Priyadarshi's Small World

Life in March

2008-03-27T06:35:00.000-07:00

Doston...How are you guys ?...How is life ?

For me...Its a hectic one..First of, there are two IIM interviews...I and B...Welll I dunno about the profs..But they are so much in love with probability...In my A and I interviews, it was all probablity..And some other aspects about my work profile...But probability is always there..God knows..if probability comes between me and my dream of going to IIM...Lets see

I am not going to jot down my interview experiences...Most of them were forgetable !!!! In B, they seemed NOT interested in me as well.....So for me, as per my understanding, I should get into the first list of IIMK...Also should make it to the waiting list of of IIML...No idea about the rest....At least I am not hopeful about them...

Tomorrow I have my MDI GDPI at Mumbai....That is the end of GDPI session of this year...Although I have my IIM Shillong GDPI on 30th of April, but I pray to GOD that I get through some other IIMs by the time...Results of other IIMS and MDI are expected by the 2nd week of April...Lets see if lady luck smiles at me this time..

Two IIM Interviews and life after that....

2008-02-15T07:06:00.000-08:00

Hello friends..
I am at Mumbai now..Attended my IIMK GDPI today...Already done with L thing..But then I havn't written anything about L..Why ? Well, I think you can guess it..It was NOT a good one....Lets jot down the circumstances of both the interviews and a bit about where I am staying in and about my life with those friends...

IIML..Before and After:
It was on 9th...My first IIM GDPI of this session..I left Indore on 7th..Reached Mumbai at dawn..Rather I should say at night..5:30 AM...The sky was dark...And o my God !!! It was so chilly morning.8.5 degree celsius temp..Can you imagine ? That too in Mumbai ? But then that was it...If it was a topic on GD, I would have already shouted about the effects of Global Warming..But hold on...I won't do that here...

Anyways, reached my friend's flat at Andheri at 7...He is Bharat Jadwani...One my my lifelong friends...Working (??) or rather drawing salary at Deloitte Consulting..There was his roomie Rahul Sharma also..And 7 AM is the sleeping hour for IT professionals....So they both were in their deep slumber..I rang the bell..No body answered...Then I called my friend Bharat...And somehow he woke up..And opened the door for me....Then he went to sleep again...With nobody awake, I also thought of catching a small nap...Upto 9:30..Then we all woke up...Had tea..And these guys left for their office.

Afternoon was pretty boring..Was alone in the flat...Anyways, next day I had my K interview in the morning...Will write about that later...

GD PI Calls and thereafter !!!

2008-01-29T01:45:00.000-08:00

I have already posted something about my IIM GDPI calls...So you must be wondering what am I going to pen down today again !!!! ..Don't worry..Its NOT some boring GDPI prep material...I just want to share my view about the fiasco called CAT...And Its tryst with my life!!!

Have you seen a child who is fed forcefully by his mother ?..Neither is he hungry, nor is he willing to taste the food..Still his mom wants him to eat all that stuff....Pretty bad situation for the poor child...Well my condition is the same...The left part of my soul (Who is inclind towards logical thinking !!) is acting as the mom...While the right part is the child who is fed up of all the post CAT GDPI prep....Left one wants me to have atleast an IIM degree after missing the IIT one...While the right one said who cares !!....You know...Going thru the current affairs.... my engineering subjects...after I left them in peace for 5 years (BTW, Have I touched them before ? be honest !!)....The Maths papers...You know I loved Maths upto 12th Standard..Then in my engineering, I was accoustomed to a new kind of Math..And I hatd that one...

So doing all these stuff, which you don't like is painfull....The only part that I like about GDPI prep is the introspection part...I never did that before...And it is awesome..But then again..there is also hipocracy...I mean I want to stay the way I am..And I don't want to open any new IT co in future...But still, the coaching classes taught me to say so....Can it be called introspection then ?..In true sense ?

There again I am going for GD PI with all these..Please wish me Good Luck !!!

CAT 07 Results and beyond !!! Thank GOD !!!

2008-01-29T00:02:00.000-08:00

Guys,
I know you must be thinking what the heck !!!..Why this guy is posting CAT results some 20 days after the CAT result was out !!!! Was he mourning about it all these days....Both YES and NO...Puzzled ??
Here goes my official CAT results for this year(I am a CAT veteran !!!)

VA/RC: 92.84 %ile : 25.00 Marks
DI: 98.75 %ile : 57.xx Marks
QA: 95.6 %ile : 32.00 Marks
Overall: 98.98 %ile

Now, I was expecting my VA/RC score to be between 35 to 45....For IMS and TIME it was 40, For PT it was 45 and for CL it was the lowest, 35....Realistically I believed IMS/TIME answer keys...And thought I would get somewhere about 99.5 %ile...But that was not to be...Bad..Bad..Really bad....

