Silence

It takes getting some used to, this silence. I've been in Princeton just about a day and already the lack of sound is driving me insane. For someone who's used to staying next to a construction zone, such peace means an emptiness.

We take the noise in our life for granted, often annoyed at its bewildering array and constant chatter. But noise (or as I like to put it, sound) is life. In the beginning was the sound, although I wasn't really there and so can't be fully certain ! For a culture that seems to equate sound with life and action, this silence is even more deafening. 

The lack of sound is great in the beginning. It helps you relax and enjoy the other senses - the light, the breeze, the perfume - without being overwhelmed and distracted by all stimuli aural. But then what ? You've made your peace, have experienced sensory delight and now have left nothing to contemplate but that twisted thing hammering away in your head, a.k.a your mind. Where do you escape to, now that the distraction is gone ?

Sound for me is a thought train. Each beat setting of a string of interesting patterns. I never feel alone at such a time, knowing that someone only has to drop a glass for me to set off on another journey. Much as you'd like to believe, this is not a tendency of the mentally disturbed alone, but happens to us all. But with such depth of noiselessness around, it feels as if my mind has hit a terminus.

It's scary sometimes, being alone with your imagination. I'm not entirely sure if I'll survive this time in Princeton without irreparable damage (some might say it has already been done in years gone by, but me, I'm an optimist, no?). What can I do to relieve such gravitas ? Music, you say. Aha ! But music is interesting as an instrument to bring order to sound, as a comparative tool. Without the underlying texture of random noise, would music sound as appealing ? Perhaps not.

Maybe the idea is to leverage this silence, to learn to escape to it, much as we escape to music. That's going to be tough to pick up and even tougher to let go once I'm back home when the jack hammer starts up at 7 am !! It does help my reading though. Vikram Chandra's Red Earth and Pouring Rain has been a delight so far, although it's ironical that a book that draws on such a kaleidoscopic and chaotic landscape is being read amidst such a bucolic setting as a New England summer in Princeton.

I've been off blogging for a while now and it seems an eternity has passed in between. Neha's off to work (finally !) while an artist (probably the one true artist) in the family passed away. Both events will leave voids in the world, in more ways than one. 

Neha's departure finally marks the end of an era that we had tried to keep protected for as long as possible, a world of adolescence and innocence where things were stored to be relived in moments of joy and sorrow. With her gone, it's as if we're all grown up now, with all vestiges of connections to our earlier selves cast aside. There's no escaping here, either, mister. It's off to the real world, now.

My uncles' unexpected passing away seemed to shake all of us. For a man who was a consummate artist, time played the role of an artistic villain. No matter what we do, where we go, time catches up with us all. And when it does, it's not kind. It makes us weak, dependent, hollow shells of a once glorious prime. What shall keep us rooted then ? I'd like to believe that my life at that point meant something to somebody, at least to me. I don't expect it to have any grand purpose or even to achieve something. I just want it to be a life, lived, inshallah. Will it be so ? Only time will tell.

As you can tell, I'm rambling. Time to sign off.

I am but an egg

My sci-fi odyssey continues. This time, it's Stranger in a strange land, a beautiful examination of religion, philosophy, love, xenophobia and just what qualifies the term mankind. Strange ideas abound through the book, and once again, I'm surprised by some of the things I've been missing.

A few years ago, when I first read Roy's God of Small Things, a comment on the blurb caught my attention. It said that all good books invent their own language. I guess, then, that all great books are imbibed into the language itself. And here, Heinlein has talent non-pareil. Not just the word grok, he has added what I would like to believe one of the most innocent phrases - I am but an egg.

I interpret it to be mean something along these lines: I accept my ignorance without thought to consequences. I do not try to hide my lack of knowledge. Consequently, I am not afraid of being "found out". In a knowledge-weary world, it is a refreshing attitude. It opens one's mind, makes one seek knowledge for knowledge. It reconnects us with our childhood again. I get the feeling that considering knowledge is power in today's world, people are more reluctant to admit that they don't know something. Especially so in an industry like consulting. This becomes a way of life, unfortunately, which blocks any further progress.

