Yet, another year… another birthday… another cake…

Oh! My Birthday! This is slowly transforming from the most awaited day to the most dreaded day. Yet, another year… another birthday… another cake… God! I’m getting older!!! At least the people around make me feel so… I wish there is a reset button where I can set the clock back to 25!! If I look back, last one year has been alt-tabbing between bharatmatrimony.com and mbamission.com. Besides that I should honestly agree that I worked (rather say ‘was forced to work’) for the first time in my professional life.

After a day of hectic shopping, I kept my mobile in silent mode and went to bed. But some of my good pals Kirru, K, NP, Puppy, Swamy, Chow and Challu, with their wishes, succeeded in waking me up. Kirru took pain to wish me with a cake. On top of this, my mom came down to Bangalore to make my day. Later, my phone kept ringing through out the day. All my friends and relatives were eager to know about my marriage plans than to wish me on my birthday. Everyone says “Get married soon…” To me, it sounded like “Get well soon…” as if I am suffering from a dengue fever.

With my Mom around, I couldn’t skip a visit to temple. After cutting a cake in the afternoon, we went to Magnolia restaurant. K’s surprise visit with a beautiful bouquet added flamboyance to the birthday treat although, the red roses in the bouquet must have scared my mom. Looking towards another year with lots of hope and loads of luck, I wish to do something different… yes something different:D To start off, I’m changing my loyalties from Brazil to Argentina!!!! After all, Does it really matter?

Waaaw! I missed it…

Do you remember the last time you missed a bus or a train?

What was your reaction?

Oops! Shit! …and what not!

Though I encountered many such situations, the recent one would last long down my memory lane. These days, I work less and participate more in meetings(inactively). When I was in one meeting, a glimpse at my watch took me by surprise. I was left with 3 hours to catch a flight to Pune in order to meet a customer the next day. I had to travel all the way from electronic city to airport with a halt at koramangala to pick my baggage.

Though I sailed swiftly through a hefty traffic to reach Koramangala, I took enough time to pack my baggage, take bath and have early dinner. With only one and a half hour to catch the flight, the skillful cab driver fetched me to airport with 20 minutes to spare. When I was about to get down, the sight of the baskin robbins ice-cream outlet tickled my taste buds. I rushed to the shop, got my favorite “pralined cashew” scoop and sprinted to collect my boarding pass. “Sorry! You are late by 4 minutes”. These words immediately induced a powerful stare that turned my head towards the cone in my hand.

Then, I said “Waaaw! Thank you” with a big smile on my face.

Even before the Spice Jet employees digest my reply, I canceled the flight ticket and booked another ticket for the next flight, Kingfisher class. I was fortunate enough to get the reimbursement for both the tickets:)

The Big Fat Indian Wedding

-->

Wedding bells rang again.. Now it’s my friend Kirti Kumar’s marriage. I went, along with my friends, to Narasapuram to attend Kirti’s marriage. We were accommodated in a beautiful Dindi guesthouse, on the banks of river Godavari in Konaseema. The boat rides, view of a bridge on the river, dexterously decorated ponds around the guesthouse, dense flora with coconut trees and accommodation adjacent to a beautiful village reflected the scenic beauty of Konaseema.

    Later, we went to Kirti’s house where he started to marriage function hall. Have you started imagining that he is getting into a car? You are wrong. He got into a majestic chariot drawn with white horses. It took us some time to come out of this shock and believe that we were still in 2009. We participated and in fact danced as the procession proceeded with colorful crackers towards the functional hall.

    As soon as I entered the marriage functional hall premises, a beautiful girl greeted me with a red rose. I was wondering, God! Where am I? What is happening to me? Later I came to know that she was a part of an event management team that is organizing the marriage. As I moved on, another girl gave me a pamphlet that has the entire menu. Though it read fruits counter, chat bandar, sweet counter, tiffin counter, etc, I did not get enough time to visit all the stalls. How do I visit? It was crowded with approximately 12000 people. Yes, it reminded me of a fair rather than a marriage.

    The marriage was held in their own college grounds, Swarnandhra Group of Engineering Colleges grounds. In parallel, there was a cultural fest, with Gemini TV and Zee TV anchors hosting the show. In the meantime, my family members, friends and I were asked to have dinner in VIP section with the politicians. The thirty six feet stage was decorated with exquisite collection of flowers. While one half of the stage was occupied with the priests who came to perform marriage ceremony, the other half was occupied with eager photographers. But, numerous screens put across in the grounds and the live video captured through a rail track system facilitated guests. I think I might never get another chance to see twenty three priests performing a marriage ceremony. They gifted me a big silver glass and a dinner set to commemorate the marriage.

    In one line, this Great Indian Big Fat Wedding is the superlative of grandeur. I attended many of my friends’ marriages. Every marriage I attend is very special to me because it is one of the biggest moments in my friends’ life. Knowing Kirti personally for more than twelve years made this marriage even more special to me.

