Project Discotheque

Here's a snap I had posted to section C about a classmate of ours.

The person on the right once acted in a movie called DiscoDancer. The one on the left used to work for Cisco. We let our logic take a hop-step-and-jump from these facts, and end up naming the person on the left as Disco (it doesn't matter what Disco's real name is - don't ask, and I won't tell).

While the name Disco is reasonably popular within our class at ISB, I am getting worried that his name isn't getting recognised among our alumni network. What would happen if subsequent batches at ISB don't recognise him as Disco? It'd be such a shame... we're talking about a missed legacy here.

So, here is my prescription for correcting this problem. Let's do a googlebomb :-)

To quote wikipedia,

Because of the way that Google's algorithm works, a page will be ranked higher if the sites that link to that page use consistent anchor text. A Google bomb is created if a large number of sites link to the page in this manner

Currently, if you google with the search phrase Disco + Cisco + ISB, Disco's blog shows up as the second search result.


If you just search for Disco + ISB, his blog is the 21st.

To me, these search results are unacceptable.

The objective of Project Discotheque is as follows - get the ranking of Disco's blog up and higher in Google's ranking for the search phrase "Disco" :-) Within a week of this announcement, Disco's blog should be the first search result for the phrase "Disco Cisco ISB" on google, yahoo and msn search. Within a month, the blog should be the first search result for the phrase "Disco ISB".

So, if you're interested in helping out, here's what you can do. If you are a blogger, or you maintain your own website, please make a link to http://isb2007.blogspot.com/ using the anchor text as "Disco".

Oh, and if you have any other suggestions, please do let me know.

We were discussing cricket with Prof Montealegre at a small get together that we had last Thursday. The conversation went something like this:

Prof Montealegre : So, I hear it takes a whole day to play a game of cricket.. that's quite fantastic!
ISBian Cricket Buff #1:Sir, there is another format that lasts five days.
Prof Montealegre : What! Oh.. that's amazing! So, which are the good teams?
ISBian Cricket Buff #1: Australia is the best. South Africa's good . India is good too. Pakistan are alright, but they play their best against India.
Prof Montealegre : Really?
ISBian Cricket Buff #2: Yeah, Indo-Pak games are very sought after. The roads are empty when there's an India-Pakistan match. Everyone takes off, nobody works.. and there are firecrackers if we win.
Prof Montealegre : Hmm.. very interesting. So, when is India's first game?
ISBian Cricket Buff #1: Day after tomorrow. We're playing Bangladesh.
Prof Montealegre : Okay, are they a good team?
ISBian Cricket Buff #2: Well, they're new, they have a lot to learn. They'll learn from us.
Prof Montealegre : Hmm.. nice, nice.

I hope the Professor has followed up on the latest.

0417 hrs - 2nd platoon Bravo team being overrun by the Viet Cong
the heroes - Charlie Sheen, William Dafoe, and a few others
the movie - Platoon
the sound - rapid fire, going rat-tat-tat...

1043 hrs - the Professor's voice overrun by the typing of students
the heroes - my classmates
the lecture - Web 2.0
the sound - frantic typing to complete an assignment, going rat-tat-tat...

INPE + CFPD + MHTP = a big smile

She said he said she said...

..that so-and-so are seeing each other.

Now, I know these two quite well.. and I'm really surprised they didn't tell me themselves. It's not like I'd go and tell people and start gossipping. I might blog about it though, but that's not the same as gossipping.

Bottomline - A party's due!!

Saris & Suits

The fourth term was the last one that we had as a section. We all go our separate ways now, each in their own chosen stream of subjects and courses.

To mourn/celebrate/rejoice the last term as a section, we had a lot of theme days - from a cas-ormal (casual + formals) day which fizzled completely to a very successful cap-day to a heavily photographed Formals Day. We also managed to get the Deans to pose with us on the Formals Day. Some memories...

Sharks in suits?

Formal Flintoff ;)

Walking the walk

With the Deans

Colours galore!

The entire section (minus Mama, the photographer)

A bird's eye view

A wave of blue

My study group

These snaps have been shot by Mama, SK, and docrahul. I again feel the effects of not owning a digital camera :-( My snaps will take their time to come, but they'll probably show up on my flickr account.

I'm moving back!!

What's worse than suffering from an injury? Self-inflicting some more.