Heinlein's other interesting definition is of mankind itself. When asked who man was, one of the characters answered, man was a creature that laughed at itself. Very poignant. Also, very true! I haven't even begun the more interesting part of the book, who knows where it will lead us.

It's getting late, but I can't resist setting out another poem that Heinlein references in the book, R.L Stevenson's (yes, he of the Treasure Island and Jekyll-n-Hyde fame) Requiem:

 Beneath the wide wide  starry sky, 
 Dig the grave and let me lie, 
 Glad did I live and gladly die, 
 And I lay me down with a will: 

 This be the verse you grave for me: 
 Here he lies where he longed to be, 
 Home is the sailor, home from sea, 
 And the hunter home from the hill. 

Haiku

I've been away for quite some time, travelling and in general being occupied with work. And within this manic world of instant everything, I discovered a form of poetry that I thought I'd never truly appreciate. Haiku.

I've never been much of a fan of romanticist poetry, though it does have extremely evocative imagery. I always believed that poetry should be based on elegance of thought and structure, being characterized by brevity in its form. If not, isn't it cutting it too close to prose ?

On chance, I stumbled upon a couple of scribbled lines of Haiku and that led to a line of interesting research. It turns out that the 17 syllables can convey a powerful image. Like the Japanese language itself, a Haiku, to me, is the hieroglyphic form of prose. To some extent, the development of Haiku in Japan has been aided by both the nature and culture of the land. Buddhism lends itself well to Haiku, focusing on minimalist language to convey the deepest thoughts. For example, the following Haiku in my mind captures the true essence of Buddhism:

a world of dew,

and within every dewdrop

a world of struggle

The best Haiku always instills in me a feeling of serenity and peace. Of realization that there is beauty in this world after all. Of recognition that there is more to life than strife and toil. Of perfection. Of harnessed intelligence. Of quiet contemplation. Of a thousand words.

A couple more that I really liked:

so very still, even

cherry blossoms are not stirred

by the temple bell

--

at the ancient pond

a frog plunges into

the sound of water

Magnum Opus

One of the drawbacks of the internet age is the inability to walk into a bookstore, rummage and walk out with a book and the anticipation of not knowing how it will turn out. It was a good experience, then, to stumble into a Reliance book-store at Korum in Thane. And on a whim, I picked up what ultimately was one of the better reads in recent times. Let's face it, I have had just too many MBA turned authors strutting their stuff on my bookshelf. So it felt good to put my fate in the hands of a writer, someone who's actually studied the art and not decided to follow his whim after friends praised the blog posts! So yes - Vikram Chandra's Sacred Games succeeded in blindsiding me like no other book in recent memory.

I bought it thinking "What the heck - it's about the Mumbai underworld, how bad can it be ?!". Just a simple back-of-the-envelope calculation meant that I'd be occupied for days, in return for just Rs 300/-. Seemed like a good deal to an business grad and so I plonked for it over Nagarkar's Cuckold. And I was pleasantly surprised. The book is about everything, but at its core, it's about Mumbai - the city and its people. It takes the antipodean approach to the city when compared to Shantaram, which sometimes felt detached, as if you knew an outsider was writing about it.

Chandra, on the other hand, writes as if he knows it intimately and is familiar with every mote of dust and every drop of sweat. The characters are real, their problems are real and one can feel the research and work that must have gone into the book's writing. I get the feeling, strongly resonant, that the characters love Mumbai not because of its inherent goodness, but because of its frailties. He succeeds in capturing the city's language perfectly, its curious mix of Marathi, Hindi and English, simultaneously giving us a glimpse of its life-force - what it means to live in this city. So even though this book happens through the eyes of a sardar-ji cop, you never feel as if he's an outsider in this world. This is his city and he belongs here. The opening scene alone should rivet you to close attention. Yes, it's opus-sized at 900+ pages. And yes, it does tend to drag a bit, especially during the insets. But the writing is never dull and this book will definitely occupy good shelf space in the Indian author's section. It's disappointing that the book was not a runaway success, though it will be difficult for the author to match the scale and scope of this work.

