The Iron Fort - Part IV

[continued from the previous post]

Lohagad is an imposing fort when you approach it. The ramparts are in excellent condition for a structure over 300 years old and the only signs of real erosion are on the steps leading through the fort, where water has created its own pathways over the years.

The arches enclosing the doorways still look remarkably sturdy and one can still see the holes in the walls that must have housed the barrels of many a cannon in the days gone by. Pretty impressive, we thought. We were left licking our lips in anticipation as to what would be found on top of the fort.

There we were mistaken. There was NOTHING of note on top of the fort, except a decrepit, dome-shaped mausoleum
and a bunch of rather aggressive monkeys which used to chase people carrying bags! The first time (with Vix), the monkeys snarled at us and made a move towards our bag but we beat a hasty retreat. The second time we were not so lucky. Some of us had moved away on our respective journeys of exploration, leaving behind D and E with the bags. The monkeys had a suitable target and laid their theiving hands on our luggage in the hope of snatching a tasty snack. Fortunately D and E along with a few others managed to scare them off.

Soon afterwards we beat a retreat, a lot tireder than when we started climbing. The sun and humidity had taken their toll. A hasty lunch at a wayside restaurant had us rejuvenated for a bit and we made our way back to Malavli station pretty quickly, helped along the way by welcome bars of chocolate.

Our adventure drew close to an end as we neared the station. However, a small twist in the road to come. There was no train due for the next 1.5 hours, so we had to take a couple of rickety autos and drive all the way to Lonavla :-)) - the route to Lonavla from Malavli was scenic as well so we did not really mind the bone-rattling drive. Along came Lonavla and a couple of chikki packets and half an hour later, we were on our way back home, tired but satisfied with a day well spent.

And oh, by the way, this post has been such a long time in the making that yours truly decided it was better to have a terse post and finish off the series than have no post at all :)

The Iron Fort - Part III

By the time I am completing this write up, the trek that we went on already ought to be a bit of a distant memory. The negligent kid in me feels like flinging down the pen and paper and walking off in a huff, miffed at his own inability to string together a write-up in time. The long forgotten trait of discipline! Hmph!

But then, the more I think about it, the more I realize that this was a trek not easily forgotten. The memories stay with me as green as a freshly watered leaf. So here goes.

The Fork in the Road:
We set off pretty briskly from Malavli station, stocking ourselves up with water, chocolates and chewing gum at a quaint provisions store on the way. The group soon split into two: 'the front-runners' and 'the back-markers' - Political propriety prevents me from saying who formed part of which group :). So let me make an ABC case out of it.

A,B and C were the frontrunners whereas D and E brought up the rear. It was quite hot that day, unlike the first trek which had a nice spray-like rain cooling me and Vix on the way. The fact did not go un-noticed and E told me, "Ranga! It is so hot! You should have asked us to bring sun-tan lotion!". Ah well, given that it had been raining the last two times I came here, forgive me for my oversight.

I thought, the weather has the uncanny ability to change the fortunes of many a man, more renowned than me. Take Hitler for instance. It was like the leader of his Russian front troops coming up to him on one fine winter morning and telling him "My dear man, You said Siberia would be nice and breezy at this time of the year and it is 40 degrees below zero - you should have told us to get our fur coats along!"

Hitler would have done two things - shrug his shoulders expansively and then shoot the Russian Commander. Given my placid nature, I thought of doing just the former :D

And shortly, after a rather sweaty climb with many breaks in between, we reached a fork in the road. Well to be more accurate, it was more like a "T-junction" on top of a mound connecting two hills. There were forts on either hill, the one on the right being Lohagad, and the one on the left, Visapur. Since Vix and I had gone right and reached Lohagad easily last time round, we took the left turn hoping to conquer Visapur this time. The fort was clearly visible - the end was nigh, or so I thought.

Our turn to Visapur did not start on the right note, with the track taking a downward turn as soon as we started off... but the hope was that it would rise again. And rise it did, though not as sharply as we'd have liked. It kept winding on and on and on and soon we realized that we might be taking an entire chakkar around the hill without going any higher at all. Serious self doubt began to creep in and the entire team was beginning to blame me for taking them on such a tortuous path. Of course, a 35 degree sun beating on our backs did not help the state of mind either. "Turn back" was the common refrain, but we plugged on for a short while afterward.

Thankfully, our decision was made relatively easy by an almost-impassable stretch of slush and mud replacing the road we were walking on. There we took a halt and decided to beat a retreat. The amount of flak that I had to take for 'guiding' people onto this route was unbelievable! When Vix and I went to Lohagad, we consulted this local stripling, who told us at the T-junction that the right path led to Lohagad and left to Visapur. And those directions I followed, in full faith. Never knew that my faith in the local would turn around and bite me in the shin like that.

