mere funde

I am against both Rahul but will come back to it after sometime. Sometime back Rahul wrote a intro for me and I guess I will do the same for him. Rahul is this person with moderate views and believes fiercely that a person has his/her own views and that they must be respected at all cost. Its thier own life after all. But then I guess I am an extremist and have very strong opinion on most subjects. But then I don’t want to force them down anyones neck. I am just expressing my own views here. If anyone agrees its ok and if not it still is.

Now coming to the point. I am against both the points Rahul mentioned below, more against hypocrisy. But then I also don’t feel that people leaving thier disciplines just for money are doing the correct thing. I don’t say that money is not important. Without that I wouldn’t be here typing in this post. But then the question remains, is it all that matters? Money can buy you all things in life other than happiness. It can get you the stuff to play hockey but it can’t make you enjoy it. Do you not think that you would regret not having done what you wanted to once you think over stuff at some point in your life? Would you rather not follow your dreams?

If you are not enjoying it please don’t do it. But do you think money should be the sole reason of not enjoying your job? I agree financial security is a major concern. And I am not judging anyone beacuse he or she made a choice. Who am I to judge? But I am just suggesting that they should also consider what they would be losing out on. I once had a lesson in Hindi which said something like “Its only the person that dives deep who comes up with a pearl. Someone who sits at the shore doesn’t know that joy.” But then I guess its not an ideal world. The priority given to money is not wrong. But don’t you think the priority should be given a bit more thought. And I know it seems like I am saying all this because I want to appear cool. But please believe that this is not the case. This is something I believe in.

By the way tomorrow is engineers day. Here’s saluting Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvarava and all other engineers who have helped India become self dependent in technological areas. Hats off to you all. Also guys this blog is getting like a dialogue between me and Rahul. I know people are busy but you all could atleast post comments.

Just to avoid misinterpreting Goyal again, I’ll put an if condition here…

I’m not sure what you’re against, Goyal… is it leaving your education behind for monetary reasons… or is it leaving it behind for monetary reasons and not admitting what the reason is… if it’s the second one, this post can be ignored… I agree hypocrisy in any form is pathetic. But if it’s the first one, here goes…

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What’s wrong in leaving your education behind for purely monetary reasons? I mean, money plays an important part in our lives, if some chap decides he wants to pursue a path that gives him faster and greater financial security, that’s his decision… who are we to question it?

When I say you’re not enjoying it, I also encapsulate the disenchantment coming in because you’re not getting enough money… because you aren’t saving enough for the future, or because you don’t feel your education will lead you to a job that gives you enough money for the material comforts you want.

I know… it’s really great to follow your dreams… but this is not an ideal world… not everyone is sure to be successful in what they do… so sometimes, you have to take the safer way out… it is a very personal decision. And neither you nor me has any right to say whether it was right or wrong…

I know it’s really cool to say money doesn’t matter… but the truth is, in this world, it does… and if someone decides to leave what he enjoys for money, it’s sad, but it’s his choice. It’s not because he’ll enjoy keeping the dosh stashed away… it’s because he believes he’ll enjoy the security money gives him more than the job he left. He prefers to do something that he doesn’t enjoy now and make money out of it (so that he can grow old in comfort) than go and play hockey (to give an example) and face a potentially uncertain future.

Money matters, it’s as simple as that… different people give it different priority… no one’s right and no one’s wrong….

This was actually gonna be a comment on Goyal’s post… but then ended up becoming too long… so, I figured I’d rather post it…

I don’t see what the fuss in not leaving your education behind is about… if, after 4 years of studying, a person realizes he’s not gonna enjoy himself stuck in this field for the rest of his life, he has every right to leave. The choices most people make about their first degree in India are hardly based on what they’re interested in… there’s a bit of peer pressure to it, there’s a little what everyone thinks would be good for him, there’s a little monetary consideration, but mostly it’s the fact that he isn’t really sure what he’s be good at, what he’d enjoy… career counselling is non-existent in this country, he doesn’t know what the job will involve… he loves fiddling with wires so he decides to be an Electrical Engineer… but he doesn’t make the cut off and ends up with Chemical… or if he does get into it, he finds out that it’s not about wires anymore but some silicon chip… what’s wrong with him decided to pursure other interests?

