This year things are different, now after two and a half years of an amazing journey in TCS, am back to college life :  MBA at one of the top B schools in India, Xavier Institute Of Management, Bhubaneswar.

So here is my long drawn list for this year…not according to priority

1. Read business newspapers daily. This is really difficult to do.

2. Blog on a consistent basis.

3. Lose atleast 10 kgs in 6 month.s Have a tennis court and a wonderful gym in our campus. But need time to get into my sport shoes.

4. Read a lot of books. Target is 1 every month.

5. Target for CFA in June.

6. Do decently in academics, no urge to top, need to give others a chance na

7. Get involved in college activities, clubs and events and enjoy every moment of my experience here.

8. Participate in a lot of inter B school events. Have great opportunities here.

9. Get placed in  good company in a job that I would be passionate about.

10 . This one is a secret… keeping it to my self .

Writing down the list of resolutions seems great….it feels like half the battle is over. Now remains the other half of the battle, sticking to those resolutions and improving as a person.

Victory will be mine

While I am exceeding expectations of my supervisors at work, certainly I have not lived upto the expectations I have set for myself. And this year I have decided come what may, I am not going to disappoint myself. Have drawn out  a list of things that I want to do this year. So hopefully when I look upon this year, I  would have a nice big smile on my face.

1. Get into a good B-school.Very very important. Top priority. Need to work real hard here.

2. Lose 12 kgs. It has to happen this year. But with no time to join a gym, things look difficult.

3.  Do things you love not necessarily things that get you money.

4. Always keep smiling. Never grumble about how life is going. This is a must for everyone, the more you grumble the more worse your life would becomes, and you would end up grumbling more. And the cycle just continues.

5. Learn, Learn, Learn.

6.  Share, Share, Share.

7. Reduce movies to a bare minimum. This one’s really tough. It’s like asking myself to stop breathing .

8. Lead from the front in all situations. If something seems right, then follow it passionately.

9. Take my public speaking and communication skills up to a whole new level. I am doing fine here, but there is always scope for improvement.

10. Treasure my loved ones. Never let down my parents or friends ever in life.

That’s it for now.Time to get working. After all I have quite a few goals to be met eh

Finally, off with that bush between my nose and lips, commonly referred to as a MOUSTACHE.

Now time to change a quite a few things (and not just physically), time to set and achieve my goals, time to continuously keep learning and adding new skills(and not just programming skills), time to blog more often, time to  make and break resolutions,  and most importantly of all…… ‘Time To Keep Enjoying‘.

There goes my alarm, and it’s put off even before a line of the beautiful song is completed.With one eye open , I check out the time its 6.30 am. I roll on my bed for a few minutes before deciding that half an hour of more sleep ain’t going to hurt anybody. The half hour somehow ends up into a 3 hour long slumber.

Damn it, it’s 9.30 am. Had promised I would sweat it out at the gym today. Have been skipping the gym religiously for sometime now, and my ever increasing waistline would soon be the inspiration for setting up a few jogging tracks in my area. But there’s no time now, have to reach office by 11 am.That too seems an impossibility. Dadar to SEEPZ in an hour, that too on a rainy day, would be the height of optimism.

I curse my self for being lazy, curse office for starting at 11am and not 2pm, curse my servant for not coming on time, curse my clothes for not being ironed, curse my mobile for not having being charged. It’s 10 am by the time I manage to leave home. It has started pouring cats and dogs, monkeys and elephants, and I send a last curse to the skies for starting my day in such a miserable manner.

If you haven’t understood by now, I hate rains. Speeding cars splashing water all over you and turning your formal wear into designer stuff, buses being jam packed, auto-rickshaw drivers doing nakhras to take you in, and the Mumbai traffic and pathetic drainage do not help either.

Finally manage to get a taxi, and that’s a pretty difficult task, specially if its a rainy day and if you wish to visit a traffic prone area like SEEPZ. I flung my office bag at the side and decide to catch some sleep in the taxi until the rather long journey to office is completed. Hardly have I slept for a few minutes, that I am woken up by persistent thumping on the windows of the taxi. A little girl in tattered clothes is knocking on my window begging for some money.

