Surrogate Nationalism

By the time i am writing this...streets in Spain must be jam-packed, and millions would be shell-shocked in the dutch-land.. yes 'Paul,the octopus' was again right, and beliefs and superstitions cut across each and every border of this world. An ardent dutch supporter, it was tough for me to swallow the bitter pill, but among all the things which shocked me the striking one was the amount of attachment people have with these foreign teams.

One of the scene of the night which shocked me most was the moment when the Spain national anthem was played down, and people sitting next to me actually got up... although they may feel ashamed doing the same for their own national anthem. Statistically speaking, we Indians have nothing to do with the world cup ( although i read somewhere that 'jabulani' has some material made in India). In the FIFA ranking, we are 133rd or 134th or whatever.. we actually do not care. Even if we take Asians as our identity still we do not have representation after the round of 16.

But still, come the world cup, we have a big screen in amphitheater, people with their divided loyalties , and i bet 1-2 must have wept for the Netherlands(i was very close to it). I wonder whether same would have been the scene if a WC cricket final was going on.

Final, to say the best, was competitive not beautiful. If any one would have got the chance to see the 3rd place match between Germany and Uruguay, it was the match of the tournament for me. May be some time reduced expectations allow players to play freely with their natural game. Anyways today Spain deserved it, they were marginally better than Holland.

The only thing consistent in WC'10 were the predictions of oracle octopus. I am sure maneka gandhi would be having a close look on the matter. After all, too much attention on him may infringe his right of privacy, but he is undoubtedly the biggest star of the world cup. Spaniards surely will exclude eight-leg creatures from their menu at least for a short time. From no onwards, when the football game goes to extra time or penalties, call the octopus.. at least it will prevent heroes from turning villains... hail the genius !!!

Ecoball

Good to see Netherlands and then Germany making it to the final four. By the time you would be reading it, Spain shall make it too. But I could not find justification in supporting any of them. All throw their hearts out in the field, only to lose or win by some chancy goals. The truth is, I hardly know more than one player from every team and have not followed the club football ever.

So I thought and came to a conclusion : It'll be better off for the world if an European nation wins the cup. Put the economist's eye and you will be happy to agree.

The Euro crisis driven by mammoth Sovereign debts of many EEC members is looming large. Investors have started washing their hands off Euro. It's falling wrt. Dollar and other currencies and thus, the costs of repayments are getting higher. This discomfort is supposed to be healed by implementing austerity measures and rolling back of govt. stimulus. But the conditions have not improved with close to 20 percent unemployed population in many countries. The squeezing of money will actually affect demand adversely. A long recession resulting from deflation seems a possibility.

If any of the three wins the world cup, things can be lot optimistic. More so Spain, which is reeling under the Fiscal deficit of 11.4 percent needs spirited hope and actions. Needless to say that a Football world cup win in a sports crazy nation usher in a grand celebration lasting weeks.

Lets be hopeful that it will provide a much needed cushion to the treasury and more time to think. As we all know that

- Lots of beers will be boozed

- Festive occasion will grace population

- Families will spend on entertainment

which will generate taxes for the exchequers and income for people.

Crisis in Europe will affect developing world (say, India) adversely as exports will go down due to shrinkage of demands. Contrarily, imports will increase as the European currency will be relatively cheaper. Thus domestic production will suffer high competition due to technological imbalance. Moreover, lower interest rates in European countries will attract ECBs from corporate world. Indian banking system will be pressurised to compromise. Sub prime crisis in America may have not shown it's direct effects in India, but it has unsettled the public.

When debts range in thousands of billions of dollars, a world cup win will hardly titillate the foundation. But, the motivational self-esteem oozing out from the mega achievement shall inspire politicians, bureaucrats and the 'aam aadmi'. They'll be expected to act in their country's utmost interests.

Loss of words

It was final year of PGDM (Finance) for them at The Management Institute, Bagiazad. New batch had joined in and the B-school was back in life! Jatin and Romin were in pensive mood, sitting in the mess during the dinner hour. Gulping down the Chinese food and updating themselves with score of the WC football match, both went for puff...followed by a walk around the park.

