cooking

I feel like I'm losing my "good cook" instincts. Nothing I make tastes great anymore. It's all a little meh... To get my groove back, I have promised myself that I will try something new in my kitchen every week or every ten days. Let's see how it goes.

I will also get nice fresh vegetables this week from farm fresh.

new lessons

1. most of us need all the help we can get so if someone is offering some advice or help, shut up and take it. You can determine later, whether you can use it or not.
2. How you look matters. clean toenails, fingers and nice clothes matter more than you think. At least they mattered more than I thought they did.
3. If you have an opinion, speak up. people who speak up are more noticed than the quiet "intelligent" types. no one will know how intelligent you are if you don't speak up.
4. if you have ideas and dreams, start working on them. it's never too early or too late.
5. learn to be alone without feeling lonely
6. de-clutter your life. it helps you start getting things done. this means negative friends, clothes that you don't wear, shoes you don't need etc.
7. most people have more to offer than we give them credit for. give people a chance.
8. compliments have power. give and receive compliments with grace and generosity.
9. read. it's important to know what's going on in the world even if it doesn't affect you. makes you smarter.
10. listen to both sides of the argument. learn to take criticism even if it seems unfair.
11. ask for feedback regularly. when the boss gives you feedback, it might be too late to correct certain things.

Lady Gaga feels pre-judged by Norwegian journalist (09/07/30)

End of first year

The first year MBA experience was just amazing. I am so glad that I picked I the school I'm attending. I've never felt this "in place" since high school. I have made friends with people very different from me and I have learnt to respect ideas very different from my own. I now know what it means to disagree without being disagreeable. I miss my family of course but I know I made the right choice. I would have been discontent if I had stayed back. Most people want to see the world during their vacation. I want to experience the world and to do this I must live in different places.
I have also become unapologetic about who I am. I have also learnt that most of us know what are weaknesses are instinctively but to know what your strengths are, is to discover yourself.
My MBA experience has been a happy one.

needs to be read

the economist

Everyone makes fun of idealists... What's wrong in thinking that you can change the world. A little more optimism and a little less cynicism makes the world a better place

We should care

I'm someone who doesn't actually care what other people think of me. I just do whatever it is that makes me happy. Funnily, I'm not selfish so this doesn't affect the people I care about in any negative sense. However, I do care about what people know and understand about the world in general. When the Buddhist monks were protesting peacefully in Myanmar and the junta brutally beat them up, I almost cried. I think I give back just by helping people around me understand that there is more to the world than the little safe universes we create for ourselves and someday I would like to do something more concrete. Until then, this will do.
Today I realized that a lot of people think that poverty is something that people bring upon themselves. This angers me. Yes, you can get out of poverty. My own father did. However, a lot depends on the society and country you born in. There should be something to get out to. A lot of people live the way they do and resort to the things they do, because they know of nothing better.
These days, I've been reading a lot about Africa. I read What is the What by Dave Eggers, I read Say you are one of them and watched a couple of really cool videos. A lot of countries in Africa are desperately poor and sick and are under oppressive and corrupt regimes. These are not problems they created for themselves. These are problems they inherited, when the Europeans left them with hastily drawn boundaries, insensitive and corrupt governments and newly discovered resources. Yes, every nation is responsible for its own destiny. However, the world has a responsibility too. when countries give these corrupt governments arms in exchange for allwoing them to mine, it is immoral. When nations are poor are desperate, they become breeding grounds for hatred and terrorism and we all end up paying a terrible price. We all have to care about the world. We don't have a choice.

A rant

What happens when we see or learn of something that we don't necessarily like? If we know that this new information is correct, we can:

1. shut out the information and pretend we never heard it.

2. Try to learn a little bit more, and see if there is anything you can do to change it

3. or be bull headed that the things you learn and see are correct.

As an Indian, suppose someone said that the number of dowry deaths in my country are disturbingly high and i didn't know this, before the person told me.

I can

1. pretend that this is absolutely false

2. Acknowledge the problem and see what I can do to fix it

3. or say that this is how it has been for centuries now and hence this must be right.