I could imagine the gang's state of mind though. The Israelites would have felt the same of Moses, who if, after a long, tedious crossing of the sea had turned around and told them, "Look folks! Here is a desert. Now I would dearly love to take all you guys to the promised land, but you have to make do without water or food for the next twenty years" - not the most charitable of feelings I s'pose.

But then, all the grumbling aside, I was with a team of great sports and they decided to follow me up to Lohagad - we were back to the T-junction in just over 20-25 minutes though it had taken us nearly 45 minutes to traverse the same distance towards Visapur. Good progress made! Now we headed towards Lohagad, again taking a few breaks along the way.

Thanks to our diversion, a gang of trekkers, clearly led by some Team building/Event management kinda company had joined us (we had overtaken them right at the base of Malavli). Now this would have been fine, had the over-enthusiastic trekkers not had an inclination for shouting out "Har Har... Mahadev", every five minutes. We felt like pushing them off a cliff for their chants.

We kept plugging on and many muttered curses, tired steps and determined stair-climbs later, we reached the summit of Lohagad fort.

(rest in next)

The Iron Fort - Part II

This write-up should have come some four weeks back if it had to have any reasonable accuracy. But as has been the long continuing tradition, laziness got the better of me.

In the meanwhile, however, I have managed to complete another (un)successful trek to Lohagad, leading a pack of office junta - Varun, Arunav, Rhea Shaama (Nishant Kumar being an absentee) - the "(un)" part coming in because we ended roughly two kilometres west of where we were supposed to end up (i.e, the adjoining Visapur Fort)! But, what the heck... trekkers can't be choosers! In hindsight, I comfort myself by mouthing some lines from "Yun Hi Chala" ... (Movie: Swades)

...जो राह तू चले अपने मन् की
हर पल की सेब से मोती ही तू चुने
जो सदा तू सुने अपने मन् की

At the end of the day, we had a great time during both treks and that is what matters!

Before I get into the narrative, let me have a preliminary digression to give some relevant travel information for the avid trekker.

Destination: Lohagad Fort (9 km away from the nearest railway station, Malavli)
Route: Mumbai (Dadar) - Lonavla - Malavli (by train)
Mode of transport: Train
Start time: 5.50 Am Indrayani Express from Dadar - scheduled for halt at Lonavla
Arrive at Lonavla: 8.05 AM
Catch the local train from Lonavla to Pune - 8.15 AM
Reach Malavli (Next station after Lonavla) - 8.20 AM
Start Trekking: 8.30 AM
Reach Lohagad Fort: 11.30-11.45 AM (at a fairly brisk walking pace)
Explore the fort and have lunch in the meanwhile: 11.45 AM - 1.30 pm
Start descent: 1.30 PM
Reach Malavli Station: 3.45-4.00 PM
Take train to Lonavla: 4.50 PM
Reach Lonavla: 4.55 PM
Catch train to Mumbai: 5.30 PM
Reach Mumbai: 7.45 PM


Now, since our two treks were largely similar in nature for the most part, I am combining the narratives into one.

The red-eyed mornings:

Let us take some time out here and contemplate the life of a sparrow. Have you ever thought how early a sparrow has to get up in the morning to start hunting for the unwitting worm? Have you thought how animals have to make do without snooze buttons? Have you contemplated how boring it must be to be up and about at the crack of dawn? Must be immensely difficult, no?

Even for me, a person used to an "up-and-about-at-6-am" ritual at one point of time in the distant past, getting up at 4 am for a trek on a Saturday morning can be a pain, me having lost the 'early-rising' habit long back. Additionally, since I had spent a fair few late nights during that week at work, I was cursing myself under my breath for having such a hare-brained trekking idea when I got up.

The first time round, Me and Vix managed to get up in time (just about) and left for Dadar Station from our respective homes at 4.40 AM(!). The second time was more of an adventure, as I became the "Mr.Alarm Clock" for all of my team-mates, giving all of them some wake-up telephone calls, yet getting another half hour of snooze time in between! Still, I managed to leave for Dadar station by 5 AM

A tale of three stations:

Dadar station, as many people would know is probably THE busiest station in all of Mumbai. The amount of hustle and bustle there at 5 am is unbelievable. Serpentine queues, busy porters, chai stalls doing roaring business, bewildered travellers trying to navigate a labyrinthian scheme of foot overbridges and platforms (for the uninitiated, there are multiple platforms with the same number in Dadar station - apparently due to two separate sets of railway lines passing through the same station! Be careful when you ask a fellow traveller to meet you at Platform No. 4!!). If ever there was a setting designed to make one feel like an ant, this is it!

