us, as always, found some place else to lose it.

The dancers (Nidhi and I) gear up and the photographer (Samridhi) starts singing...beedi jalayileeeee....

And the two of us do the popular steps from the original video! The exact same steps! NOW I can’t believe I did it, but yes, I did. I also had a big red flower in my hair by then.

The couple that got married the same day exactly a year ago was not behind. They wanted attention as well. So they again exchanged rings and made sure that the others applauded. We lost a chance for a separate party though!

I reached home early in the morning, slept for 2 hours and then went to college. There we dissected the ways of the different kinds of weddings that happen in India, but mostly Punjabi weddings. From how women make dirty jokes during the sangeet, to how the showing off really does happen; from how old aunties have curious minds with big mouths to the flexibility with which pandits complete the rituals... we talked and laughed about it all.

Everybody liked the way my hair looked and I loved loved LOVED it! Always a great feeling! :P

Then some of us went to CP looking for some nice sweatshirts because all our college sweatshirts are cheesy and we want to have our own, sophisticated ones. But we couldn’t find anything.
Does anyone know where we can find plain sweatshirts at reasonable prices and also get something printed on them?
The kids that went along wanted to run on the escalators before doing anything else. In retrospect, I think I should have joined them too. It’s not as much fun being on the side that is just watching and wondering when they will move so that we can get the work done.

Sleeplessness was having its effects. I was told, “I am not listening to what you are saying because you are drunk.” People are so rude nowadays! I don’t drink!

But there’s a hollow. Everybody is laughing but reality does not do that. It stares blankly.

College Sweethearts I

Non-Stop

Everything is running; everyone is running; the time is running; and the work is running too.

As of now, I am just chasing. I think it would be more pleasant once I catch up and can jog along.
Till then, I’m enjoying the thought of struggle. I don’t want that ten years down the line someone comes and says to me that you got things the easy way. I’m slogging. Yeah, so is everyone else but it’s just a nice feeling. Yes, I'm completely exhausted, frustrated, irritable, tired, sleepless, and more at the end of each day. But I think I like it.

I’m finally getting certain things that I deserved to get many years ago. I am also getting things that I don’t think I deserve today. I guess it is some sort of a balance.

I had a lot of fun in college today. Went around hugging people, clicking pictures, laughing out loud, concentrating in class, bugging little pups, having tea and Maggi at Irfan’s after a very very long time, and just feeling good about everything in life.
I wish every day was like today. Happy!

:-)