First snowfall experience!

27th November 2010...my first encounter with snowfall. woooo hoooo...!!!



Snow covered path

I hate early mornings yet I could not avoid it on 27th Nov 2010 to wake up at 6 am since I had TO take a bus at 7 am to travel to Oxford for attending EMERGE (a conference on social entrepreneurship). I dragged myself out of bed and forced myself to get ready. Finally, I stepped out of my place at 6.50 am and as I stepped out of the building little snowflakes wished me good morning! It was still dark, the entire pathway was covered with snow and glowed in the light of the bulbs. The scene looked lovely! I felt the snowflakes on my face... that was an experience! I loved the view. I suddenly realised I was cold and so I rushed to the bus.

The road where the bus broke down... in the middle of nowhere!

We moved at 7.10 am and then may 3/4 miles away from Cranfield, the bus broke down in the middle of nowhere. If Cranfield is in the middle of nowhere, thiS was even worse!! Someone played with the idea of walking back to the University and I shivered with the thought of walking back while it was still snowing. Thankfully, the driver arranged fr another bus to come and pick us up and while waiting we enjoyed the scenery outside. The snow covered fields looked beautiful. I was thrilled with the view and the idea of having experienced the first snowfall! Wonderful!! Loved it. Though I know, this would not be the last snowfall I see in UK, the first one will always have its charm!! :)

End of Term One!

Exams just got over...what a relief! Not sure how I will do in the last exam, I finished a 2-hour SDS exam in a little over an hour. Now I am confused whether the questions were too easy that I could answer quickly or were they so difficult that I did not know anything about them.

Anyways, exams over means party time and what better way to start a party than stepping out of the examination hall and be greeted by snow? The watery snowflakes (yes, they were very watery... the melted the moment they fell) felt nice despite the cold. Almost the whole batch gathered at the Social club...people discussed the vacation plans and bid goodbyes to the ones who were not attending the MBA Christmas party later in the evening. After a while, we moved on to get ready for the MBA Christmas party. I thought of taking a nap before getting ready but alas that wasn’t in store. L I had not realised that my room was such a mess during the exams! Well, a bit of cleaning up at the room, talking at home and general surfing took my time and then I had to rush to get ready.

The party was good...the food was ok... but the company was great. The whole cohort enjoying themselves and sharing stories about their experiences in term one. Oohh la la... finally term one is over and strangely none of us realised it was that long! Isn’t it strange that I have been here for about four months and it seems like ages but I feel that the term went by really quickly without giving a moment to even blink the eye!! 

A trip to Brighton

7 a.m. in the morning on 17^th December 2010, my friend Rahul calls up... “Get ready, the cab will be here in half an hour”. Ohh yes, just 3 hours of sleep that too on the next day after the exams finished... is that fair? Actually, it is fair: four of us were to go to Brighton to celebrate completing one term...yay yay yay!

Within a few minutes we were in the cab on our way to MK, to my surprise there was traffic on the way, had never seen such traffic on the road from Cranfield to MK. Will we miss our train? Nope...we dint. We made it in time but the train developed some technical problems and we got delayed in reaching the station from where we had to change our train. However, we managed to board another train...and there we were in Brighton... a beautiful town on the banks of English Channel. We reached our abode... a nice cosy two-bedroom apartment, which had the view of the English channel from each of its large glass windows. Kept our luggage there. The comfi sofas looked so inviting...we could not resist and decided to relax before stepping out again for lunch. About 45 minutes’ bus journey got us to a pub on the banks of the English Channel. Some photo clicking, then a superb meal, and mouth-watering desserts. The view from the restaurant was breath taking! The lovely view, the great food and awesome company makes this lunch one of the most memorable meals of my life!

Lunch followed by shopping, movie at home, superb dinner and most importantly awesome company... a day well spent! The next morning was beautiful... got up to a snow-clad Brighton. In no time, it was time for us to leave Brighton. L We moved on and reached London. Once in London, we realised that the snow had disrupted lot of services. It had not snowed a lot in Sussex, so the effect was not felt to that extent on our way from Brighton to London.