Now, given that Vix and I had left together, the trip to Dadar station and the attendant navigational bloopers were much diminished. The journey to Lonavla too was uneventful, with the only interesting incident worth recounting being better described by the following picture.



Things, however, were different the second time round.

Arunav Tripathi and Shaama were the unfortunate victims of the 'dual Platform number' confusion. There are two Platform No. 4's in Dadar station. I did not know this fact and had asked everyone to assemble on Platform No. 4 at 5.30 Am sharp. Shaama managed to overcome the confusion in time and reach PF. No. 4 by around 5.35 or so (thank God for cell phones). Arunav Tripathi, of course, was not so lucky. Not only did he come a bit late to Dadar station, but also got lost in the maze of foot overbridges in his attempt to come to the ill-fated platform.

The Indrayani express puffed by 5.50 Am (dot on time!) and was scheduled to depart in the next couple of minutes, closely followed by Arunav Tripathi huffing and puffing his way onto the platform, and that too ticketless! Better late than never though... we hurriedly boarded the train and it chugged out of Dadar station shortly.

After the usual cloak and dagger deals with the TTE, we managed to extricate Arunav from his ticketless plight and sped away on our serene journey to Lonavla - beautiful scenery sped rapidly to greet us. The refreshing smell of the fresh earth was a welcome change from the smoggy pollution of Mumbai roads. The change of scenery from Kalyan to Karjat (stations en route to Lonavla) was stark - dank shanties and stinking streams, nay rivers, of sewage giving way to verdant fields, idyllic thatched houses and gurgling silvery brooks.

The way from Karjat to Lonavla was even better, with steep valleys fading away into the depths on one side and gorgeous waterfalls greeting us with their spray on another. (This experience was better the first time when I went with Vix, thanks to it raining intermittently then). The train too was fast, just halting at three stations en route to Lonavla.

We reached Lonavla by around 8.10 Am, greeted by swirling clouds and fine drizzle the first time and with warm sunlight the second time. But oh man! Lonavla station sure is DIRTY! One look at the tracks below and you would want to puke! The station is dirty even by normal Indian standards, with the track just being one unending mass of plastic litter, paper bags, carelessly thrown chikki packets... grrr.... when will the Indian public change its mindset?

Anyway, me and Vix managed to grab a breakfast at the station, and, unknowingly, missed the 8.15 local to Malavli in the process. We had to wait for another couple of hours for the next local and occupied ourselves by searching out photo-worthy scenes within Lonavla station. Nothing much could be classified as photo-worthy material, except, of course, a seedy, run-down building that claimed itself to be "Suyash theatre- Dolby Digital" - If that theatre is Dolby Digital then I am George W. Bush.

The second time round, I was wiser, running down to the ticket counter and getting the team some tickets to Malavli and running back in time for catching the 8.15 local from Lonavla. Thank God we made it in time! Spending 2 hours in that dirty station was not my idea of fun!

Malavli is the next station after Lonavla on the way from Mumbai to Pune. The train made short work of the miles in between and 5 minutes after it started from Lonavla station, we found ourselves in the quaint railway station that was Malavli. You reach the station and you perceptibly feel the nature of life undergoing a sea change - fewer people on the platform, a much slower pace of activity an infinitely cleaner station than Lonavla! A lazy, contented feeling envelops you like Chanel perfume and the mood is set for a lovely trek.

(rest in next)

The Iron Fort

Have you ever got the feeling that your life is just passing you by randomly, without any direction whatever? That there is a larger purpose to your existence than mere day-to-day prestidigations in front of the computer? That there is something out there that is calling out to you more persistently than an ICICI bank Credit Card Seller?

One of the things I feel very strongly about is a healthy work-life balance. Balancing these two different spheres requires a great degree of determination, especially on the 'life' front (your office will ensure that you pay sufficient attention to work!). One of my ways of having a good "life" is to explore nature - go on treks, take pictures, go running. etc. And the monsoons are a lovely time of the year to do that, especially in and around Mumbai. Couple with this the fact that I have not been trekking since April (that wonderful Gangtok Visit) and you know the reason behind my introductory paragraph

Thanks this feeling of 'not having been among the great outdoors' going at my vitals like a persistent woodpecker, and more importantly, thanks to Vix (photos to be found here) , who moved my from my lethargy through an inspirational gtalk session, we both planned a trek to this fort near Lonavla called Lohagadh.

A write-up of the rather interesting trek follows, but in the meanwhile, you can find some pictures from the trip here

Cheers,
Ranga

A Collection of PJs

Have been planning to compile a small collection of PJs which I have created over the past few years - been a while now, but here are a few. More to come

Situation: The RIL Office in Sewri is the Fly Capital of the World… (I mean the Insect variety, not Pilots)

Complication: Employees often spend most of their time swatting away the flies and manage to spend very little time actually working…

Conversation in the morning:

Client: "My God, there are so many flies here... All we do through the day is to swat them away"

Ranga: “That’s what we said we'd deliver at the beginning of the project right? We now actually have a SWAT team!