As if tearing a ligament wasn't bad enough, I deliberately asked for permission from the ASA to move to the first row. And they didn't have the heart to deny my request. I ended up sacrificing a perfectly-hidden last-row seat to swap places with SR in my last term. Then it got worse. Not knowing how long my injury would take to recover, I asked ASA to allow me to continue on my first row seat this term too.

But I'm getting better now. And I now have a chance to redeem myself. AB's now been casted and is on a wheelchair. And thanks to the limitation of the wheelchair, he has to swap his last-row seat with me. So, AA & KanKan, I'm going to be your new neighbour for the last few days of the term :-)

BTW, here's a pic of me handing over the baton, er.. crutch.

Dunked, er... drenched

If you can't take the horse to the water, take the water to the horse...




While celebrating birthdays, section-C maintains a tradition of dunking the birthday boy's study group, close friends, not-so-close friends, innocent by-standers, and people who show up just to have the cake. We proudly kept up our tradition on the last birthday of the core terms.




Happy birthday, Watson!!

After a long-due haircut..

..here's what a bloke gets to hear

R : (over sms) nice hair cut, much needed.

Major : hmm.. fauji hair-cut, eh? You look like a fauji, returned from the front, especially with your crutch.

Kan : You used to look like a pomeranian before you got your haircut.
Me : (with one eyebrow raised) What do I look like now?
Kan : A pomeranian with a haircut.

ATK : You must be feeling very light-headed.

One pizza too less

This blogpost contains many references to non-vegetarian food. If you are repulsed by talk of non-vegetarian food, or are related to Maneka Gandhi by blood or by ideals, please stop reading right now, move over to the next blog you were planning to read and pretend that you never opened this post.

What does one do when Domino's takes down the order for a Pepper Paneer Pizza, but delivers a Pepperoni Pizza? Does one:

a) Curse Domino's
b) Go hungry
c) Fall back to good-ol' Maggi Noodles
d) Turn non-vegetarian
e) Option (a) followed by inky-pinky-ponky between (b), (c) & (d)

At the outset, let me clarify -- I still am non-vegetarian. The above-mentioned decision dilemma didn't affect me, it affected two of my quaddies. Domino's managed to bring my pizza alright - a delicious Meatzaa¹, which is supposed to have every non-exotic meat that Domino's serves in India. Non-exotic - that's the operative word here. As most of us non-vegetarians know, you can't really get exotic meats easily. Can you call up Wan's Kitchen and ask for a dish of "Yak curry"? Probably not. Anyway, Meatzaa comes with this great assortment of chicken, keema, ham, and umm, that's it, I guess, that quite literally melts in your mouth. (Damn, my mouth waters even as I write of it) Oh, and I think this particular pizza has the greatest density of non-vegetarian toppings per square inch ever. Probably not good for those who care about their cholesterol; but then if you do care about your cholesterol, I'd suggest that you not order pizza.

All right, let me come back to the original problem. The four of us had ordered four pizzas (two non-vegetarian and two vegetarian) to celebrate A's birthday. And thanks to the static on the phone provided by the Huawei equipment that separates Hutch & BSNL, a Pepperoni pizza was delivered instead of the desired Pepper Paneer. To make matters worse for my vegetarian friends, we noticed this problem after yours truly had devoured most of the garlic bread (I should ask them to send more of the dip the next time). So now we had two veggies and one veg pizza. (I faintly recall someone named Gabbar saying something very apt for such a situation). Nice people that we non-veggies are, we asked V to switch to non-vegetarian ways. But his response was a quick "No", which he topped up with a "Maggi banaoon kya?" to the other veggie. Somehow, Maggi noodles didn't seem very appealing to them after a pizza, and they decided to pretend to relish their lone green pizza & 7-up and then went back to their studies.

I think I heard the cupboards in the kitchen creak later in the night, but I have to sympathise with a bloke who's been denied his Pepper Paneer.

¹ I'm not sure if the name Meatzaa ends with one or two or three 'a's - I've just taken the average (yes, I pay great attention to detail).

The Ferrari lies parked in front of A-block in SV1, untouched for the day. Its temporary owner has started to use a crutch to limp around the campus. A chap who could run for twenty minutes non-stop a few weeks back can now be easily overtaken by snails.