Those five minutes...

Challenging work, tight schedules and layoffs in November first week. Need I say more? Gosh! My professional life was never so hectic before. On top of this sits the b-school application process. I’m literally craving for a five hour sleep a day. Even though I’m wriggling hard with the essays, I feel that I’m not giving even 60% of what I can. However, I amassed a few exciting experiences in this application process.

For one b-school application, I worked on my essays and incorporated the changes that my friends suggested me. With half an hour time to deadline, one of my friends called me and said that he would edit my essays. Even though I was reluctant to take his feedback in the last hour, I took a chance thinking that his feedback might make a difference. Meanwhile, I reviewed my essays and forgot to keep track of time. When I checked the time, I had only 5 minutes to submit the application. I ran to search for my wallet to pick my credit card.

Those 5 minutes

5 minutes to spare:

Tring.. tring… tring… There comes a call from the devil’s advocate. He asked me to check his feedback. Oh! What an inappropriate time?

4 minutes to spare:

I checked his feedback on my essays. Oh! No. There were too many changes to make. My nerves started trembling and my brain started a non-cooperation movement. With much difficulty, I prioritized the changes and picked two.

3 minutes to spare:

Only one question hit my mind from all the corners. Can I submit the application on time? I made necessary changes and uploaded the new document. A sigh of relief has just lasted an instant when I noticed that the site stopped working.

2 minutes to spare:

My thoughts drove me outside this world. All of a sudden, I called my friend in US to know the US Eastern Standard Time. My friends say that sometimes I go crazy and this is a good example.

1 minute 30 seconds to spare:

I chanted a few times “Om Jayanthaaya namahaa… ”. In jet speed, I paid the fee to submit the application.

1 minute to spare:

My first reaction was a gape at the ceiling followed by a loud laugh saying to myself “Vow! I have 60 more seconds”.

Lesson: Plan in advance and make wise decisions. Otherwise you have to rely on the powerful weapon “Om Jayanthaaya namahaa…” :))))))))))

Tailoring "Walkathon 2009"

I attended an event “Walkathon” in the month of July in 2008. Walkathon is an Aashayein Foundation’s initiative to raise funds to empower child’s education. The Foundation invites people from different walks of life to come together to spread the awareness of child education by walking four kilometers. I have been associated with Aashayein Foundation for some time by teaching the children in Government schools on every Saturday.

    When I expressed my interest in volunteering the event “Walkathon 2009” to one of the founders, he asked me to attend the meetings and see how I can add some value. My inputs on how people perceive the event and how we can involve people from different walks of life and enable them to make a difference added some value to the discussions. After a few meetings, we realized that propagating the message of empowering child’s education is an uphill task. I identified that I have those contacts and ideas to propagate the message. In no time, I leveraged my contacts within my friends, Toastmasters group and Siemens associates. I could get the Media contacts required to publicize the message. I took the responsibility of marketing the event and selling the tickets within Siemens. I could form a small group of employees who wish to volunteer for the cause. Even though I had a tough time in convincing the Siemens administration, Siemens encouraged the event “Walkathon” by permitting us to place the posters of the event in the company premises, to send a mail to every employee and to sell the tickets.

   Gradually my involvement in the campaign of the event increased. I gave an inspiring presentation in different engineering and dental colleges in Bangalore and requested them to be a part of this cause. In some colleges, the students even came up with an idea of starting a Social Club within their college. I even gave an inspiring speech in Toastmasters and that made some of the Club members buy the tickets on the spot. I could put the posters of the event in some big malls in Bangalore. I wielded my contacts to get in touch with the Media houses and formed a team to invite the major Media houses. The newspaper agencies and news channels propagated the message and covered the event for which more than 600 people turned up. Finally, Walkathon volunteers could raise around 10 lac rupees.

    This wonderful experience gave me a chance to interact with many people, manage my time effectively and identify certain skills within me. But, the thought that the funds would be used to pay the tuition fee of more than 1000 children in Bangalore slums gives me more satisfaction than anything else. I heartily thank each and every person who made this happen.

-->

Independence Day Celebrations by Samanvaya Foundation

After a long time, I woke up early in the morning on 15th of August. If you are guessing that someone woke me up with a calling bell, you are wrong. Guess again. Yes! your wildest guess is correct. I woke up early in the morning to join the students of Government Higher Primary School in celebrating the Independence Day. To mark the 62nd Independence Day and to pay respect to our nation, the students of Government Higher Primary School, Jakksandra celebrated the Independence Day with great enthusiasm. On behalf of Samanvaya Foundation, I helped the students in Independence Day arrangements and distributed the national flags to all the students to imbibe the feeling of nationalism.