For more info on SWAT teams, please refer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWAT_team !

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Why do misers simply adore cans and cans of Tropicana?

Coz they are Can-juices (kanjooeses)

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Lower Parel, Mumbai>

Hari: Ranga, why don't you get a vodka for me?

Anip Sharma (simultaneously): Hey Ranga, I am planning to go on vacation to Europe... you know any good places to go to?

Nithin Chandra (also simultaneously): I need some fresh air man... it is so stifling inside...

Ranga: Ba(ha)r-se-lo-na !

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During the Heights of the currency crisis (pre liberalization) in 1991, India was forced to pledge its gold reserves to Bank of England to maintain solvency. The country was literally on its knees and days away from bankruptcy! The celluloid potential of an event so momentous could not but be noticed. Yash Chopra ji has decided to 'cash in' on the opportunity and wants to make SRK play the role of Narasimha Rao in a movie about the crisis. Qn. is... what will the name of the movie be?

Ans: Cheque De India...

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Once upon a time in China, (not so long ago) there was this really talented painter... like many of the impressionist masters, he was widely acknowledged for his use of colors. However, the market for color paintings in China was not too lucrative. He decided to move to India, where the market for such colored artistry was booming at that point of time... and true to expectations, his work was a huge success here. What was the name of the painter? And what was the painting style he used?

Ans: Rango-Lee

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How do you describe the following situation?

One of India's brightest lawyers fell in love with a colleague of his. He takes her to Paris, that most romantic of cities. There, they go to the Eiffel Tower. On the restaurant atop the tower, just as the sun is setting, the lawyer proposes to her….

Ans: High Court

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Which Bank has the Most Unfriendly customer service at its branches?

Ans: I see Icy Eye (ICICI)

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Which hill station is a Boxer's favorite retreat?

Ans: Punch Gunny (Panchgani)

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Dr.Salim Ali, when he was young, had built a reputation of being quite the flirt. But he grew out of it, later to become one of the greatest ornithologists in the country. Many moons later, he decided he had had enough of ornithology and decided to make a profession out of his second great love… Aeroplanes… he became a pilot. Soon after retiring from aviation, he decided to write an autobiography narrating his life story from the cradle to almost-at-the-grave…what would it be called?

Ans: Birds I-view

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Traffic Sign board en route to Vashi

GO
SLOW
WORK IN
PROGRESS

Yours truly felt it was lacking in proper punctuation. Modified suitably, it reads as:

GO.

SLOW
WORK IN
PROGRESS

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Here's one interesting incident from office… protagonists being Sonali Agarwal and Rangarajan Vijayaraghavan

Sonali Agarwal: "Ranga, where's the slide?"

Ranga: "[slid across the marbled floor] There you go…"

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What do you call a dark, talented, male Bengali singer?

Ans: Tan Sen...

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How do you describe a really hot Indian woman?

Ans: Sizzling Brownie

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Why is it that the normal, average human being is so selfish and nasty?

Ans: Coz statistically, the average human being = a mean human being

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A geeky statistician Mr.Ranjit Singh Quartile falls in love with numbers so much that he spends all his time in the statistics section of the library. And, as fate would have it, there was this attractive female statistician (!) who shared the same passion for numbers… it was a case of love at first sight for the guy... Time passed and the couple kept running into each other more and more frequently at the library. One fine day, RSQuartile could no more bear to keep his love under wraps and he launched into a fervent declaration of love towards his star attraction… what song did he sing?

Ans: Pyaar humein kis 'mode' pe le aaya…

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Why did the second guy in a row of three laugh at another guy who was third in a row of five?

Ans: coz he was a co-median…

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What do you call a website that helps you make fun of yourself?

www.takemytrip.com

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ATK Colleague 1, ATK colleague 2 and Rangarajan having a conversation about the Marathon. Reference was made to how we ran in the hot sun, wearing a shirt supporting the United Way NGO cause…from which a rather intuitive connection was drawn… as follows

Ah… how much more trigonometrical can we get? We run for a cause(cos), wear a sign(sin) and get (tan)ned…umm… wait a (sec) ….caught(cot) the point?

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Next to the Nestle Milk Chocolate Factory in Switzerland is an animal farm.

There were some prize bulls in the farm which bristled with discontent at the treatment they were getting from their human masters. In true Orwellian style, they launched a stinging attack on the inhabitants and the contents of the factory next door. What was the outcome of the revolt?