I’m a total disapprover of giving money to beggars as I believe you are aiding some one to be reliant on others mercy rather than one’s own hard work. So as usual, I tell the girl to move ahead, without even looking at her. But she stills pleads, saying that she is in real hunger.

I look up at her, determined to tell her sternly to move on. But the determination vanishes as soon as I look into her face. It’s pouring heavily, the girl has tattered clothes, she seems to be hungry for a long time, and is nothing older than six years. Despite, having faced such adversity at such a small age, she still manages a smile on her face. A smile that crumbles me, her innocence makes me draw my wallet out. I see a sparkle in the girl’s eyes, realising perhaps that she can finally relish on some food now. I search my wallet for some coins, nothing’s there. No ten rupee or twenty rupee notes too, all I have are a few hundred rupee notes. Without looking at her ( this time out of shame) I tell her to move ahead. But she pleads, “Bhaiya kuch paise toh de do, khana khana hain“. I really want to help her out, but am feeling painful to part away with my hundred rupee note. I am feeling the pinch within me. Without giving me more time to ponder on my decision , the traffic signal changes from red to green, and my taxi moves away. Away from the girl and away from her problems.

That whole day passed by miserably. Every moment went by, having me in thought about my totally selfish behaviour. I can well spend money (without thinking twice) on some rather stupid coffee in CCD or on a rather unhealthy pizza from Dominos, but when it comes to giving that same money for providing someone witha days food, I start feeling the pinch. What kind of selfish person have I grown up to be?

I call my self unlucky when I do badly in a test or grumble about a bad day in office or the traffic of Mumbai daily. Don’t my problems with life totally pale down, when compared to that little girl? Am, I not the luckiest person from that little girl’s point of view?

That girl’s thumping on my window that day was a wakeup call from God. A call to make me feel how lucky I am, compared to the many unfortunate one’s around . And how I must inturn do something for being fortunate enough to be in a position I am. How I should wakeup everyday with a smile and thank God for giving me a life with comforts rather than grumbling about my miniscule problems.

Henceforth instead of spending unnecessarily on watching some stupid movies, eating in some fancy restaurant, purchasing excess of branded clothes, will be saving money to do something concrete for the less fortunate people amongst us . Do not know what it is going to be as of now. But every year, would surely return something back to the society I belong to. Because it is only our small actions that will collectively make this world a better place. That’s all for now, time to light some candles rather than curse the darkness around.

Panaji’s Most Busiest SideWalk At Peaktime

Miramar Highway

The Camera Just Went Click

After Hogging At Hotel Orion With Friends

Trying To Be Innovative

Check out some more of my pathetic photography skills inside

Bambolim Church At 1 am

In Search Of a Petrol Pump At 2 am

Ghost Hunting At 3 am

Baga Beach at 5 am

Breakfast at Goa Marriots 7 am

The Goggles Are for hiding those sleepy eyes

Aseem, Niraj And South’s Upcoming Superstar

Aseem And Ashish Striking A Pose With The Superstar

A much needed fantastic weekend that definitely had me rejuvenated. A weekend that flew as fast  as that Shoaib Akthar delivery. A weekend that flew as fast as college days. A weekend that flew as fast as life itself. A weekend that flew as fast as the plane that departed from Goa airport with me seated in it.

Now it’s back to the rat race…….back to congestion….back to a claustrophobic life …… back to canteen food ……back to fighting with rickshaw wallas …. back to water clogged streets….. back to filling sad looking excel sheets…..back to creating meaningless reports……back to using coffee as a sleep deprivation drug………back to loneliness……back to a sleepless city…..back to Mumbai…..

3rd December 1984 : Bhopal Gas Tragedy

23rd July 1973 : Himesh Reshammiya is born

29th June 2007 : Himesh Reshammiya debuts as an actor with Aap Ka Surrooor.

9th May 2008 : Mimoh debuts as an actor with Jimmy

And now its time to update this list of all time disasters.

11th May 2008 : Me and my room-mates decide to wake up the Sanjeev Kapoor sleeping within us and decide to exploit our culinary skills.

To all the ladies and a few men, who have ever managed to cook anything eatable in their entire lifetime, hats off to you all. One attempt at cooking and I have realised cracking CAT or I.I.T. JEE seems a lot more easier. And no kidding here.

