The MT Batch ’09 - A Back Bencher’s Perspective

Despite the NOT SO GOOD perception about the back benchers in teaching community, one important advantage, in addition to the obvious ones ;), is that they get the bird eye view of the ecosystem called class. Being an experienced chap of same back bench, I take the opportunity to present the MT Batch of 2009…but ZARA HATKE…

Before we begin, a disclaimer: Though names have not been taken but any resemblance to characteristics & symptoms are purely deliberate.
Classifying the batch in 4 breeds/species, let’s get into the thick of matter:

· Breed called Pre Probed Officially (PPO)
· Breed called Doubtful Young Blood (DYB)
· Breed called Name Plates Available (NPA)
· Breed called The Unpredictibles

First kind of species, PPO, arguably the most informed customers (FYI…not consumers) of the organization hanging helplessly in the PPT sessions, struggling to give attention in the already known KYC. This kind of species can be identified easily playing somewhere a game called WHAT THEY DID LAST SUMMER…one such bugger lives in my flat with an “8x10 tasveer”

Second one, for all official purposes let us call them DYBs (Doubtful Young Bloods), have never been doubted about being young. Not for the surprise of many, they derive their name because from their brain, through the belly…till the very bottom, they are full of doubts. Dare you touch them & they will jump of their seats with impressively baked, obvious question woven in an ultimate complex MBA jargon dipped in Cherry Blossomed accent, consummately added toppings of serious inquisitive gestures.
Predominantly suffocated by the marketers, they surpass all visible, invisible entry barriers to undifferentiatedly* targeting the Still Confused silver jubilee MTs who started their career few decades back in the organization, surviving the cross functional syndrome unbelievably finds themselves glued to the Most Trusted Brand. Anyways, it’s not the subject under discussion here…
The above specie, DYB, forms the most dangerous of the lot as they many a times end up as a Disruptive Innovation especially for those in the Self Introspective Solo Calm Zone (read as “sleep”) who supposedly have burned their midnight oil in movies or LDLD (Long distance long duration) calls.

Third one, I think it’s them for whom we all have been honored with name plates. They follow the beautiful positioning of…BAS, NAAM HI KAAFI HAI. When you SELECT ALL, they pop up like FEW HIDDEN FILES. Their presence is majorly felt in the morning when people shuffle their positions in the quest to reach the best possible geopolitical location or to have a DESIRED neighbor. OR when tired of same bunch of monkeys, presenter try to read names on this UNTAPPED MARKET…
Our NPAs are very interesting & the one defying the famous financial abbreviation known to the world. Silent as they look, carries killing smile used as weapon to avoid any evidence proving that they aren’t in NOW ;) Probe them, talk to them…PAKAOFY them (as I do) to realize that they are the latent assets, well above the materialistic discussions of DYBs.

Forth one, The Unpredictibles*…The Uncategorized…in short…The Left Overs. At times, they create iconic ROTFL interventions, at other time their existence are proven by the lost name plates. Oscillating between extremes, they act as the fluids to this ecosystem, taking any form as required.

The only difference in bird eye view & back bencher’s perspective is that where a bird eye view is from a distance, my bench…though at back, is in same frame ;)

*grammer & spelling mistakes are attempt to make the post little short of perfection ;)

Oceans’10…another way of life !!

Before the movie, lets see the casting:
Jaspreet: The BHABHI searcher !!
Ankit: The nocturnal researcher !!
Abhishek: Asli Punjabi & the jumping jack !!
Akshay: Aate samay bhot saare kele lete ana !!
Kartik: Mere liye 2 McVeggie with EXTRA cheese & coke lana !!
Karan: Main chala Mumbai, nxt 4 days class nahi hai !!
Anshuman: The Chatter-box & blogger !!
Arunesh: Maa da ladla, bahen da ladla !!
Anuroop: The lughing Buddha !!
Shashank: hi hi hi…naruto naruto, sayona sayona, aori aori !!

Oceans’10 is what we call it, name given not only to the group of 10 freaks but to the FEELING we are experiencing, the AIR we are breathing, the SUPPORT we are enjoying… a LIFE in its truest sense, lived for a year & a half.

Messed up in dire need of accommodation at the very first day of our SIBM journey, we 10 were forced to live in one flat, unaware of the fact that we will become so fond of each other probably for the rest of the same journey. I don’t know if its unfortunate or fortunate but it’s the most diversified group of the batch. Look at the composition (Market Research people please pay attention):
3 Mktg, 2 HR, 3 Fin, 2 Ops
6 Veg & 4 Non Veg
2 Debtors, 2 Creditors & 6 Self Sufficient
3 Committed, 3 Strugglers & 4 HOPELESS
10 Speakers, no LISTENER

But irrespective of our disparity, 1 thing where we unanimously zero down is - FOOD ….99% of our parties with 99.9% of confidence level have either ended up in Domino’s or Pizza Hut or Cumsum. Despite having photographs virtually at each move, you can’t find a pic where we are EATING…its either before STARTER or after DESSERT…& one more thing boss, never judge our eating capacities through our physique. Even, Ankit alone is capable to give you FINANCIAL SWEAT when he comes to it…

PJs are something that flow through Oceans’ veins. In this domain probably bar is raised so high that a NORMAL PERSON will take ABNORMALLY long time to follow up with our super quick reflexes. Being together day in day out for so long time that now we know how the other will react, what he will say or think on anything…thus most of our advanced PJ have gone beyond the level of utterance…saala, bolna bhi nahi padta ab to, bas hasna shuru :)

When SIMC happened at Lavale, few of Oceans’10 started thinking about other members & started a selfless drive to provide “BHABHI KA ASHIRWAD” for welfare of group, definitely a CSR activity…JP took the lead, daily he would bless us with 2-3 new faces as our BHABHIs, then nxt day divorce & 2-3 new faces…most of times he would tend to lose the track of them & will select them again. Saala, most pitiful condition is of our so called BHABHI, bechari ko pata bhi nahi ki idhar uska kya kya ho gaya :) Sometimes conflict of interest among other members primarily with AB became prime agenda for many of our dinner discussions.