Ans: Chocolate Moos (Mousse)

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There is this particular collection of clothes doing the rounds in various fashion capitals of the world which mysteriously gave the models wearing them some highly embarrassing moments in public, by malfunctioning at ....umm... inappropriate times - Question is: what is the collection called?

Ans: The Fall collection

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Why would it be a very bad idea to give loans to HUL retirees?

Ans: They are already lever-aged

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What would Napoleon the Great be called if he were a glutton?

Ans: Napoleon Bon-Apetit

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Which cell phone brand would Johnny Depp endorse in the movie 'Pirates of the Caribbean'?

'Sea-men's' (Siemens)

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Q. What did the Inventory controller say to the Head of Procurement to explain to him the benefits of pooling?

A. 'Prevention is better than pro-cure'!

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What term do you use to describe a frustrated birdwatcher (and I don't mean the winged variety :D)?

Ans: Horny-thologist

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The character 'Donkey' in the film Shrek is chosen as the mascot of a popular internet shopping site. The name of the site was changed in its honor… what were the original and revised names?

Ans: www.ebay.com became www.ebray.com

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Why is a car without a stepney the longest lasting variety?

Ans: Coz it is tire-less

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What would be an assassination consultant's favourite movie?

Ans: Kill, Bill

( Bill as in billing the client)

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Which is the world's most lecherous website?

Ans: www.go-ogle.com

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What is the favourite music of Comp-Sci Engineers

Ans: Algo-rhythms

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Why did Princess Anne and her husband Philip feel happy about conducting a Photograph throwing competition ?

Ans: because it was Phil-Anne-throw-pic ...

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It was the peak of the resume submitting season and PGP1s are scrambling over themselves in order to apply to all the Day Zero companies.... some consulting and Fin companies ask for covering letters to be attached to the resumes...

One such hypothetical case stares a consultant in the face: Mr.xyz has always wanted to do banking since he was in the cradle and has dedicated his life to the singleminded pursuit of investment banking as a career ... [damn...copy-paste gone horribly wrong!]

How would you describe such a resume?

Ans: Ctrl+(C-V)

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The West Bengal State Government decides to formulate a policy to promote three industries in the state. The Industries are: 1) Information Technology, 2) Golfing and 3) Tea .. what would the policy be called?

Ans: The West Bengal IT, I-Tee and High Tea Policy

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Imaginary Situation: House Maid is found stealing money from the house and is caught red-handed by my mother.... she is chased rather publicly to the ends of the city for her transgression... and in the end collapses out of exhaustion after covering pretty much the whole of the city... This became highly celebrated and the public decides to take out an annual event in its commemoration... what city am I talking about and what is the event?

Mum-Bai Marathon...

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Misbah Ul Haq was caught sledging in the ongoing Indo Pak cricket match and the match Referee Ranjan Madugalle booked him for an offence under the ICC Code of Conduct... what did he term the offence?

Ans: Misbah-aviour….

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King Arthur, the leader of the Knights of the Round Table was obsessed with fighting evil and expected his twelve chivalrous knights to share the same obsession. He made them go through drill after monotonous drill to train them for fights - real and imaginary... "Up thy noble steed Sir Lance-a-lot, chaaaaarge...., let ye ugly dragon feel thy might…attaaaaaaackkk....Well Done Sir Lance-a-lot! You may now Alight and take a bow.." and so on... Doing so many up-down routines on a daily basis can decidedly be a wearing business and the noble knights were pained in more ways than one... they decided to name their physical affliction after their Leader. What was this affliction called?

Ans: Arthur-itis (Arthritis)

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The market for re-treaded tires is a dangerous one (highly fragmented and low margins)… and yet an entrepreneur decided to seek angel investor funding to set up a small scale retreading plant in India … the investor, naturally, declined the offer and our entrepreneur decided to go it alone… How would you describe the situation?

Ans: Fools rush in where Angels fear to "Tread"

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A.T.Kearney, despite having some profitable clients in the Middle East, took quite some time to set up a Dubai Office… why?

Ans: They thought Dubai's No Great Sheikhs (No great shakes)

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There was this Arab who went prospecting for oil in the vast deserts of the Middle East and , not unexpectedly, he found huge reserves just waiting to be tapped. He immediately had an oil well built in the area, but did not start pumping out the crude from the well immediately… soon after this event, there was a huge earthquake in the immediate surroundings of the well… Why?

Ans: Coz, Mother Nature read the situation as: "Sheikh Well Before Use"

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When does one musician fall in love with another musician?

Ans: When they strike a chord

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What does one musician say when he meets another musician at a meet?

