Tuesday, July 27, 2004

The week that was...

Sunday:
In the confines of the small room built outside Swami Narayan Temple in Kalupur, the slide projector and screen seemed as out of place as a Mylapore Maami in a Mcdonalds. That and a few plastic chairs made the setting for the Ahmedabad Heritage Walk. For 365 days a year, come rain or shine, the Amdavad Heritage Walk starts from that small room. Two kilometers through some of the richest history this well-chronicled city has to offer. Last sunday it was mine, and a couple of friends', turn to be take the walk and see the underbelly of the city for ourselves.

Streaming out from the gateway to the temple the trip winds through the heart of the walled city, or the old city, across the Sabarmati. The IIM, meanwhile, languishes in the newer, some say even tasteless, part of the city across the river. The scenes we walk through are so picturesque and vivid, it seems like a film set in places. Within a few minutes I am clicking away to photographic fame and fortune on my Sony digicam. I step in what appears to be a wonderful epoxy mock up of cow dung on the road. As squishy. The lengths these heritage guys go...

Walking from "pole" to "pole", the medium sized walking party strains through narrow paths, some only a few feet wide. I walk sideways in places. Jain temples. Many many Jain temples. Wonderful craftsmanship in marble and wood and stone. The residential areas are divided into well-defined enclaves called "pole-s". I do a rough calculation in my head and come up with the figure of 10 jains to every temple in Ahmedabad. The guide clarifies that everything you see and touch is real. Good lord, not the epoxy goo thing...

What they did all those years ago in Amdavad is awe-inspiring, and 0ften humbling. Bird feeders built tall into the sky like sceptres, elaborate sewerage systems. My photographic genius surprises even me. I struggle to contain my click-happiness. Strangely none of my tour-mates seem interested in my snaps. Wonder why they all stay away. The green stain on my shoe was not epoxy. Dammit.

Temples. Pretty ones. Mostly Jain. I am dumbstruck by the detail, the perseverance. Coming from a campus built in the highest artistic traditions of FCI warehouses and railway loco sheds, it is truly a feast for the eyes, nay, soul. On further revisions of my calculations, I find there are 3 Jain temples per Amdavadi jain person's limb. Reminds me of Kottayam, driving through which you notice only two things, churches and toddy shops. Mostly in pairs next to each other. Sin and absolution.

The walk winds to a rather abrupt halt at the Jamma Masjid. Its magical shaking minarets lost to an earthquake a hundred years ago, the Mosque, and its sprawling prayer grounds still take your breath away. A delightful Mughal pond in the foreground. The caretaker welcomes us with enthusiasm that could single handedly combat global warming. Earthy tones abound in the column filled masjid. The walled in area for the women in the right background tugs a bit.

Tying up our laces for the last time, we decide to complete our morning with a quick lunch and a movie. I have pasta. And then we watch Garv. If I was younger it may have left me permanently scarred. The walk however gives us much to talk and photos to share. I go back to the insti full of images of temples, brackets, wooden facades, bird feeders, and Salman Khan wearing a magenta shirt, pink tie and sharp white pants.  I also get a cute "I love Amdavad" brooch.

Monday:
Another day another temple. The Ekalavya Foundation School in Ahmedabad. A pioneering effort by Sunil Handa, an alum. Far away from the IIM campus, entering the gates immediately fills one with a melange of nostalgia and young fervour. I wont say academic, that would it make it too wooden. A wholesome campus. Built by the same architect who designed the new campus back at the insti, it wont make it to any heritage walk any time soon. But it is utilitarian, sparse and a little larger than life.

On a personal request I was allowed to take a double-period on World War 2 for the students in classes 9th and 11th. Handa saab was generous enough to let me do something I have wanted to do for a long time. Tell young people about the past, sans textbooks, sans syllabus, sans dates. So here I was sitting in a school assembly for the first time in years and years. After the songs and anthem, I felt, and cliche here, a lot younger.  But no doubt about what I saw in front of me. Potential. Now if only they would learn their history well...

An hour and a half later, I can confidently say I had a class of pretty interested students and staff. Felt warm and fuzzy inside when some of the students send me letters and notes a few days later telling me how some of them now think they should read more and that they never knew history was this good. They better read up on stuff though. Not one guy knew the population of Ahmedabad or Bombay even approximately. They all knew Sachin's one day aggregate to the third decimal.

Now I have an invitation to talk to the 8th graders and get them to like humanities and not all become engineers...

