The case of the unread case

And he fell to the ground with a big thud!

Whoa! What a crazy dream it had been... enough to throw him off the bed by the end of it. As he woke up, groggy, dis-oriented, he wondered whether he was back to reality or if he was still dreaming. His room seemed alright, everything was just as he'd left it last night, and, as usual, he was just in time for class. 3 minutes to go..RUSHHH!! ... Yep, definitely he was back to reality.

He dashed to the bathroom, a frantic brush, splasha water on the face, back to the room, change clothes, spray some..phishh phishh.. 2 minutes... RUN!

Run...

Breeze up the stairs...

Run...

In class.. finally.. the prof's just walkin in.. Just in time.. As always :) And the last row, last bench seat was empty, as always, waiting for its rightful owner to arrive. Ahhh...

He could feel the blood pumping in his legs, each artery and vein and capillary, throbbing. The sound of his heart in his head was louder than the prof's good-mornings and usual jokes. Phoooooo... A few deep breaths... Yes.. that's better.. now he could hear the spectacled guy talk.. not that he wanted to.. but he could hear him nevertheless.

As the rant continued, he found himself looking at the other students in class. Some were excitable, raising their hands to give answers, some lost in conversation with their neighbours, some quietly and diligently taking notes, and still some others completely out of the equation - sleeping, soundly.

Suddenly, there was a power outage. The ACs hissed to a quick death (albeit short-lived). The projector rumbled on. The room was left lit just with the light from the prof's presentation on screen. It was a plain slide with four bullet points. But before he could really read what was written in them, the prof switched the slide and a new slide came up "Thank you...?".

The class had ended so soon? Not possible. He listened a little intently to the prof now... "and that's the question we need to answer. Would you like to start Venkat..?" The prof was looking right at him. Yep, he'd just asked him a question!

Venkat fumbled. "Ahem.. Sir, if we look at the facts of the case".. in saying so, he snatched the caselet from his diligent neighbour's grasp, "when we see the .." and read out the heading ".. the.. Growth of Thames Corporation..." .. and just as he said that, the power came back on, blaring lights, loud ACs whirring back to life. The class erupted into a murmur as relative darkness gave way to light. It was the ideal opportunity Venkat needed to go through some more of the case...
"The growth of Thames Corp was essentially inorganic in nature... which helped it sustain a healthy growth rate in a competitive market"

Silence.

Venkat looked around. Had he said something wrong?? The prof was looking right into his eyes, breathing fire, it seemed. Venkat looked to his row-mates for some prompting, some help, anything. He just felt like kicking himself for not having read the case the previous day, and an extra kick for not listening to the prof in class. Damn!

The prof started walking towards the last row. Towards Venkat's seat. Venkat was frantically flipping through the pages of the case, trying to make some sense out of the chaos. The prof neared. Venkat stopped his search, tried to look calm and composed, and smiled at the prof as he came. He reached his desk, removed his spectacles, and without folding them, kept it on the caselet, which was now lying between Venkat and his neighbour.

The prof smiled. Venkat smiled back, with all the courage he could muster. Mr. Prof then checked his watch, and then looked back at Venkat. This was getting decidedly uncomfortable.

And then, out of nowhere, the prof raised both his hands, straight above his head, and gave out the nastiest laugh that Venkat would ever hear. In a flash, his arms came down and pushed Venkat back, off his chair, and onto the ground.

Thud!

Ouch, that sure hurt... Venkat checked his watch. A whole 23 minutes to class. Perfect... He could, for once, read the case and then go...

Aamby, Chennai & parties

Life in the last 1 1/2 months has just flown by with P&G. Flying around from city to city, attending trainings, presentations, cocktails, dinners, parties interspersed with some skin-tanning, back-breaking market work!

The mother of all parties though was at Aamby valley last week (Thu & Fri). Now this place, between Bombay & Pune is just unbelievable in the monsoons. You might remember going to some places and seeing clouds floating around what would seem like just a few meters above you... and then there are times, in the plane for example, where you get to see clouds below you.. but then you'd wonder, hey where do I actually get to be 'amongst' these clouds... For the first time in my life, I can say, I was quite literally among them at Aamby Valley. The clouds were there, just there floating around, and you could go touch!

The two days spent there were terrific. Sporting activities like a military training ground, shooting range, remote controlled race-car driving.. I loved it all... And then the party at night... where we danced, and we danced and we danced. It reminded me of the parties we used to have in college. I'd thought I'd never get such parties again. But Aamby... was good.

From the chilly hill-tops of Aamby, I've now moved to the (currently) breezy and hot coast of Chennai. This city, as well known for its lack of hot women (or any women for that matter) as for its delectable lunch meals, has been quite a good host to me so far. The weather's been ok, not too hot, nice breeze blowing throughout the day, much like Bombay, though I'd love to have a shower here and there once in a while. The hotel (hotel Savera) is decent. The people in office are cool and fun to be with. All in all, looks well set up for the next two weeks.

xx

Internet & Myshkin

This is too cool.. I'm on a bus to Thane from Andheri (number 425 :P) and I'm blogging on my Dell Latitude D430 with a Tata Indicom Data card.. although the connection is patchy, this is like a dream.. All those hours wasted travelling can now actually be put to good use!

Also as we say often in speeches :P "I would like to take this opportunity to WISH MY DEAR FRIEND MYSHKIN A HAPPY MARRIED LIFE WITH SHIVA". All the best to you two, you make a fabulous couple!

Oh n btw.. am on my way to Myshkin's place for the (wedding) dinner! :)

xx

Hide-a-da-baad

After an amazing 3 weeks in Kolkata, the action's shifted to Ramoji Film City in Hyderabad!! This place is huuge.. spread over 1800 acres (and growing..!) it has film sets of airports, railway stations, hospitals, London, waterfalls, innumerable gardens, etc. etc. We're here for a national level meet, and the good weather seems to be following me around.

The hotel (Hotel Sitara) is fairly comfy but overtly decorated - so much so, I'd risk calling it gaudy. But one gets used to it in a while. I really loved the sports facilities, played some squash and basketball.. and if I'd have had some time, would've tried out tennis as well :-P

Ramoji also has a small entertainment/theme park kinda thing inside which was good time-pass on the first day when we had some time in the afternoon.

xx- Friday, 4th July - on way to airport

I rued the fact that I didn't get to visit Hyderabad city again. Wanted to catch up with many friends, but our schedule was quite tightly packed, plus Hyd is like 2 hrs from the place, so no chance. Nevertheless, the holy city of Tirupati has called me for my final posting and frequent trips to Hyd will be on the anvil for sure.

xx - Sat early morn, 5th July