Jatin says, "I remember last year I was mad about blogging. The creativity enthused by the marketing classes and insightful case studies spurred me to write. I had participated in blogging contests centering on different marketing themes. Building on it, I diversified to write about other issues. The craziness was such that I dared to start new blogsites for operations, economics, finance and even word of the day. Many people often ridiculed the exercise. You, who's as passionate towards blogging had been there to contribute. It's soooo enthralling. It was another matter that the warning bells rang soon. I was found wanting on the basic knowledge of Finance and thus, turned my interest towards it. It was proven by track record that I liked numbers. But, I believe a lot of effort from my family was the driver."

Jatin turns philosophical, "Now I am into the sea of Finance, swimming among the numbers and trying to form a life boat out of them. It's not easy since they are attached with the mesmerising formulas, which in turn are to be explored deep into the sea. Finding the roots is the key. Thus, the need to learn 'YOGA' to stop breath for a substantial time and dip in. Ha! Ha! No joke! Try it and you can feel the difference."

Romin feels weird to link Finance and yoga. He enjoys his sutta and adds his own piece, "Brain has transformed into a calculative mood with adherence to all the constraints. Interaction with people has decreased considerably. Life seems to be coming a full circle and the true self is now back. The PGDM programme is a sort of change management for me. I have been a recluse for large part of my academic career. The idea here was to open up and express myself to people. Be a known person, that is. The main difficulty arises when the socialization gets into the psyche and I deviate from studies. It happened here too and I had to change back to what I was good at. Understand the concept better than anyone else...deep down. It involves a lot of mental exersion. Something like forgetting the world when you and your book are together."

He concludes, "Look at the way Marketing guys spend their 24 hours. They read one book and write answers for 3 subjects. And we, immersed in books all the time. Finance and Marketing are two different sides of a same coin. People who are equally good in both of them can be considered Geniuses."

start of a journey

Coming and going is the universal law of this world.. and it cant be more true for a B-School. So after our seniors left for their corporate sojourn, yesterday we had the registration of the incoming batch. Among all the other things one enjoyable thing about this event is the delicious food served in the mess , which is a bi-annual phenomena ( second occasion is convocation), which also shows that how the incoming and outgoing of batches is a sacred event for a B School.

As i have been there , done that.. i can safely say that there is lot of anxiousness while joining a B- School. When you join a Engg college or any other graduation course for that matter, you are still in your teens and you dream for the sky. your mind knows no limitation, your ideas of this world is completely different. Now contrast this with a B-School. Few of the joiners come after a work-ex from good companies, some leave decent job offers.. so the first question which a student ask on joining a B -School , is how much he can expect to earn after the completion of the course. In this summer i address numerous queries regarding the ROI of the institute.

With all the humbleness, i just wanna suggest that if the view of the person is limited to such a small objective he will miss the bigger picture. From the very beginning i have a firm belief that the purpose of education is to make a person better human being. This comprises of a nice personality, knowledge of surroundings, confidence in what you do, and last but not the least the way you behave and act with other people. In the age of competition its very east to get carried away, but as i firmly believe that life is not a zero sum game. Its not necessary for someone to lose if you have to win. To keep it brief, try to learn from others and also help other learning what you know, so that collective worth of this place increases.

Last but not the least, summers is at it is torturous best now a days, and sincerely now i began ti believe what Mr Algore has said, that its very hard for the earth to survive like this. Thank god IMT G has AC Lab.. else this summer would definitely had killed me. Now eagerly waiting for the monsoon... and calcio rombio ( inter disciplinary football tournament)...

Takes Time

Takes time


It takes time for a toddler to hold her mother,
It takes time for thoughts to discover,
It takes time to give vent to our emotions,
And to lose someone and let go of all false notions...

It takes time to sport a smile when you are down,
It takes longer to hurt someone and hold back before you drown..
It takes time to understand one another,
And takes a life-time to know oneself rather.

It takes ages to unravel the words unsaid...
takes time to see through one's eyes and the uncomfortable silence
instead...
It takes time to reciprocate the unconditional love and care we get
from our loved ones...
and to realise what we've lost until it silently burns...

This isn't mere procrastination...it's just a part and parcel of human

nature..