    To grace the occasion, some esteemed people in the society were invited. Students welcomed the guests in a traditional way with flowers and lemon. The celebrations began when the chief guest, the president of the Bangalore Rotary Club, hoisted the flag while the students sang the National Anthem. Later, the students sang patriotic songs and even performed for the folk songs. The performance of the talented children truly reflected the glimpse of rich culture in India. Along with the volunteers of Samanvaya Foundation, I sang a motivating hindi song “Hum Honge Kamyab….”, which means “We shall overcome…”. The inspired students responded with a huge applaud.

    Sir Menon who is guiding Samanvaya Foundation prepared a book on Communication Skills and Vedic Mathematics. Ms Sudha, one of the sponsors of Samanvaya Foundation, released the book and distributed a few copies of the book among the students to mark the occasion. I could see a spark of light their eyes when the students received the books. Their eyes reflected the passion to learn and the zeal to succeed. Later, I distributed the chocolates and biscuits among the kids.

My journey with GMAT

Yesterday, I took the GMAT (on 29th of July). I made 740/800 (Q-50, V-39). Total – 97 percentile (Q – 93 percentile, V – 87 percentile). It took me more than two years, with many long breaks in between, to prepare for GMAT. Over a period of time, I worked very hard to develop certain skills, which are pre-requisites to pursue MBA and to manage business. I want to share my views on and my preparation strategies in GMAT preparation so that some points would help aspiring MBA candidates who wish to take the GMAT.

Quantitative Ability:

Problem Solving & Data Sufficiency – You should learn the concepts, remember the formulas and solve wide variety of problems. To master Quantitative Ability, practice problems with a smart approach. I prepared for CAT, which requires one to solve problems of a high difficulty level. Thus, I did not spend much time to master Quantitative Ability. I followed only the Official Guide to study the concepts in Quantitative Ability.

Verbal Ability:

As I am a non-native English speaker, I had to spend much of my time to improve my score in Verbal ability section.

Sentence Correction – Unless you know the rules of Sentence Correction, you are recommended not to proceed further. Study the rules (especially idioms) with due diligence. Looking at a sentence, you should identify the flaws and this skill requires good amount of practice. I suggest Official Guide, Manhattan Review, Princeton Review and the flash cards from ‘beat the gmat’.

Critical Reasoning – Usually, the time required to solve a Critical reasoning question is more than the average time required to solve a question in Verbal Ability section. Whether you read the question first and go to the passage or you read the passage first and go to the question later should not make much difference. But, before looking into the options, you should have a vague idea about what the answer could be. Don’t overlook other options, even if you think you got the Bingo! in the first option itself. Although I practiced L-SAT questions, I do not suggest others this path because the questions are pretty difficult and may unnecessarily consume your time. I suggest you follow Official Guide, Princeton Review and Kaplan Review.

Reading Comprehension – Many of us have different approaches to solve Reading Comprehension questions. I recommend you read the passage first, understand the gist and refer to the passage only if needed, while answering questions. This approach helps you a lot not only in b-school but also in your future endeavours in managing a business. The concentration with which you read the passage is inversly proportional to the time you take to answer the questions. I suggest you follow Official Guide and Princeton Review.

AWA:

If you apply the Verbal Ability strategies in AWA, you can reap the benefits with less effort.

Practice Tests:

GMAT Prep Tests : These tests are highly recommended because the difficulty level of the actual GMAT tests is more or less the same level of GMAT Prep tests. Try to take more than one test so that you can get a clear picture of what kind of traps GMAC has devised for you. I made 720+ in all the GMAT Prep tests I practiced.

Manhattan GMAT Tests : I recommend even these tests because the difficulty level of actual GMAT tests is more closer to that of Manhattan tests than to that of any other test. By the time I took these tests, I was not strong enough in Verbal ability fundamentals. My average score is 690 in these tests. Later I worked on Verbal ability fundamentals and proceeded with GMAT Prep tests.

Princeton Tests : I heard that the scores in Princeton are skewed. I cannot comment on this claim as I took only one test when I was taking Manhattan tests. I made 720 in Princeton test.

Kaplan Tests : You better avoid taking these tests. The difficulty level in these tests is pretty high. I made scores in the range of 570-640.

I hope this information helps the MBA aspirants who are planning to give GMAT in near future. If you have any query or need some help, you can shoot a mail at jet706@gmail.com or post the query in the comments below. If you post the query in the comments, your query and my answer will help others who are planning to take GMAT.

How often do you take a shower?

This is a short and funny conversation among my friends. I hope you enjoy this conversation.

Puppy : Thanks to the climate in Visakhapatnam. I take bath thrice a day.

Jayanth : Thanks to the climate in Bangalore. I take bath once in three days.

Rajesh : Thanks to the climate in Noida. I don’t remember when I took bath last time.

Chinna : Thanks to the climate in Netherlands. I don’t know what does ‘bath’ mean?