Ans: Let’s exchange ‘notes’

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(C) All Rights reserved - No part of this work may be reproduced in any form by anyone without the written consent of the author :-)

A Consultant's life - Part V

Just discovered how to paste HTML code onto blogs directly. Thought I would start off by putting one of my favourite pictures from the recent Gangtok trip


Without HTML pasting, putting up pictures on the blog is one hell of a pain. Every time I want to insert a picture, it goes and sits right at the top of the article! Is there any way around this predicament?

A Consultant's Life - Part IV (Incomplete)

This thread of posts must take the record of being the longest set of chronicles I have written under the same title. Is it that two years of working has taken its toll on my imaginative capabilities? Hope not!

In terms of content, this is a follow-up of the 1st part of the series with the above title: Some things don't change and some things do...

Of the things that do change, especially on the personal front, the most prominent and significant is the change in marital status - tons of my friends, batchmates etc. who were leading single, unattached lives have decided to take the plunge and step over to the grhasta side of life.

The latest bachelor to bite the dust among my friends' circle is Avishek Addy (the PJ king of my batch) - he is getting engaged this May. Guess he hid his PJs well during the time his would-be made the choice :D. A months back, couple of my best friends, Poza and Bhars, also got married. Is it something about the stage of one life? A little introspection leads me to a very consultanty answer...

I figured that people by and large go through a 2x2 matrix of life [my non-consultant friends call this the point of no return, the point where I form 'frameworks' for the heck of it :)] - I call it the JOL framework (nothing bengali about this, though!). In a nutshell, the journey of many people's lives follows a 'Z' pattern through the following matrix

The JOL (Journey of Life) Matrix

Most people start their lives by being single and happy about it and somewhere down the line, that happiness vanishes and a desire to be with a member of the other sex takes over- neatly described by the following masterpiece


JOL-ly Roger Calvin here is in the bottom left quadrant of the matrix and Hobbes is in the top left quadrant. From the "Girls/Boys! Ewwwwww... yuck! I hate girls/boys" phase to the Hobbes phase of "Whom do we smooch?", it is one turbulent journey!

Another natural question which cropped up was: where do you fit "Relationships" in the picture? To that the answer is: Substitute "Marriage" with "Relationships" in the matrix and you get the answer in a more generic way

(Incomplete)

A Consultant's life - Part III

Yes, Consultants do have 'lives' ;-), especially when they get time off to refresh themselves with some well earned leave! Yours truly went on a trip to Darjeeling and Gangtok recently - Paradise found!

I shall be uploading a more detailed travel write-up shortly, but in the meanwhile, the interested reader can check out some photos here.

PS: The not so interested reader can stifle his/her yawns :-)

A Classic PJ

This is not mine, though I wish it were.... (one of the best PJs I have heard in a long time)

The cows in the Animal Farm have been reading about bear runs and bull runs in the stock market for a while now. First its one, then the other. After a while, they got really frustrated...Why the hell can't we have a cow run!!
So, they started a new stock exchange, the Cow Jones Index, and proclaimed, "There shall only be cow runs in this one, bulls and bears take a hike."

But having grown so fond of the hedge surrounding the animal farm, they became quite interested in hedging their risks as well. Thus began the Cow Jones Futures Index (CJFI). Now, what did these chaps trade in the CJFI?




Ans: Dairyvatives, of course

Of course, yours truly made a dairivative PJ of this masterpiece, and came up with the following:

If investors got wary of investing in the Cow Jones Index directly and decided to give their money to someone else to manage, what would they be investing in?



Ans: Moo-tual Funds

PS: I am in the process of collating some of my PJs and putting them up for display on the blog... so people who remember some of my earlier ones, please send me a mail/dbab/comment, anything!

A Consultant's life Part II

In this post I am supposed to write some stuff on how things change and how things don't. But then, as someone before my lifetime put it,
The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men Often Go Astray (or some such thing)

To cut a long story short, my best laid plans have changed, not permanently, but enough to warrant a deviation in the topic of this post.

We at A.T.Kearney had an intra-office cricket 'tournament' - basically a lot of young and old consultants getting together and having a lot of fun. I prepared a match report and thought it fit to post it on the blog. A word of warning though: All characters mentioned in the report are real, though the non-ATK reader can, for all intents and purposes, treat them as fictional :)

Official Match Report

A Lukewarm start, a sizzling mid-game and a red-hot end (literally!)

Ladies and Gentlemen, call it Saturday morning blues, call it cold feet, but indisputable was the fact that the start to this all important cricket fixture was lukewarm. Of the 18 members registered, drop-outs were so significant that the teams had to be pruned to two from three, with “Scorching Suns” being the casualty. The captains of the remaining teams, viz. Kearney Kangaroos and Dada’s Devils took to the field on a pleasant breezy morning to inspect the pitch and formulate team strategies accordingly. This was followed by the toss for Match 1

“Dada’s Devils”, under the leadership of our very own Kaustav-da (who, ironically, is a bigger fan of Sachin Tendulkar than Sourav Ganguly), got off to a good start by doing what has eluded even the charismatic captain of the Indian Team, Mahendra Singh Dhoni – winning the toss. Batting first was the natural choice and, as time proved, a good one.