Tuesday:
The death of my laptop was confirmed beyond all doubt. I have a slight chance of salvaging information from the hard drive, but otherwise the only option left is a full reinstall. I love life.

Wednesday:
Finally got the snaps from a medical camp conducted by the local social service team. Called Prayaas, they conducted a medical camp for the slum dwellers outside the insti compound wall. The team put in all their own money. They gush when they tell you how 140 people turned when they were expecting only 50. If there is a greater, more sincere joy, I am yet to find it. Kindly note the 40% plus people who said in my survery that IIMA junta are arrogant pigs...

Thursday:
Genuine fears of the site losing readers strikes me in the middle of the night.  3 in the morning and I am still bent over a borrowed computer trying to make sense of last years placement budget and figuring where changes need to be made this year. Excel sheet after excel sheet. I start a post on how to buy clothes.  I stop after fifteen minutes. Creativity was flowing as freely and gracefully as obscenities from an auto driver in Jafferkhanpet. And I was writing sentences like: "Thus the fat man should never allocate more than 10% of last years budget for snacks and cool drinks, provided batch size increase..."

Radio Roman Dimension broadcasts again to an increasingly dedicated clientele.  Domain Maximus continues to languish...

Friday:
Imagine the contradiction. On the one hand your in Bschool par excellence, on the other hand a quotation comes back from admin for resubmission. Reason: Font size too small. So much for organizational revolution.. who moved my f!#$%^& cheese...

Saturday:
The cloud cover breaks. My head works again... The music troop plays a thumping good show. My camera conks off after four photos. I go back and read my horoscope. "The planets indicate ease in the workplace and a period of deep contentment..."

Sunday and Monday:
Weird hazy whacky. Nothing really happened.

Tuesday:
5 meetings in 8 hours.

Wednesday:
Voila!!!

The future: Laptop should return in two days. Post drafts should achieve completion by Friday. People till then sympathize, pray for my laptop...

Much love,
Sidin

44 comments:

Anonymous said...

Tch..Tch.. just for the sake of putting up something.. Go on and you ll lose a lotta readers man. Why the hell did I waste so much time reading this!

Anonymous said...

Hey sidin

One thing you could probably try is deactivate the anonymous comment option. That way you d get "little" more genuine comments. Just to increase your site hits, there's no use of having the option of anonymous comments!

another sincere critic

Anonymous said...

Sidin,
Woof Woof Woof...woof woof...whineeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

- Doggy

Anonymous said...

i simply love ur analogies. u r very creative at that.
it figures that u used another laptop...
ur usual flair, it seems, has changed because of it...
and there is a '0' (zero) instead of a 'o' in the word "often". yeah i know, they are very close in the keyboard.
i pray.
-Smitha

Anonymous said...

Hi Sidin,

Enjoy your blog. Keep up the good work. Dont let Heisenbergs uncertainty principle catch up with u!

Visit my blog - http://thelearningmba.blogspot.com (Im a novice, from nother IIM :)

I think I stand to learn from u. Hope to see great blogging in the future!

Cheers.

Anonymous said...

this writing of yours is really really addictive. I think i better cut loose before i break into your school scoop you away and lock you up in a cellar and get u to write at gun point. had a good time in here. take care and best of luck with ur book, trotsky!
iw

Anonymous said...

Let the word spread..Return of the gladiator!!

ashwin said...

1. Have always thought one MUST be rather jobless to post a comment to a blog. India won the match, am in a relaxed kind of mood, so am rather jobless anyways.
2. It was interesting to see domain maximus being used to advertise a "rival" blog (Balk, Bill Gates). Must employ same strategy if I decide to blog some day!
3. Nice blog sidin...its good to get the flavour of life at iima. Got a faccha pal there who will have a slightly different view of life than u!

Anonymous said...

i wonder why people take the pains to read and then critisise and then read again the next time over and criticise again and go on and on. if they are really so upset about a guy's writing , they might as well stop logging on or better still blog their own. give the guy a break. he isnt exactly looking up for lessons up here . shut up, you sincere or insincere critic types and move on with your lives which i suspect isnt gonig anywhere any way.

rosie said...

Completely second that!
Nice blog Sid! And what a sight for sore eyes..
From NO angle is this post horrendous except by way of comments...
Keep rocking..

Anonymous said...