Anyways, this is something like buckets of water from Ocean, few things are not complete unless experienced. Thousands of incidents, millions of PJs, billions of giggles & zillions of laughter…all beyond my capability of expression are left untold.

Pappu can dance saala !!

Again an example of my random life. Rotten in the boredom of freedom, Bansal’s offer to dance in college fest (Transloocent) came as desperate shrug in a dead body. Karan who was planning his eveready expedition to Mumbai (though its his hometown, I let u all decide why he has become so frequent traveler), suddenly decided to postpone his LOVEly trip (miracle indeed) to have a duet with me .
I could never, even in my wildest dreams, refuse a chance to dance (chance pe dance karna is marketing..Pappu!!). 2 days left & suddenly I found myself busy, not exactly busy but probably found a reason to survive for next couple of days. Suddenly, couple of hour gap between classes, which used to leave me in the dilemma (whether to go to hostel, consume half of the time in walking & have a irritated stop in a Would Be Cozy sleep or whether to do “bird watching” in canteen), used to come as a welcome surprises for me. Karan was usually at his room (FYI…he is in HR).
We used to run to my room, rehearse lastly so called “final” steps & then try to fill the highly elongated music with draught storage of “dance steps”. My bed which for few days had been habitual of bearing me on it, had to wait looking at me awfully jumping in front of it but not on it. But trust me, my mind was pretty happy to see that it wasn’t forced to roam directionless to find some employment for me
So the D-Day arrived, having prepared with best we could do, I was somehow excited to be on stage for the first time for dance, pinged everyone on my gtalk list to invite them. Coincidently all of them had one thing common in their response “hehe, tu dance kar raah hun”. But trust me such sarcastic remark for my work or any opposition to my way always give me unusual/weird boost to do whatever m doing.
Anyways, that boost somehow phewed as soon as I reached the stage & I found myself asking Karan, which is the first song in our medley. For sure, Karan would have felt his legs trembling in his expensive black cargo. Oh! I remembered my dress sourcing: T-Shirt from Aditya, Jeans from Ankit, Shirt from Anuroop & my shoes from Akshay….so 4 A’s required to make one Anshu.
The support of crowd at my each step was actually was big boost. One confession to make, at 3rd song I checked Karan if he had forgot the step he used to, but then I actually forgot the same. Post performance market reviews were very encouraging mainly coz nobody expected me to be there, (Courtesy PAT). Another confession, the 2nd song sequence which was liked actually was somehow inserted in last few hours to make our theme visible (Karan would again agree).
One thing what I conclude through this is that we should sometime let life flow freely the it want, unexpected adventure & random decisions have their own sweet taste.

It was fun !!

Sometimes randomness in life adds revitalizing spice to it, refuel it for the rest of journey. Tired of the boring lectures & propelled by the awesome climate, 8 of us decided to touch the peak of small mountain near the campus & return back in say an hour or so. When you listen to your heart at every step, its may not be the technically, socially right path you follow but when you plan the unplanned, you enjoy for sure…
Played in –out with small pebble to decide whether we are trekking up or down. What….? We are going down the slippery, grassy slides in heavy rains to see that golf course…my god you people are CRAZY. Yups, we are…we are Ocean’s
Raining heavily, slipping down the rocks & mud (taking pics regularly…o’course), couple of hours of indecisive & kiddish decisions at every slip to move down further without a thought of return, we were somehow approaching the golf course. The same beautiful scene we admired everyday from campus was looking approachable. Soiled in the temptation of fun & nature, we ignored all logic & continued.
To our bad luck, golf course was restricted to members only…thrashed we decided to return. Saw a tractor, all 8 dogs chased it to the last breadth (though jassi won the race but lost the tractor). Heavy legs, broken heart, galloping lungs we walked till we find our Mr. Right (haha..Tata Ace to be precise). Again all 8 dogs as in municipality van crowded the luggage area, shouting, singing & expecting a U-Turn to the campus which never came…misunderstanding took us to Pune Bangalore highway. A simple lift converted to a hired taxi, driver expecting the money from us & to add to the already going adventure, none of us had even a single penny. Thanks to technological development, one of us carried virtual money…an ATM card
At last reached the right place, bus waiting for us…but something had already cooked in half of us. What about a late night movie? Assembly again stuck at 50% votes. An old saying, “do what you feel is right, not what is comfortable”. Idea of movie was neither right nor comfortableJ but mischievous three (needless to say, I was one) had to do something. They stayed… reserved late night movie tickets, then ate whatever in the capacity at Manmeet, involved Akshay, pity on him to be with us.
Movie was just the type we wanted that moment. The most terrible questioned which we never gave thought… NOW WHAT?
Jiska koi nahi hota, uski govt. hoti hai (Indian Railways), equipped with a blanket, found a relatively cleaner patch of platform to sit on, blabbered all night till we were moved by outsourced sweepersJ. Anyways a satisfaction of doing what your mischievous heart sometimes desires overcame our ego. In the end…it was fun !!