The Devils’ innings – An idle bat is the Devil’s workshop

Kaustav-da and Nithin took the field, with Varun “Lee” Poddar opening the bowling for the Kearney Kangaroos. Disaster struck quickly as both Kaustav Da and Vivek Kalucha (who came in after K-da was out, caught) came and went without troubling the scorers within the first over. The score at the end of the first over read 3/2 and the Kangaroos, justifiably, were jumping all over the place. However, for Nithin “Yuvraj” Chandra, this was just the calm before the storm.

GG was the first victim of Nithin’s onslaught, with his second over being mercilessly dispatched for 30 runs including three towering sixes and two fours. The spring in the step of the Kangaroos was brought to a brutal, but effective halt. Jassi turned to Arunav to stem the haemorrhage. A run-out effected of Nishant in the third over provided a brief respite for the fielding team but Dada’s Devils still managed to eke out twelve runs from the over, including a couple of well struck fours.

Nithin and Abhiram continued the innings for the Devils with Arunav and the Jassi/Mahesh combo holding fort relatively economically. Arunav conceded just 25 runs from his two overs… (the figures would not have been as bad, had Nithin not decided to despatch Arunav away for a 4 and a 6 just as the innings was winding up to a close) and Jassi/Mahesh managed to keep Abhiram quiet, though they would not have liked the Umpire’s strictness with balls going down the leg side being heartlessly declared wides. (Damn those limited overs rules!)

Thanks to Nithin’s masterclass and significant contribution from extras (13 of them), Dada’s Devils set the Kearney Kangaroos a target of 85 in 6 overs, translating to a run-rate of just over 14 runs per over. The lukewarm start had morphed into a sizzling mid-game and a mouth-watering chase loomed on the horizon.

Kangaroos’ chase - look before you leap

Jassi planned to lead from the front as he took the field with Mahesh to open the innings for the Kearney Kangaroos. The chase began disastrously with Jassi being stumped efficiently by Nithin off Vivek’s opening over. Mahesh soon followed, getting run-out without troubling the scorers. GG restored some life to the chase, with a brilliantly struck six right over square leg, followed by another sparkling four.

The second over of the chase was a tight one, with Nishant steaming in and beating the batsmen with sheer pace, conceding just three runs and bowling GG out. The pressure was mounting! 71 runs to be scored off the 4 remaining overs. Dada turned to the star of the first innings and said “Ek over daalega?” , to which Nithin said, “haan, daaloonga”, and the rest, as they say, folks, is history.

An extremely tight over with Arunav’s wicket thrown in for good measure made the task for the Kangaroos even more difficult. What made the task more difficult for the chasers is the fact, that the graciousness shown by the Kangaroos while bowling to Nithin, was not reciprocated, with not even a single extra being conceded.

Varun Poddar struck some valiant blows for the Kangaroos and their team took 25 of the next two overs (Vivek and Nishant being the sufferers), without the loss of a wicket. Still, the required run-rate was not met, leaving the chasers a 36-run target off the final over, to be bowled by Nithin.

If Nithin had been miserly in his previous over, he was downright mean in this one. A nagging line and impeccable length meant that the ‘roos task was that much more difficult. Apart from a conciliatory 4 off the penultimate ball of the innings, the last over was a terrible let-down for the Kangaroos with neither Varun nor Kunal able to make any impact.

The result: Dada’s Devils defeat Kearney’s Kangaroos by 28 runs – a convincing victory, with the Man-of-the-Match award going to Nithin “Yuvraj” Chandra. Kaustav-da marshaled his troops very well, though his contribution with the bat resembled more the hero of his land, Sourav than the hero of his mind, Sachin

Match 2 & Match 3: Commentary truncated!

The remaining two matches were on similar lines, except that Ranga, the resident photographer, added strength to Dada’s Devils while Kunal and Hemant lent their expertise to the Kearney Kangaroos.

An added attraction was the commentary of Varun, Vivek, GG, Kunal and others whose observations on the activity on the field were as funny as they were insightful, though their sledging against the umpiring did not find much favour with either the opposition or the umpires. There was talk of the commentators being fined 50% of their post-match pizzas for the transgressions.

Just before this correspondent signs off, late on a Sunday night, his blow-by-blow commentary on the excellent proceedings looking to be cut short by a series of uncontrollable yawns and project commitments looming large in front of him, he feels it worthwhile to recount one unforgettable 13-ball over from the Kearney Kangaroos to Dada’s Devils in Match 3 as a sign-off gesture.