After a long day, as I sit back in my quad, mulling over my new-found respect for snails, V walks in and asks if his French beard looks all right. "It's perfect", I reply. V goes on to describe how he needs constant reassurance about how his beard looks. I give the most sensible reply that I can think of. I say something monosyllabic that starts with hm and ends with mm.

Thankfully for me, the conversation shifts to V's new-born son. He shows me a picture of his son, sleeping peacefully. "He's always sleeping", V comments. "As are you", I observe. "Oh yes, he's just like me. I used to look exactly the same way when I was born", says V. Twenty-five years hence, if this kid dons a French beard and V is kind enough to send me a picture, I might be able to make more than a monosyllabic comment.

Back to the present, a case on Palace Hotels is staring at me in the face. And the clock reads 2:58 AM.

After-effect of Argentina vs Netherlands

Time : 0850 hrs
C's location: Academic Center 2, Lecture Theater
T's location: SV3, Quad CX, bed

T's phone rings for about 10 seconds. T picks up.

T (in his usual peppy voice): Bol, Chi!!
C (hushed whisper) : class! class!
T (looks at watch) : oh f***!! oh bloody f***!

Biking to Bidar

This post comes a bit late, not due to the delay in getting snaps developed, but because I've been caught in a whirlwhind of Term-2 activity. Well, as the saying goes, better late than never...

We got a term break of five days after our exams last term. I dare say I've made the most of it. First up, I took a train to Vizag to attend Suresh's wedding. Met up with a few people from my previous job.

The day I returned, I packed my bags again as Disco (aka Sumit), Kanika, Tuhin & I headed out for Bidar - by motorcycles. We started off under the cool summer afternoon sun, hit the road to Panjagutta, Begumpet and then reached the highway. Realised after five minutes it was the wrong highway, turned back, hit the road to the correct highway. Finally, we reached the major landmark of Kotpally. Crossed the place, and took our first break for sometime.

A few kilometres later, we came up to an intersection that read "Gachibowli - 5kms left" (Gachibowli is where the ISB campus is located). We'd covered about 35kms of Hyderabad's roads to reach the highway that was right next door :-( Cursing our maps and our map-reader, mostly the map-reader, we trudged along. Stopped for lunch at Sangareddy and hit the road again. The breaks we took were fun, with papayas falling and some people resorting to Tarzan-line antics.

The empty road

in a field we invaded

the falling papayas

Kan-kan playing Tarzan, er.. Jane?

We reached Bidar at around six in the evening. Didn't do much for the rest of the day.. there was dinner at good old Kamat and the opening game of the World Cup.

The next day, we spent about an hour (maybe more) at the Rangeen Mahal of the Bidar Fort. The Rangeen Mahal has lots of intricate designs made by Persian artisans using Mother of Pearl We spent a good deal of time exploring photo-ops in the rest of the fort. There was the solah-khamba masjid with a lawn that's been surprisingly well-maintained.

The roof of a chamber in Rangeen Mahal

In front of the solah-khamba masjid

We headed for Ashtoor afterwards, eight tombs stand tall, but one of them is in a peculiar run-down state. I'm surprised how it still stands.




Our last place of visit was the sacred Nanak Jheera. Legend has it that Guru Nanak came to parched Bidar, moved a few rocks with his feet, and a stream flowed. We wrapped up our trip of Nanak Jheera with lunch at a Punjabi dhaba.

The return to Hyd was pretty uneventful, but with more photo-ops for us. Here are some more snaps from our trip. There are more I've put up on flickr.

The Sun peeps through the clouds..

Tuhin shooting Chiranth shooting Tuhin shooting Chiranth .. ad infinitum


ek, do, teen, chaar

L to R: I, Tuhin, Disco

p.s. The snaps that look brighter and have the date printed on the bottom right corner have been shot off Kanika's camera. The studio made a big fiasco with my snaps when they developed 'em. They scanned the print copies instead of getting the images directly off the negatives :-(

update: I've done what I could using Picasa.. let's hope my snaps look better now.

Missing: my ISB blogroll

I need to build a blog roll of my to-be ISBian classmates. But I thought I ought to meet the people first before I link to their blogs. So I'm going to give myself time till I reach Hyd.

In the meantime, here's a link listing blogs of various people at different b-school: http://www.resolvequery.com/blogger.php And if I may add, the CEO of resolvequery is going to be my classmate at ISB.

S - I'll add this to my blogroll after 15th April. Hope it's OK.