Hey, but that was not all.....Thanks to my Mom n Dad, who pushed me hard to study hard during my childhood days.....So I was supposedly a scholar upto 12th standard...Then came my engineering..And I was my own boss..So you can very well guess about that time....but for my results in Secondary and Higher Secondary exams, some IIMs still thought to have pity on me...And they are IIM Lucknow, Indore and Kozhikode...Well my 5 years of IT work ex also helped a lot..IIM Ahmedabad also gave a call under OBC quota, but I don't bank upon that one...

See, I have seen only one guy to have a score like mine (Below 99 %ile) in PG...And get 3 genuine IIM calls (I don't call the OBC calls as genu...)...Had I got another question wrong in VA/RC...And I would have got no calls !!!....If somehow, my VA/RC %ile were below 92, I would have missed IIMK call...I know one guy in my office who had 98.93 %ile overall, with 91.9 %ile in VA/RC..And no IIM call.....Another girl..With 99.07 %ile with min 93+ %ile in one section, and still received only one call..IIMK

So, I guess I was lucky...Hey GOD ..Thank you very much !!!

CAT 07 Results

2008-01-03T02:08:00.000-08:00

Hey CAT aspirant

How you find the time just before the results? I tried everything to shift my focus from this thing…But alas!! It was a failure. I am not able to concentrate on my office works as well. And my PM thinks that I am neglecting my work. That’s true, but I can’t help it.

To top it, IIMB site said earlier that the call list will be out by 2nd Jan. Then came the surprise. They changed the date to 10th of Jan on 2nd Jan itself. What a pity!! I mean, if you can’t do something within a deadline, convey it beforehand, and not on the last day!! That’s what my peers have taught my all 4 years. Now I see IIMB doing that thing.

But I won’t complain. Rather I will wait. XAT is scheduled on 6th Jan. Lets do some justice with that at least!!

Forbidden Pleasure !!

2007-12-28T05:19:00.000-08:00

WOW !!!!!!

Today only I am able to logon to my blog from my office. It feels great, especially when you are knowingly doing something wrong. (You dirty mind..What else were you thinking about on a public forum ??)
I won't write much today. Its Friday 7:00 P.M. So time to booze....Pardon me. I am that kind of software engineer who likes to slog on weekdays and hates to spend anything more than 9 hours at office on Fridays.
See you all on Monday. Till then, just chill !!

P.S.: Jyada filmi ho gaya kya ?

Home coming and then

2007-12-27T06:36:00.000-08:00

Hey..How many of you are working in some private organization in India(Not in home city) and still haven't visited your home for one and a half years ? I know, the number is very less..But then I am one of them.

So what prompted me to stay here at Indore, away from my home, for such a long time ? Do I have (For that matter, I am not seeing someone at Indore !!)..Well, the answer may seem ridiculous, but its true. Its an exam called CAT.

Yes. If any of you are a CAT veteran, then you will understand. And this is third time that I have attempted CAT. CAT has taken its toll not only on me, but also with my family members.
Last time, in CAT 2006 I had 3 IIM calls (OBC Quota man !!!). Then I prepared for GDPI, attended them, waited madly like an pregnant lady, and finally the quota fiasco was over in April,2007. So was my chances of making it to an IIM. But then it was the ideal time to start prep for CAT2007. And me, being an ideal CAT aspirant, did the same thing.

Finally it was over on Nov 18, and I was just ready to visit my home. It is in Durgapur,West Bengal. Wow...It felt great to have 2 weeks leave.But the time before I start my journey was better..As soon as I reached there, it seemed that time is passing by very fast..And 2 weeks was over in just 2 weeks !!!

I am here again at Indore this week.

Lets see if my staying at Indore for 1.5 years makes any impact on my CAT results.

All the best to all CAT takers.

My Friends - Part 1

2007-12-05T06:54:00.000-08:00

I have made the promise (to myself) to post my daily e-diary here. But then, the forgetful soul I am, I always forget my promises..Sorry for that.

Today I am going to write about some of my friends...

There is a proverb saying "A Friend in need is a friend indeed.". when I was a mere school-going kid, I used to use this maxim in my essays whenever I got any opportunity...But truly speaking, I didn't fully realize neither the meaning and nor the depth of this. When I was going to school. Not even during my engineering days...Yes I have made many friends there, but none was close to my heart...Except one during my school days...And another in my engineering college...First one is Prasenjit Roy...And second one is Tapan Pal....