Equipped with a lot of enthusiasm and optimistic of giving the Sanjeev Kapoors and the Tarla Dalal’s of the world a run for their money, I and my room mates decided to don the chef’s hat.

My grand-mom is the world’s best cook, mom cooks pretty well, and dad also does manage to cook well when he does decide to cook. So guess genetically ( if there are cooking genes) I was pretty much equipped to be a fine cook. So no more waitin, Sanjeev Kapoor was all set to wakeup from his slumber.

Bhendi ki Sabji, Soya beans Masala Gravy, Bundi Raita was what we intended to cook but ask my digestive system and you are sure to get way different answers. I really love spicy food but after having a bit of what we cooked yesterday, it will be good bye to spicy and masaledar food for a while(like for some centuries). Not paying heed to my friend who claimed to have some previous cooking experience, I went on adding scoops of chilli powder to every dish that was burning (cann’t use the term cooking here) on the gas stove. While she prayed for me to stop my experimentation and rest and watch IPL instead, I insisted on being innovative. Something in me said that adding Dominos chilli flakes and Dominos organic seasonings would surely give the food a different taste. It gave it a different taste alright, but it no longer remained food. And the moment I added Tropicana Apple Juice to the soya bean gravy, she gave up providing help with the food. So it was just the food at the mercy of me and my room mates innovation and experimentation.

After about two hours of experimentation with the food. The “so called food” was ready. Cooking reminded me of my Chemistry practical sessions where we mindlessly used to mix up chemicals just to see what combination would be produced. The only difference was the experimentations at the laboratory resulted in me almost losing one of my eyes and the expire – mentations in the kitchen resulted in all of us getting a bad stomach ache and losing the desire of ever having or cooking food again.

Here’s a look at what we prepared. It might look alright, but ask our angry bowels who are right now firing all kinds of expletives (arreey no need of opening up the dictionary : it just a nice way of saying maa behen ki gaaliyaan) at me and my room mates and you shall get pretty much disgusting answers.

We did have a lot of fun trying our hands at cooking. But too much of such kind of fun is sure to land us in one of those stinky little dingy Government hospitals. New Year’s long gone. But it’s time to make a resolution. I promise to give the Sanjeev Kapoor in me a thousand sleeping pills so that he goes into a long long coma. Goodnight Mr. Sanjeev Kapoor.

That’s all for now. Have to now decide what has to be done of the entire grocery store that my roomie picked up , thinking that cooking was going to be a regular feature in our lives. At the moment though challenging  the Great Indian Mahabali Khali  for a fight seems to be a better option than our experiments with cooking. So any of you who needs some extra vegetables or masala’s just pop in and we will be pleased to give it all away to you.

Sorry Note : Am really sorry to my digestive system for having to digest the rubbish that we cooked up, the sweet friend of mine who I invited over for dinner and made her eat all that bakwaas (I did make her laugh a lot though if that’s any compensation), the stray dogs who are right now eating a cocktail of all the things(cann’t call it food) we dumped in the nearby dustbin, and my servant who almost died of a shock seeing the mess we had made in the kitchen.

Sorry all of you. Sanjeev Kapoor is now in deep sleep. Infact he is snoring. Wait a sec, I guess it’s my stomach growling. Have to rush somewhere now. Here’s taking your leave.

What’s In My Favor

• My dedication and motivation.

• This blog post, that will continuously remind me of my GOAL.

• A room mate who is equally health conscious.

The Odd’s Against Me

• A sedentary ten hours job.

• A metabolism rate that pretty much SUCKS.

• Time , that always seems so less.

• As I am away from home, have to rely on hotel food and the chefs in the restaurants I frequent aren’t particularly health conscious.

That’s Me , One Year From Now

There is no point pondering over things like is this the right time to say this or should I wait for a more appropriate situation. For take it from me, there is no such thing as RIGHT TIME.

I personally used to ponder over a lot over the after effects of what I wanted to say and wait for the right time to come. A wait that would never end. But have resolved to never do so in future and just express my feelings than hiding them deep inside.

So whenever you’ve got to say something, Just Say It.

If you’ve got to say Sorry. Just Say It.

If you’ve got to say Thank You. Just Say It.

If you’ve got to say I Love You. Just Say It.

If you’ve got to say F$%& Off. Just Say It.