The experience after that was one of the worst experiences I have had till date in UK. The train from London to Milton Keynes was the slowest ever. At Milton Keynes were greeted with 8 inch snow and no transport available to Cranfield. Two girls stranded in snow and no one to help... L  It took the two of us more than an hour to get a cab to go from Milton Keynes to Cranfield. One hour shivering in 8 inch snow while it was still snowing more, haggling with the cab drivers and persuading them to drop us at Cranfield took a toll on us. The taxi drivers were asking for 4 times more fare than the actual fare: opportunistic behaviour! And the most amazing part: when a taxi driver saw my fren talking in Hindi... he said, “kyonki aap hindi mein baat kar rahi hain isliye main risk leta hun par you will have to pay more. I will take you in thrice the fare.” We agreed. The moment we sat in the taxi, the driver says, “aap pehle pay kar dijiye”. We were shocked! Why pay in advance? Probably e thought we did not have enough money so we showed him that we had money but he kept insisting that we should pay him in advance. Probably he thought that if we got stuck in the traffic he would leave us there so we decided to get off the cab with even more worry that we might probably not be able to reach home at all. Friends kept calling to find out whether we got a cab and trying to arrange for people to pick us up from the station so that we either reach home or get a safe abode for the night. But alas! Nothing worked. Finally, after about an hour of haggling we got a cab for about thrice the fare but we had no option but to agree. The taxi driver was nice and despite the heavy almost still traffic we reached Cranfield in one hour and a half. Thankfully! Later, we found that a few people had taken 2.5 hours to get to Cranfield and some people had to stay back at strangers’ places for the night. 

End of year with shopping!

I got a feeling… that its gonna be a great new year! Celebrating new year with my family in Dilli dil walon ki! Being in Delhi after so long feels good…nothing can beat the spirit of Delhites. I love Mumbai too and Mumbaikars are great in their own way. Delhi has a different feel altogether. The streets are never empty of people, narrow corridors filled with people standing haphazardly and enjoying their chaat- a view you will probably not be able to find anywhere else in the world. The rush outside Bengali Sweets…puts some off but to me it brought a smile to my face! J I have seen this before and have even been one of these during my college days and will do it again!! 

As soon as I step in Delhi, my college memories always come flooding by. Those were the days. Shopping for the next season in the off-season sale, freaking on chaat and khatte laddoo, Mc. Donalds’ ka burger, Indian food at I-ching (guess that wasthe name of a small vibrant Chinese restaurant that served delicious Indian food- what a combination!), chocolate excess at Barista… these were a few of my favourite things. Delhi, I would say gives the best shopping experience, if not in the world then in India atleast.

After so many years, here I am in Delhi again, ready for a shopping spree with my best shopping mates… my Mom and my brother!! Yipppieeeeeeeeeeeeeee…. Happy Shopping! :D

The start of the new term with PMI experience!

After the refreshing Christmas break that I spent with family back home, I was looking forward to the new term. The term started with PMI (Project Management Introduction).  I knew there was going to be a simulation and I was excited about it...we did something similar in the Pre-MBA and it was a good experience. At the end of the week, I felt like I had run a marathon! 

• Do not try to put your hand into everything. Always divide work. 

• Trust your team. Well, this is a lesson I learnt from my Boss at work rather than here. So, I already did trust them. :)

• Patience and being calm in crisis is the key. Again, something I learnt from my Boss. :)

• Plan, plan and plan. And if something goes wrong, replan on the same lines as the original plan. The strategy remains the same.

 Classes from 8.45 am to 5.45 pm followed by team work to prepare for the Simulation. The most interesting and challenging part of the course was the Simulation. each team was given a contract and was required to build a warehouse profitably. The minimum time for delivering the project, if everything went well, would be 14 weeks (each cycle was one week). After the entire day of classes, the team would sit together and work on the projections, the deliverables and the strategy of how we would minimise costs. It was an interesting thing to do. So, there we kept sitting sometimes till even 2 am working on the reports or presentation for the simulation. After all, it would get us marks...the higher our profits, the higher will be our marks! There were a few keys lessons I learnt during this simulation:We followed these and made a profit. A few mistakes but a learning experience. :) 

Am I already lagging behind?

