The Code (that I liked most)

Long awaited movie version of 'The Da Vinci Code' is opening on 19-May worldwide. I am eagerly waiting to watch the movie. Even thinking of (re)reading the book before watching the movie. If just the readers of this novel watch the movie at least once, the movie will be a huge box office hit. This novel is not an easy one to make it as a movie. Fulfilling millions of readers' imaginations is a real challenge. Lets see how the movie has been filmed.

This is the first time ever that I am going to see a hollywood movie that's made out of a novel, which I had already read. Generally the readers who see the movie version of novels don't appreciate the movie much. Their usual comment is that the novel was better than the movie. I guess, somehow the movie versions fail to meet the readers' expectation or imagination. God Father is one great movie & still in number one of top 100 hollywood movies made so far. I know people who claim that the novel is much better than movie. One very common thing that I never heard of is movie version being better than the novel. If you know any such movie/novel do share it with me. I would love evaluate it myself.

Standing Tall

Just 'chumma' posted my picture. This was me a year ago...what a year can do to your body is amazing.
What a year did to my body
- Put on 8 kgs weight
- Waistline gone up by 3 inches
- Flesh on cheeks look always like I have bunch of chocolates in my mouth
- Lost good amount of hair

Depressing list...I am getting old...

When I was in my teens I used to like getting older. When I was in early 20's slowly that mentality changed. Now I almost want to stop the time or want to stop getting old. Among the 100 odd people on the floor of my work place I am definitely top 10 oldest people. I am worried that my sub-ordinates start calling me uncle, like I used to tease older people.

hmmm...MBA

A colleague-friend of mine introduced his fried, who was an ISB aspirant a few years back but did not get a chance to sit on the 'hot seat' of ISB. He is working for BNP Paribas, an European bank now.

I always have a thing for MBAs and MBA aspirants. When a person says that he is thinking of pursuing an MBA or he is an MBA, my eyes go wide and balls (eyes') come a little out to watch them keenly. I observe their style, the way they present themselves, the way they talk about them & others etc. Not that I am on an evaluation kind of mode; just that I am trying to learn something. This guy I was talking about in the first two lines was an interesting person. He shared why he couldn't get through. Learning from failures is a good thing; learning from other's failures is a wise thing. So I had to probe a little to make him talk about his failure. Lets not get into all what he said for now.

According to him, one must prepare for MBA interviews like a girl prepares for a beauty contest. Virtual or real the way you answer the interviewer should be spontaneous, wearing a smile on your face and showing a good gesture. I have not watched many beauty contests but his statement reminded me of the movie Miss Congeniality. And I was able to correlate. The punch line "World Peace" is unforgettable. And the way Sandra Bullock says that on beauty pageant was sweet. (I am not a big fan of Sandra though).

I see two kinds of people a lot around me. One, who wants to pursue MBA; two, who wanted to puruse MBA. I definitely fall under one of these two categories.

What an MBA teaches people? It teaches you how to think. (I read this line sometime somewhere)

A-Rush

Today is a significant day in my life.

I have kicked off 3 new projects today with a team sized 24, my highest ever.

24 is a mix of people from 0 to 6 yrs of experience, with 0 being the major part of the pie.Above this, I am supposed to run the show with 75% of staffing. hmmm.....that's interesting.

This is going to be one of the most challenging assignments that I have undertaken.

Whenever I start off with doing something 'big' or 'new' or 'tough' or 'many-eyes-watching-it' kinda work, I would feel an
adrenaline rush in me.

Speaking of adrenaline rush, the first time I felt the A-Rush quite frequently was when I was doing my first year under grad.
That's a very nice, pleasant & embarrassing feeling to recall now. Like all normal adolescent boys in college, I also liked talking to girls. Poor me, never had experience in interacting with girls much in my school days. I used(!) to be very shy and self-conscious about talking to a girl, I think a lot about what she would think about me, if I talked to her. I used to rehearse a few times myeslf before spitting the words out. Even then I would stammer a lot. Ad-libbing? Definitely not my cup of tea. The time I start rehearsing to the time I complete with spitting it out is the A-Rush period. I am a dead meat, when it comes to conversing with girls in english. Double the rehearsals, double the stammering, double the A-Rush. But the things changed over the course of time. Remarkable improvement during the four years of my collegehood. By the time I was at my final year, I was really an expert(!) and even did pass my wisdom on to poor souls who were like me just a few years back. No more A-Rush while talking to girls. (Bad, eh?)

Do I have this adrenaline rush with my newly started assignments? Absolutely NO.
Probably this is like that 'talking-to-girls' thing. Over the course of time A-Rush got reduced and gone down to zero.

Last time I had a grrrrreat adrenaline rush was when I was standing 160 metre high on a pad just seconds before bungy jumping.
That was awesome