You would think a majority of people as highly educated and "well-informed" as a class of MBAs in a world class business school, would chose option 2. but sadly today, i learnt that well-informed or not, MBA or not, most people choose to react to negative information about their countries, societies and religion either by shutting it out or reacting extremely defensively.

What's my point? Well, nothing really. I just want people to be a little more open minded.

For the first time in my life, i think being intelligent is an absolute f...ing waste

What a wonderful but strange feeling it is, to realize that the life lessons that your parents "subtly"taught you are all true and work for you!

2010 resolutions

My new year's resolutions for a better 2010

1. read more - no more excuses that I am super busy
   
2. blog more frequently- i love blogging and want to blog more regularly, no more excuses that I am super busy. it is clear that I am not.
3. find an internship -put more effort into the internship search. no more excuses that I am super busy. It is clear that I am not.
4. Stay as happy and peaceful as I was in 2009 if not more
5. continue to be a compassionate and well informed global citizen.
6. continue to be flexible, accepting and as non-judgmental as possible
7. try my best to see both sides of the story
8. BE MORE ORGANIZED
9. stay in touch with God and my conscience.
   

HAppy new Year!

Things that I learned in 2009

1. it is possible for me to have more than 5 friends
2. i still haven't pushed myself hard enough this year although I promised to do so at the beginning of 2009 to realize my true potential. The reason for this I this is that I actually don't want to. I find great pleasure and peace in doing nothing, in not being busy all the time and in not working extremely hard. That's just who I am. True potential be damned. I'd rather be truly happy, which I am
3. You can still be best friends with someone even if you are in different continents.
4. Cooking is my second greatest passion. Eating is one thing I am never lazy about. I love a good meal and have no trouble preparing it myself.
5. I realize that there are very few people who really don't care what other people think of them and I am one of them. this I think is the real key to happiness.
6. Even very smart people make horrible decisions and there is nothing you can do to change it
7. The reason there are so many cultures that co exist in America and retain their cultural identity is that Americans are a lot more open, accepting and secure about their identity than we ever give them credit for. That is part of their culture.
8. I am still a feminist but I have stopped trying to convince other people about feminism really is. I am tired and I think that people see things and understand ideas only if they want to.
9. I always thought that I would never get an abortion despite the fact that I am vehemently pro choice but now I think that's ot true. Children are a huge responsibility and you must be completely ready to take on that responsibility and if you are not, do what you must. It is more important than not do a good job in bringing them up.

And I miss my sis so.... much.......... :( but i'm fine.. not sad or anything

A note to myself

Getting into an MBA program is a lot easier than staying in and excelling in the course. I hope this serves as a reminder to me, making sure that I work hard, give it my best shot and not forget to unwind and relax a little. I also hope that I do not get too cocky and then fall really hard. I hope I never forget who I am and where I came from. I also hope that I do not forget the things that are most important to me. This includes my family and friends. They are the reason I am here. I also hope that I don't get too proud and remember to remain humble and modest because I truely believe that pride comes before fall.

me

It has been a week since i came to Williamsburg and I just love the place. It's so clean and the people are very very nice.... More about that later. Yesterday I realized something about myself. I like having friends but I don't need to surround myself with people all the time. I like being by myself and almost never feel lonely. All my emotional needs are met by my family and a couple of my really close friends. Distance and physical presence do not matter to me,

Of Cats and Mice

a few days back, i finished reading Maus, a two part graphic novel series that talks about the holocaust. I was so touched and deeply disturbed. I never thought of human hatred as such a potent force, capable of causing so much destruction and despair. I also never thought of the tenacity that we can show in times of such despair. human beings are capable of so much compassion and so much love, yet our hatred knows no bounds either. To treat people like the way the jews were treated is simply not human. to think that so many people went along with it and let it happen is also such a shame and such a disgrace. yet we seem to learn nothing from history. you would think that after such a great tragedy, the world would never let anything quite like that happen but think again. the genocides in Bosnia, Sudan and many other places suggest otherwise. looks like we don't learn anything from the past. It scares me to think that fellow human beings are capable of such carnal acts. hatered is very very scary

plrrrr.. life's a bitch

life sometimes more than sucks! today i realized that other than my folks, my sis and bro inlaw, no one else will be coming to drop me to the airport and that just sucks! you know why because i have more than been there for my friends. i am sometimes an ass

Holidays!