It’s just the start of the term and I seem to be lagging behind. Felt miserable today for having missed an email about a social venture competition. Over the past few months, my interest in social ventures and corporate social responsibility has been increasing. I have always wanted to work towards the cause of education and I was hoping to put forward my idea in this competition. The passion for doing something on those lines has made me think and rethink on the subject, and now that I had something clear in my mind, I missed this deadline. The worst is... TODAY was the deadline!

I seem to lagging behind on applications, interview preparation... but those are my targets for this term! I need to prioritise even more and to plan very efficiently. Have set a few targets for this term and need to achieve them. And, what about football? I really wanna be good at it by the time I leave from here so have to do some good practice for that too!!

Uncertainities of life!

24^th January 2011: Today I felt restless, worried, tensed all at the same time! I was preparing for a competition for tomorrow when Sinchan called. I usually do not pick calls when I am in team meetings but I don’t know why I picked this call up. As soon as I said ‘hello’, Sinchan said, ‘Pracs, wherever you are come quickly to my room, I fell down and I think I broke my leg’. I rushed to Sinchan’s room. When I rang the bell, he called again and said he could not move and so will not be able to come to open the door. Thankfully, he had the presence of mind to have called another flat mate who had the keys. While waiting I kept trying to reach Rahul and Tanu but sadly their phones were on silent. After about 3 minutes, I got access to Sinchan’s room and reached there to see him sitting on the floor, his right leg swollen and shivering due to the pain.  He told us that he was sitting on his chair and working on his laptop for a long time and when he got up, his right leg went numb and he fell down and now has sever pain in his right leg. We helped him get on the bed and tried our ‘dadi maa ka nuskha’ of putting some ice on the swelling so that it reduces. In the meanwhile, Madhur (Sinchan’s flatmate) arranged for the security to come and help us. The security was quick in coming and came within 2/3 minutes. There was a round of questions and then they called the ambulance which was followed by another round of questions from the other end...’is the patient conscious?’, ‘is there any external bleeding?’, ‘can you explain again how the patient fell down?’, ‘is the patient relaxed?’, ‘is he talking?’... Gosh, I seriously felt these questions weren’t really required to call for an ambulance...but then procedures!!! 

While this was going on...Rahul and Tanu came. Only then did I realise that I had been so tensed seeing all this. The swelling on Sinchan’s leg started to reduce and we thought it would not be a fracture. Finally, the ambulance came and Rahul and Sinchan left for the hospital. We asked Rahul to give us regular updates. Initially he sent us an SMS saying, ‘swelling gone down won’t be a fracture’. I was glad! Then after sometime came a message, ‘bad news. Two fractures. One large, one small’. And a little more time passes by when Sinchan calls and says, ‘3 fractures, one large, two small’. I thought ‘well, fracture on the shin would mean a plaster from the ankle to the knee’. And then, they returned from the hospital at half past midnight and when Tanu and me entered the room, we were shocked to see Sinchan with his whole right leg plastered. It was a shock! Tanu almost fainted! Worse still...the plaster stays for 8 weeks and movement during these 8 weeks has to be kept to minimum. The five hours from 7.30 pm to 12.30 am were stressful and full of anxiousness for the three of us but for Sinchan, they were painful. Its difficult to even think of such a severe injury due to a fall in your own room while you were doing almost nothing!

I know what it is like to stay in a room all alone, all day (reminds me of my chicken pox days in NIBM!)... we are just trying that the next 8 weeks are not those dreadful lonely days for Sinchan.  And am sure he is gonna to walking much before those 8 weeks!! 

This blog is dedicated to Sinch... the ever-smiling, brave, angry young man! ;) Hope you get well really really soon!!!