And mostly I got to know my true friends when I was struggling with my first job at Mumbai. Those were the painful days...Three long years..2003 to 2006....And Tapan was there with me. In Syntel...Infact he was my flat mate there as well. When we went to Mumbai in July, we stayed in a hotel in Churchgate. We got up early in the morning. At 5 O' clock…Then be in a queue to use the toilet. I mean we were not in a position to afford any good hotel, that too at Churchgate. Then be ready by 7: 15.Run to Churchgate station..Catch the train to Andheri…Got down there by 8:15.catch the office bus there..Reach Seepz by 8:30..And enter the den to face new quizzes and assignments. Now I must confess that I was ( Was or Is ??..) pathetic in programming stuff…I hardly wrote 10 programs in the whole 4 years of my engineering life..Then the dreaded faculty used to come..Hardly teach something. And take everyone for some test. It was real tough after those 4 years..I swear…We left office at around 7..Went to some other place to find a flat ( Read shelter) for us, a kind of broker who won't take much brokerage ..Then we used to meet at 9 near our hotel. Have dinner. Went to room. Revise whatever has been told to us in those training hours.

I still remember my first test at Syntel. It was about writing some algorithms for some 8/9 problems. Oh boy. Someone like me, who couldn't write the algo to find whether a number is prime or not (I guess its way too tough. For that matter, I won't be able to write it now as well after a healthy 4.5 years of experience), its gonna be a bad day. But then whatever I learned in engineering, I put all that skill at test. I mean copying skills. Yes I copied from my poor friend Tapan, who was incidentally not as bad as me in those stuff. Next day our training coordinator, Kaizad announced that the results are put on the notice board. And some poor guy managed to get only 40% marks. Mind this, you have to get 60% marks overall to successfully complete the training program, otherwise you will be kicked out of the company.

Well, I was pretty sure that 40%-wala poor soul is none other than me. But good heavens! When I checked the result sheet, it said I got 88%. And I am the second topper in my batch. For a moment I sighed. Oh! Then I heard my friend's voice. "How on earth can I manage only 40%", cried Tapan. Now that's strange. I mean, I copied from him. And whatever I have written on my own, I was damn sure, that was nothing but shit. Then I tried to introspect what went right with me.

And I found out. It was all because of my dad (I call him baba). Guess how? It was those days, when he used to sit in front of me with a stick and force me to practice handwriting. As a result, I have a handwriting which is neat. So that helped me to get those marks, as Kaizad was able to read those lines somehow. While my friend, with poor handwriting, suffered the setback.

Well I missed another friend there. Joydeep, the muggu guy. Tapan, Joydeep and me joined Syntel together, and we were classmates before. Now this is one guy, who has the ability to go to study in some top US versities, and still was with us, at Mumbai, struggling to complete the VB assignments at the training program. This guy is hell bent on getting confused in taking some decisions about his life as well as others, whom he knows.

Well…Enough good words about Tapan and Joydeep…Now face the reality….

First, lets complete about Joydeep..For the only reason, that, he is a normal guy. You won't find much amusing about him...Well he is good looking(Man.You owe a treat to me for this line!!). Not overweight, Something like 5 feet 8. Basically a good boy. Every father will surely want to have a son like him. Extremely obedient. Cautious about his duties and all that. But only one weakness. Yes Sir/Madam...You guessed right...Its girls...How much obessed ?..Let me tell you an incident...Sometime when we nearly completed one year at Syntel, a girl joined our project. Man she was like the "witches" we see in comic books..I mean, I know I shouldn't comment like this about someone..But then this is only to reveal the attraction my friend feels about the fairer sex...Now, during that time Tapan and Joydeep were both in the same project, while I was in another one. That girl joined their project. And I remember Joydeep was absent that day. So when we were having lunch at the resturant, we discussed about that girl..I mean Tapan and me. Nest day Joydeep was present, but he hadn't seen her yet. So he was damn curious. And someone told that girl about another member in their project team, Joydeep. Then the real fun begins. The girl came to Tapan( He was seated beside Joydeep), and asked him who Joydeep is. And Tapan gave one killer of an answer. He said "Hey. If you see someone going for you also..Samajh jana..wohi Joydeep hai"."

Now comes the gem of a person, my dear friend Tapan.
He is staying in USA for last two years…he weighs nearly 110 kilos (In his words its just one and a half quintal .U know he prefers to use a different scale, to make the numerical simpler)…6 feet high…Lost half of his hair from the front side.. When he sent me one of his pics, standing beside the Wall street bull in NY City, it was really difficult to identify my friend from the two creatures..Anyways, he is good at heart. And I mean it.

The other guy, my schoolmate, was not there with me after our 12th std studies…I mean I went to Jadavpur university, and he went to NIT Durgapur…Both graduated in Electronics & Telecommunication engineering…Then I went to Mumbai and joined Syntel and he stayed back at Kolkata and joined Cognizant..Now he is with Amdocs, at Cypras..Whereas I am with CSC at Indore..