I have been home for almost 20 days now. I have now observed one thing. The children upstairs are way too quiet... for a boy of 7 and a girl of 12, they are surprisingly quiet... they don't fight with each other loudly, they don't play together or atleast i think they don't because i can't hear a thing.
They watch tv for half an hour everyday,.. i think they're angels....Now it was quite different with me and my sis...
As kids, although the age gap between us was 6 years, we did play with each other until my sis was around 14. We fought a LOT... but we would also get along wonderfully well and play house, barbies or space adventures... We fought about the names our barbies had.. my sis always came up with these wonderful names and i always wanted the name she took up.... we fought over whose barbie's boyfriend was archie and whose was reggie.... i had no clue about who archie or reggie was but i wanted what she wanted. we fought over barbie furniture, clothes... everything possible.. but we always comprmised and then played with each other and had so much fun.
At home, during holidays my mom wouldn't even make us pick up our toys. A barbie house set up on the floor would stay like that for days. She was such a good sport. She instructed the maid to sweep around it....
One more game that my sis and i loved playing was library... Once in a while we would arrnage the heaps of books we had and number them and catalogue them and pretend that we had our own library... that was the best. we would just sit around reading. Our mom pretty much let us to do what we pleased during the holidays. we never cleaned our rooms or cupboards. It was a nice mess and we had lots of fun fighting and playing. Just before the holidays would end, our mom would come, dump our clothes from the cupboard and make sure we arranged them...
and now I see these kids and their room looks so clean and neat, nothing out of place, no raised voices, no fights, perfect little angels who always listen to their mum and i can't help but feel a little sad for the fun they are missing out on.

MBA

So i have decided that I will be attending the mason school of business from August... I fell in love with the school and after talking to the current students, I feel that it is a very happy place. So really looking forward to going there. My journey up to this point has been interesting. The first time I realized that I wanted to do an MBA was in the third semester of engineering. Gautam and I were sitting below the big banyan tree in the gangothri campus, and he was telling me that he wanted to do his PhD in AI techniques. I said I wasn't sure and our conversation proceeded something like this. I so clearly remember.
me: I think i want to do an MBA... I'm not sure... I really haven't thought this through.
gautam: well.... don't you think it's time for you to put some thought into it... don't tell me you want to stop after just doing your B.E...
me: you know what, don't tell anyone but I'm secretly very ambitious
gautam: why secretly? you should be ambitious.
me:i don't know... i never tell anyone these things....
can't believe I told you!
gautam: what's the big deal..... by the way you ought to start putting some effort to learn about what you want to do. talk to people, read...
me: ya ya....

learning to be smart

I think I was 12 years old when my mom told me something that I will never forget. I had gotten mediocre marks in my annual exams and had just received a long lecture from my class teacher about how indifferent I was becoming towards everything. I had also been yelled at quite badly by my dad and was in no mood to listen to another lecture. My mom and I were sitting by the swimming pool and this is exactly what she said to me..
"So you had a lot of fun last year in class I guess...I know how nice it is when boys pay you a lot of attention, when they want to talk to you and be with you but I'll tell you a secret... when you study well and do smart things, smarter boys will want to be around you... so think about it."
This was something that I never forgot...For us at home it was important to be smart. Smart meant thinking before you spoke, smart meant trying your best even if you sometimes failed, smart meant sticking to rules. We could and still can talk to our mother about anything. She never stopped us from asking questions.Sex, boys, ambition, marriage, children, life... she always tells me what she thinks. Always honest.Never apologetic.
I believe i have made smart choices in life and that is why I am happy today. I also trust myself to do the smart thing in future also. This is something I learnt from my folks