Cranfield Vs. LBS and the Burns Night Ball

Women's Football teams from Cranfield & LBS

The much-awaited Burns night event happened exactly a week back! A day full of sports... football, rugby, badminton, squash, table tennis... against LBS. How badly we wanted to win this one. It was a cold day and everyone on the grounds- players and supporters alike- were freezing but that did not deter us from playing. We played hard and fair. Alas! We could not win any sport except the Table Tennis... the team that did us proud. I wish I had played football, not that we would have won if we played but standing their cheering my team made me feel like getting on the court and try. J The women football team played really well. Cheers to them! Many people were hurt during the games but no one was complaining. The best part was that I saw most of them dance in the evening during the Burns Night Ball.

The Table-tennis Champions!

The evening was a special affair... black suit party. I had always wanted to attend one of those black suit parties and being there did feel nice. Everyone was so immaculately dressed- perfect suits, suave gowns. There were people all around, some networking with LBS students followed by Scottish dance. The Scottish dance was the most enjoyable part of the evening. After having fun with the Scottish dance, we moved to CSA. I caught up with my old team at CSA and we had some good time teasing Chris. By the time I got back home, it was about 2 am. 

A good evening after a long time...lots of people, happy faces, lovely dresses and lots of fun! Felt just right!!

International week...the Indian show

The MBA International week started on 26^th January 20111 and ended on 31^st January 2011. Each evening was allocated to different countries to show case their culture, food etc to the cohort. It started with China, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand followed by other and ended with a bang with the evening where we, the Indians, invited the cohort to experience our culture. As goes with the Indians, we put up our food stalls a bit late but once we had put the stalls up, people queued to taste the Indian food. Most of us were dressed in Indian attires- the girls in sarees or salwar kameez and the boys in kurtas. We played a video of the old ‘Mile sur mera tumhara’  and showed our cohort the different cultures of India and the video ended with a few of us stepping on to the stage to sing the chorus and folding hands for a ‘namaste’ to the cohort. The whole thing gave a feeling of immense joy and it was an emotional moment when the cohort applauded to this act. 

The cultural programme that followed included a classical dance, a presentation on various parts of India where we told people about the diversity of culture in India, a flute performance and a dance by the kids. We had some prize distributions for non-Indians based on who dances the best on songs like ‘Sheila ki jawani’. 

We had three course meal..where we served starters, main course and dessert, all made by the superb cooks on our cohort and we were amazed to see that everyone liked the food so much. 

People said they had been waiting for the Indian evening and they thoroughly enjoyed. These words make us swell with pride for being Indians. And so my Facebook message...’Prachi Khare is so proud to be an Indian’!!

The four day weekend

Been long since I wrote... Lots has happened since the International Week... Term 2 passed in a whiz and I could not decide whether time was passing too quickly or too slowly...a tough decision. Term 2 exams were interesting! Apply you knowledge was the challenge! J

The Easter break was the best time I have had till now in UK. I visited Scotland and enjoyed every moment of being there. Also spent sometime in London. Did a bit of shopping. That was one week..the next week, I just recharged my energy- i.e. slept, watched movies and generally lazed around!!

Then started Term 3 with a bang! It started with a recruitment presentation by A.T.Kearney. Day 1 of Term 3 and we need to start job search at an accelerated pace. The deadlines are glaring into our faces and people are doing 4/5 applications per day. It makes me think whether I should be turning in applications at that rate or should I follow my current level of efforts into applications? Well, I decide to stick to my ways!

Last week I also had an Assessment Centre. My first real assessment centre. Actually, last week was very hectic. With SOAR pending (delayed to be true!!) and preparation for AC required, I was almost getting nervous about things. Finally, the AC went just alright (hope the results are alright too!) and I turned in the SOAR as a WAC (actually in lesser time than a WAC!).

The weekend that followed was the Easter weekend which is quickly coming to an end. The long four-day weekend is something I always look forward to... the weekend spent sleeping, shopping, reading, lazing and most importantly...job searching! Just one more day to go and still got a checklist to complete.... aaahhh...these checklists and me... God save me!!