"...you notice only two things, churches and toddy shops. Mostly in pairs next to each other. Sin and absolution" I hope you didn't mean that respectively..i hope you did though :) and how dare you compare Loius I.Kahn's architecture to warehouses and loos...

Patrix
patrix.typepad.com

Vivek Kumar said...

Cant see too many "kudos" coming for this one. Unless someone made an account on blogger just so that they could post comments on this blog ;-)

J said...

I Dunno...
1. y/how i landed on ur blog
2. y/how i managed to read some of ur loooooooong posts
3. y/how i like u

So long...

Cheers,
~j~

Anonymous said...

abbu : am following u`r blog for the past month or so, read most of u`r archives.

u really have the got a fluid style. wanna adopt u`r style,

realized adapatation is next to impossible.
(the reason all these species die out!!)
really appreciate u sidin

Paddy said...

Sidin,

What happens when an evil blogger stops blogging to an entire community to stop reading for thirty days? What happens when couple of heavy blog readers from Northern Virginia take up the challenge? The Cold Turkey has finally been broken.

Anonymous said...

I came here on a random fly by from Prufrock's, and was frozen to my seat when I first saw your profile, I am from the same school (ADIS) as you!!!!!!! When did you graduate? I left it in 91. Do you still go to Abu Dhabi sometimes?

So surprised was I that I didn't even bother to read your post! Sorry!

Wonderbug

Anonymous said...

Dear Sid
This one was BAD.
I read it more than once to check if there lied some substance. Only style was there.

Come back 2 form d00d.

Vivek Kumar said...

Tuesday to Saturday.. 3-4 days passed. No one is screaming for Sidin to make another post!

What is the world coming to?

rosie said...

You promised on Friday!!
It's Tuesday.... :(
Is it your laptop, ur placements or ur classes (ahem)?
Post, post, post!!!

En Jay said...

Sidin, Sidin, Sidin... Will you marry me?? Puh-leeze??

Well, since you've so kindly let the world know you were available and all, I thought no harm in trying...

I'm here coz of ur instant-hit article...
And now, I might've just become an instant fan.

Anonymous said...

sidin - its a week without ur posts..what has happened??!

Anonymous said...

sidin,
now go get that laptop repaired.finish all those pending chores. your reading and organizing. everything. get out of your room take a walk in the rain. listen to jamacian musik.go to macdonald. get yourself a hamburger. drink cola. change your lungi.clean your room. flirt with the pretty juniors. read dave barry. read wodehouse. read femina. eat paan. have a lassi.
okay how abt fredo beer and moonligth? try sidin. get your fingers back on the keyboard. its raining. cloudy days.come back .

rosie said...

Hi Sid,
Came upon this article that could help when (not if) you finish your book. Check it out... along with the sites that are supposed to be useful..
www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_485533,00300010.htm
www.kevinsmokler.com.
www.sonewmedia.com

AR Hemant said...

10,000 hits since ur last post! My blog didnt get more than 3500 in the last 9 months. 2000 might be my own, I susoect. Hahaha! Post soon!

Anonymous said...

Okay.. I give up.

I hereby remove Sidin's blog from the my Internet Explorer's Favourites.

Enough of waiting for him to post. Enough of feeling like a loser, waiting for someone else to cheer me up.

Goddamn it! I can cheer myself up pretty well.

Thank you very much Sidin, for whatever its worth.

Anonymous said...

hey people

Don't lose your self respect and waste valuable web space posting begging comments (this is all the rosy and die hard fans of sidin). So I ve got a better idea. Why don'tt we use sidin's comments space to discuss some other issue?? :-) and let's keep doing it till sidin posts the next one. what say PEOPLE! ok for now i ve a very important issue which has been bothering me for long:
IS SIDIN SUNNY GAY??
If you see the signs. The mails and all, you ll notice a pattern of showing that he wants to attract females. Comeon this guys smart, witty and lookable (cudn't do better?!) anyway, so why doesn't he see that any female ll fall for all that. I think it's cos of his confused hormones. He's definitely not straight. what do you think??

the poll myster

rosie said...

Hi,
I have HAD IT with people going on about 'rosy' comments. I will comment on what I want, when I want and how I want for this blog. If Sidin has a problem...(being his blog and all) then I could reconsider... for the rest of you... lay off!

Anonymous said...

now i've seen it all. sidin taking offense to comments and a commenter on sidin's blog taking offense to a comment on a comment...

hey sidin, can u translate this one pls? "aanaye pedichaal pore? aana pappaaneyum pedikkano?"