It's interesting to note a bit of trivia on Chandra. He co-wrote Mission Kashmir with Suketu Mehta, who has himself written a largely documentary-style book about Mumbai - Maximum City (not a big fan). Chandra's sister, Tanuja, makes (or rather used to make) quite half-decent films. Mom Kamna wrote classics like 1942: A Love Story and Chandini while other sister Anupama is Vidhu Vinod Chopra's wife and a Bollywood historian/author herself in addition to being a consulting editor with NDTV. That is a family with some achievers !

This lack of cable TV has really been a blessing in disguise. Have had some good reads in this time. Finally completed Asimov's two remaining novels (End of Eternity and The Gods, Themselves - typical Asimov), Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card's masterpiece) plus Philip K Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (Brilliant) and will start exploring the Gabriel Garcia Marquez books soon. Interesting times ahead !

I leave you with an elegant quote I came across:

 Life happened because I turned the pages ~ Alberto Manguel

Steed

After a long time, I'm mobile again ! I bought a Hyundai i10 Asta towards the end of May and God, what a relief it is to not depend on auto-wallas again :) I've been meaning to jot this down for a long time, but finally getting around to writing about how I finally zeroed in on the i10.

Since mom and dad were absolutely hell bent on not allowing me a bike (YZF R-15 ?), I decided to opt for a set of two extra wheels. I was quite sure I wanted something small for my first car that had a petrol engine and definitely didn't want a Maruti. The Beat was just too radical for my taste. Finally, the hatches in consideration were Hyundai, Punto, Figo and Polo. While Figo is probably the best VFM out there, I wasn't sure about the quality of the build and the petrol engine. Ford has always been associated to the oil-burner in my mind and it was difficult to break that link. Looks-wise, I loved the Polo, but reviews have noticed a lethargic 1.2L and was expensive for its bracket. That left Punto and Hyundai. I really liked the specs on the Punto and almost decided to buy the 1.4 Emo Pk. The only thing that stopped me was having to deal with Tata showrooms and service centers. That's a big no-no.

Finally, after realizing that manual transmission in the i20 has the same 1.2L which brings down the power-weight ratio, I finally decided that the i10 is the right fit. I've not regretted it in the short time I've had it. Some good things:

• The interiors are plush, compared to the others.
• Seats are comfortable and the space for rear passengers is ample enough.
• It's got a very light steering which is a pleasure to drive in traffic
• The NVH levels are more than acceptable upto 110 kph
• The gear shift it precise
• The music system is sufficient for my use and
• You get good highway handling with ABS and EBD

And now the not-so-good:

• low-rpm grunt is sorely lacking
• Visibility is obstructed due to the front right pillar
• The gear shift sometimes refuses to shift into 1st or R
• The light steering is too light on the highway
• The headlights are bad. Really bad
• Well, there are just so many of them out there !

Overall, though, I'm quite satisfied with the package. For 90% of the time, it suits my needs. In fact, dad's considering getting an AT for himself. That ought to be fun.

What's not fun, though, has been the traffic. It's just crazy. It seems like only yesterday that I was weaving effortlessly out of traffic on my Pulsar. But somehow, seated in a car, you realize the mindless risks that people take to shave seconds. Rules are not even recognized, forget followed. Whoever said one has to stop at red light ?! The worst part is that akin to corruption, it is very difficult for an honest driver to make a fist of it. Basically, driving in India is more like loco motion rather than locomotion :)

Transition

So the ride that was ISB finally ended. The graduation day was well organized and I thought all the speakers spoke rather well. I do feel sorry for Mr Sibal, though, having to shake 550+ hands ! All in all, a satisfactory end to an energetic year.

I did expect the ride from student life to corporate life to be rather bumpy, a little like the morning after a night spent painting the town red :) I was pleasantly surprised then, to find that I had almost two and half months of doing nothing! It was fun at first, not having to be on your toes 24x7, but I guess it got a little boring towards the end. A part of the boredom was relieved by the arrival of my spanking new Hyundai i10. Being a newbie, the learning curve in Mumbai's traffic was rather steep. But we did manage to make trips to Pune, Nashik and Alibaug before I joined ZS.