The bowler in question shall not be mentioned, but Mumbai Mauler Nithin Chandra was the tormentor. The bowler managed to deceive batsmen, wicket-keepers, umpires and commentators alike with his flight, with one well-directed (!) delivery failing to release properly from his hand and trickling down to short cover.

The few times the ball actually managed to float into Nithin’s vicinity, it went away rather quickly, getting dispatched to all corners of the ground. The outcome: a match-winning 37 runs conceded off 1 over, with 2 sixes, 4 fours (including byes) and god-only-knows how many wides!

This particular over sent the Kangaroos scurrying to all parts of the ground and was well liked by the rather limited audience of Parul and little Arjun Kalbag, whose presence did much to add to the fun and festivities (For those who did not turn up to watch the match today: You missed the treat of the year, people!)

Till the next event, cheers and lagey raho!

- Rangarajan Vijayaraghavan

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A Consultant's life - Part I

A relatively chill period on my current project and an irresistible urge to let my fingers loose on blogosphere has resulted in this post - ages after my previous one

Faiz Azim (a good friend of mine at work) and yours truly were having this illuminating conversation today (for ease of typing, Faiz Azim will henceforth be referred to as "F" ):

F: "Hey Ranga. Good to see you.. been a while! Are you still working on two projects simultaneously?"

R: "No, thank God! I am relieved to say that is now past tense... My recent past was indeed tense

F: "Ah! I see ... your present is continuous, but do you think your future is perfect?"

R: :)

A wholly unintended side-effect of this grammatical jousting was that I realized one thing: To keep my present continuously recountable in future, I'd better do some blogging right away! So here goes... This post is a rather light-hearted take on consulting, work, life and all that has happened in the 1.898765 years since I joined A.T.Kearney!

I know Consultants are very fond of structure (did I hear someone mutter 'paranoid'?), but giving a structure to a reminescence is a good idea nevertheless. This chronicle is divided into the following sections:

- Some things don't change

- Some things do change :)

Some things don’t change

- Mumbai’s commuting infrastructure still sucks: The average speed of commuting on Mumbai roads is 12 kmph – as much as a fast jog. Roads keep getting dug up in a heartbeat. The municipal authorities are like God . They are continually engaged in a cycle of creation-preservation-destruction of existing infrastructure.

In my opinion, the municipal authorities have a three step approach to ease infrastructure bottlenecks (yeah, yeah, 2 years in consulting does have its effects!) :

• Create bottlenecks first ("Ah... this stretch of road looks neat! Let’s say a nice big gash across the middle? After all, the city needs better telecom connectivity right?", or "Wow! This is a smooth bit of road... but wait, come the monsoons, it would be choc-a-bloc with potholes. What say we ‘concretize’ it just before the monsoons?" [Conversation with Road contractor: Psst... Psst...give me 10 crores and this baby is yours])

• Let commuters suffer for a few months (the following is an actual mail sent out by a large Indian bank to its employees)

"We have received information from MSRDC that work of the flyover at Santacruz Airport junction is in full swing and it is targeted to open the northbound carriageway of the flyover to traffic before the onset of monsoon 2008. Due to the construction of the flyover, there will be little more congestion on this stretch for the next 3-4 months.

In view of this we request you to inform all passengers traveling to keep an additional margin of 1 hour for reaching the airport so that they may not miss the flight."

• Shift the bottleneck from the place of creation to some other place . I can just about visualize a ToI article like the one below "After the flyover was constructed over the turn towards Santacruz (Domestic) Airport, congestion near the Andheri flyover has multiplied enormously, with vehicles often having to wait over 1 hour to turn towards Andheri station from the highway. The authorities, however, are jubilant, saying that there are no more traffic jams near the domestic airport."

- IIMA Campus still rocks: I have been to campus multiple times for recruitment related activities, my most recent being on that most touted of days, Day Zero of Placements. Placement activities take place in the new campus these days and things have improved to a great extent since my placements took place 2 years back.

• For one, the greenery is beautifully spread across the new campus and the buildings just look amazing at night
• The eternal charm of the LKP is beyond description ... When I visit campus, I go there sometimes just to let the atmosphere and grandeur of the architecture soak in.
  
• Despite the supposed laxity which has crept into the current batches at IIMA, we still have facchas losing sleep over Operations Management, MANAC & WAC - guhahahahahahahaaaaaaa [Muggo Facchon Muggo! Short MANAC Quiz at 2.30 beckons :)]
• People still doze off in classes , only to get told off by DT or some other prof at IIMA

- Calvin and Hobbes RULE!
Came across some outstanding (as usual) pieces from Waterson - am posting them below for the greater good of society :)




Rest in next!