~im

Anonymous said...

oh my... now now rosy dear. join in the discussion if you want to. or are you so possesive and protective of sidin that yu acn't accept facts abt his emotions for the same kind? I too share this opinion as even in college, he had a kinda aversion for em fems and always tried to prove that he's as desp as the rest of the rectians, but somewhere i saw it thro i guess. Rosy dear probably it d be a good idea for you to lay off yourself for sometime cos i doubt sidin'll lay you for all the effort you re taking to protect him.

Anonymous said...

How long do you plan to make us wait? Helllooooo, poossssttttt

Anonymous said...

yes sidin is a gay.. i've seen him for four yrs in college.... he had a relationship with few mallu fellows... esp with agarpatti..

Anonymous said...

sidin.. the below gals r trying u desperately.. (names r in the desc order of desperation)
1. smitha (she does it indirectly by pointing our ur 'o' and '0' mistakes... good try dear)
2. rosie (she acts ultra smart)
3. EnJay (she directly tried.. i like gals like u only dear..)

Sujith said...

Sidin,
Take your time for the next post aliya.
Hey anonymous who studied with him/us in RECT, kindly identify yourself. You should know why, right;)
I have been following this blog all this while Sidin,Its really good. I even read all the comments:)they are also pretty good. Noticed a lot of Rectians also posting a few. A hi to all you guys/gals I know.
Eagerly waiting for the next post da.
till then khudahafis

Anonymous said...

Ok, I am tired of waiting for Sid to write, Cmon sid there is something called a Desktop, its partially movable if u prefer to have it on ur lap...so plz start writing,,,office seems boring otherise:>

Anonymous said...

Is it time to write an obituary to the blog? Let's give him a month more :-) In truth though, it must be difficult to update, with midterms, quizzes and so on... Hope it's the exams keeping you away and not a general exhaustion with the blog, sidin.

En Jay said...

Yevrybody yexcept the owner himself is bothered about what's happening on his blog....

And yeah, looks like Sidin doesn't know that things like desktops exist...

And Anonymous, request you to take me off that list pal :))... Saw all the hullabaloo happening here, and just thought I'd add to it... the other two can share him... or whatever... yenewayz, looks like he's gone into hibernation or sumthin....

Anonymous said...

Check out this blog :
http://www.wibsite.com/wiblog/dull/

Cool or what,eh!

Anonymous said...

hello EnJay,
as per ur request, u've been removed from that 'despo' list..
for ur information, i'm also available.. u dont have to fight with many gals to get me.. and also i'm not very fat like sidin... sidin writes bolg.. i write comments.. so not much diff btn him and me.. so u can try me..
thanks and regards,

Anonymous said...

when theres no post, we can use this site as a matchmaker or chat room and all... see, now i'm trying EnJay. how constructively i'm using this site..
ok.. EnJay.. i',waiting for ur reply....

Anonymous said...

I suggest you disable the anonymous posting section- I don't have a blogger a/c so it does become difficult to post a comment then, but if people are so keen to post they will open an a/c and do it anyway!

and this way creepazoids like the one above posting sleazy remarks about female bloggers will be somewhat deterred.. it really puts people off seeing comments like this on a general blog, sidin.

Anonymous said...

me me me EnJay !!! ( Note:I'm a different Anonymous from the one above, you can call me Anon2 )

Anonymous said...

Folks,
This is to confirm that Sidin is a gay, dunno whether he's still a gay. Ask Sujith Satyadas aka Agarbatti, what they were doing on the eve of new year day 2000 under the starry night behind the sapphire hostel.
Sidin also had affairs with gb, premlal, ashif, Vikash, Sleeba, Praful.
Biggest affair was with a non-mallu Dawood. The affair left both of them devastated and they both are still recovering.
Rest is fine.

- A Mole.

Sharath Chandra said...

It's already been close to a month since your last Blog. You better think of something really fast to satisfy all those thousands of fans of yours (thats including me). Whats interesting though, is that your hit count has moved up from 80k to 100+k even without adding a word on the blog. Whew! Talk about fan following.......

Anonymous said...

A cigaratte a day,
Keeps Sidin happy and gay!!!

hohohohohohoho...

How was the movie "anal planet" Sidin,which you and couple of your gay friends watched last night?? Pretty awesome naaa!!! esp. the scene where the horse comes in......

uhummmmmmm....

- By-stander.