First part ends here. Wait for other parts.
P.S. Part 2 will be published very soon.

eDiary on 11/29

2007-11-29T06:48:00.000-08:00

Today was one helluva of a day..Went to office early...And met my manager in the elevator..Thought he will appreciate it...Well..Rather he called me at his cubicle...Handed me a whole lot of tasks..Some 7 issues were there...And I should finish all of them by EOD...By any means !!

Man...What a way to start your day...Then I somehow got out of that shock..And started my application in my local...But it wasn't working...It was working yesterday when I left my office..But not today...God knows how Microsoft is still the numero uno in IT industry (I work in Microsoft .NET technology)..Tried for 1 hour...But to no avail...Went to my manager again...He tried for 1 and a half hour...Still no progress...Rebooted my m/c....Still same...Finally I took a fresh copy of the code from my manager's box...It usually takes sometime to setup your local..But then, today, it started within 5 minutes...Then I was getting some new kind of errors....It was a pathetic situation....Did no changes..Instead rebooted my m/c again...And voila..Everything started working smoothly...

Finally I solved nearly 4 issues, my manager did 2...1 is still left for tomorrow...And now I am out of that horrible place, my cubile...

Lets see what is in store for me tomorrow......

PS: I have planned to watch "The Ring 1" day before yesterday...But man...it is a deadly horror movie...And I was watching this all alone in the first floor of our flat..So couldn't proceed after 15 minutes...Instead watched "Eurotrip" again..Planning to complete that movie again today...But none of my flatmates reached home yet....So waiting for them...

e-Diary of 11/28...

2007-11-28T17:28:00.000-08:00

Today itself I have thought of writing e-diary...if possible everyday when I am at office :)) ..You can understand how much hardwork I do at my office...

I work in .NET technology..I wouldn't say I am good at it, but somehow I can manage...Today we got some webservice problem, and I got to fix it..Now, that, its done, and I am sitting idle, just to complete my 9 hour stay at office, so I thought of writing something...

Well..my CAT score is coming to be 122 or more...With clearing all the cutoffs (Possibly !!)...But last year I have gone through the pain of expectation and failure...So I am not thinking about that right now...

One more point I have thought of...Most of my well-wishers have advised me to start GDPI prep right now..But boy!! I need a break..So the best strategy I have thought of : Watch all possible movies in lappy/theatre..And then if you get some GDPI calls, go there and say that Watching movies is your hobby :))..I am justifying myself this way at least.!!!

So you all have fun...Let me go and watch The Ring - 1 now

Fast Forward to Nov 07...

2007-11-27T18:39:00.000-08:00

Well...7 months have passed by ..After my first post...Life had been a roller coaster ride these days..Changes in my life...Lets jot them down...

1) IIM results came out in April...And as per Hon'ble Supreme court decesion, OBC quota got scrapped..So was my chances of making to a big b school...It was undoubtedly one of the worst days in my life..The day the results came out...Most of my friends who got IIM calls were overjoyed with their final converts...Everybody was asking about mine...Man it was painful...I left my office early just to avoid any eye contact with my near and dear ones....I was looking for a place to hide...from that obvious question...What happened to me ???

2) But life exists beyond IIMs...So I was again bck to normal life...I completed 4 years in IT industry in June this year..My project manager asked me again if I'll go onsite or not...Well..I have never gone onsite...Normel IT people find this somewhat strange...But then these were the toll taken by CAT !!..
Anyways, I had a word with my Dad regarding my onsite trip...Somehow this is one guy who has tremendous faith on me...And he again said not to go and try CAT again...Earlier I was apprehensive about CAT..I didn't want CAT to decide/control my life...But my ego...I found out that I am again ready to go for CAT..And I was waiting for someone to support my decesion...And it was my Dad..

3) This time the prep session was somewhat chilled...Not to give much attention to CAT...Last year my prep was good..That helped me as well....So even without studying 1 hour regularly, I was scoring above 95% in AIMCATs...Joined IMS...The least % I got there was 97%.
Finally the D Day came..My test center was same as last year...IPS Academy, Indore...And I wrote the test..For the first time without any fear and tension...
I don't know whether I'll get IIM calls or not..But this time I enjoyed the process...And that justifies my decesion of saying no to my PM for onsite trip..

Lets see what is in store for me from IIMS....Results are on first week of Jan,08..Wish me good luck !!

Getting Started

2007-04-19T09:55:00.000-07:00

Well...Its going to be my first blog...

Really I don't have much to say..Infact I'm in no mood to write something lengthy..I'm anxiously waiting for my IIM final results..But then my hardles are not only other candidates..There are the HRD ministry and SC also, blocking my way !!

I shall Keep everybody updated, once the results are out !!!..Till then chill out guys!!