The orientation in Gurgaon was simply a way to transition back into corporate life, I guess. I learnt quite a few things about ZS and the Pharmaceutical industry and survived the rest. The Leela Kempenski where we were initially put up was an excellent choice, but could have done with some better food. All in all, the 1st week was comfortable and a nice introduction to the company, function and industry. The second week was a deeper look at the respective practice areas and we did get a chance to interact with the MD, OMPs and other consultants/managers over dinner. More importantly, the NEO allowed us to interact across designations and hopefully establish some rapport.

Over the weekend, it was also an opportunity for me to catch up with classmates from BHU. I was rather pleased to find out that in this ever-changing world, some people at least have remained constant. With the Germany-England match in the background, it was a nice reunion at Connaught Place. Was burning with jealousy to find out that the Schneider Electric folks are usually home by 4:30 PM. Yeh kahaa ka insaaf hai ?!

The one thing that amazed me is the amount of development that Gurgaon has seen. All things have a new-ish feel to them. But, I was disappointed at the lack of a life beyond the professional circle in Gurgaon. You are expected to be either at work or shopping. For everything else, head to Delhi. I guess it could get really boring after a few days. Without full Metro connectivity and the lack of any mode of public transport, getting by without a vehicle is a challenge to say the least. I was, however, impressed by Delhi's Metro and if the quality of Mumbai's metro is as good, we are in for some comfortable commutes indeed.

After all this, I'm finally back a full circle. having arrived first in Pune in 2004, I'm back in the same place. The same lovely weather, the same traffic, the same attitude. It feels good to be back ! Magarpatta has grown in the years gone by and I notice that almost everything here is expensive, even when benchmarked against Mumbai. There was hardly any time settling in, since work demanded my attention almost immediately. However, I have decided to call a rental in Trillium my home for the foreseeable future.

That's about it for now, I'll try to put up a review of the i10 along with some pics and travelogues a little later.

Disconnecting

Leaving an educational institute is one of the toughest things to do. Even more so at a place like ISB. Just physically leaving the campus is a challenge in itself. For 360 days we have been pampered by Sarovar and nature. I can't imagine what it would be like to make my own bed!! As if to make things worse, summer has arrived with warmth, colors and today, cooling rain. Sigh...

Disconnecting from the more abstract attributes will require greater effort than anything else. In some sense withdrawal symptoms started to creep in after placements. The classrooms seem uninviting, the conversations repetitive and the parties monotonous. I guess I'm yearning for a newer challenge and the accompanying anticipation of the unknown!

For various reasons, term 8 is meant to facilitate this process. The courses are instructive rather than participative, giving us that much free time to create memories. Some choose to move the bull, others find memories a bottle and a few lucky ones like me get to go on an all-expenses-paid vacation to Bangkok! Team Trip-Plan learnt a lot in that visit, made a few good friends and overall had a reality check on what it means to be an entrepreneur. And of course, it wasn't just all work :)

We can do without the campus, without even the daily dose of gyaan since we will find substitutes once we leave this place. What I will miss are the students. Contrary to perception, an institute does not make the students, but vice versa. This is what I found at BHU and what I have observed at ISB. Whatever the ills and criticisms of ISB, what cannot be doubted is the talent inherent in the student body. Who knows if I'll ever find another collection of such specimens (!) in a single place at the same time.

Filling up the year book did bring back tons of memories. It was surprising to note what people actually thought of you. For some, it was payback time :) . The last section party was great and given the large turnout, it absolutely rocked. People are now busy collecting pictures, videos, books, presentations, anything at all that defined their time here. I'm not sure if that's the right way. We tend to accumulate just too much baggage.

SLC has promised an absolute blast for the next three weeks including parties, lunches, paintball fights and what not. With the Hon. Kapil Sibal expected for Graduation Day, the coming days offer a plethora of entertainment.

I'm left wondering sometimes, though, what it would be like to call ISB an alma mater. How would people perceive me ? Would I be branded as snobbish and elitist or smart and wise ? Time will tell...