I mean, think about it, out of a 900 batch at BITS, how many got first choice? What is wrong with them saying, this sucks, it’s not what I wanted, I’ve had enough… and even if they do get first choice, what wrong in them realizing they made a mistake and deciding to change streams? Personally, if I hadn’t made a Comps dual, I’d have left Civil far behind anyways… that’s a fact… and there’s nothing wrong in that… I don’t like designing structures why should I spend my life doing it? Just because I shouldn’t leave my education behind? As far as I know, education is for my benefit, and not the other way around. In fact one of the reasons I joined BITS with a Civil degree was because everyone told me the environment there would help me in leaving my education behind, change streams if I wanted to…

The reason can be anything… it can be that I’d rather sit under an AC instead of surveying outside on site… or just the fact that I think there are greater opportunities here… or maybe that I enjoy coding… whatever it is, the point is, education is the means to an end… if it doesn’t take me to the end I want, I have every right to pursue what I want, take a 180 degree turn if need be.

You’re lucky Goyal, you’ve found your goal in life sciences… there are many who haven’t… and they have every right to keep on searching… even if what they’re looking for is a pot of gold… even if they plan on leaving the road they’re on completely… even if it means “leaving [their] education behind”…

There are a few images that always leave deep impact on your minds and will always flash in front of you throughout your life. There was a picture of a tiny hand tightly clutching a cross from amongst the many Belsan pictures Rahul had sent. For a moment I was speechless. I could think of nothing else and and was praying silently without realizing it. Maybe even searching for answers. Why?? Why kids?? Why innocent kids??

I couldn’t help thinking about the countless families that were destroyed. The many inconsolabe parents who had lost a kid. The stunned kids inside who were clueless about whatever happened. The kids at home in an endless wait for their parent. The young minds which will always be imprinted with the image a terrorist killing thier friends. The explosion. The countless bodies. The blood. The screams. And then I was questioning God and in a way the terrorists. Why kids? What had they done to you? Why innocent people who do not know the difference between a “terrorist” and a “freedome fighter”?

How many more Hitlers? How many more Gujrat riots? How many more WTCs? How long will we stay Comfortably Numb?

We really do suck…….

Now that you know who Goyal is I accept the fact that many a times I digress but its what I feel very strongly about and somehow do not find words to express myself. About the last post I meant that i hate the hypocrisy which i thought was evident by the line “Cut the crap and have the guts to accept the fact that all you care about is the fuckin’ money.” I say fuckin’ money because, is it all that we should care about. I know I need the money too but is it all I want?

What are my priorities? I want to do the thinking now and not when I am forty something and sulk about what probably I missed out in life. Don’t get me wrong. I am not against earning big money. But you can earn a bit less say and do what you would like to I probably would take it up. I don’t wanna later regret that the best years of my life were spent only earning money. All said and done I probably would agree with Rahul that it has to be done in moderation. But please do not leave your education behind. Or atleast try not to.

I still remember the night before the Infosys placement. I was trying hard to convince myself that I should make a job and guess what? I could not. Only after I had asked in the pre placement talk if the company had interest in life sciences could I get myself to go for the Apti. I wanted a job but I also did not want to do something completely unrelated to my education at BITS which is probably why I did not go for the CTS interview. They were paying about 30k more but had nothing to do in life sciences. I did not want to leave my field altogether.

Coming to a good news site. Rahul I have an advice. Try BBC and get a RSS feed read from the site in your Outlook mailbox. I did carry the Indonesia bomb attck story. As for Indiatimes…. forget it. Rediff though is better has still to go a long waybefore it gets to the level of BBC. Also one more thing we need to remember is that perhaps they are not purely news site unlike BBC.

But is that a good enough excuse? Maybe we have become insensitive to human pain. How many of us do really feel pained when people die in J&K? If we do why don’t we question the government and it’s working. How many of us remember Manipur and that perhaps it’s still burning? It has been pushed to the middle pages for long now. All that matters to newspapers is the metros and states which are economically beneficial to them. I guess it all boils down to the same old question.

Is money everything?

Hey, the previous post got published too… the damn dollar is up!

I apologize Blogger, out of all of us in this world… you’re the only thing that doesn’t suck!

Maybe you should start a news site too…

I typed in a huge post a couple of days ago… only to get the stupid time out error the whole day. And this interface didn’t even let me retrieve it… it was called “Of Goyal, rhymes and the damn dollar”… or something like that… it still exists on the dashboard, a broken link… Blogger sucks…

There was a terrorist attack in Indonesia yesterday… and there’s no news on the Indiatimes “Top Headlines”… it seems “Asia’s most expensive wedding ever” is more important. Indiatimes sucks…

Rediff talks of “A good workout, 20 minutes only” under their main six links… I searched more and under “News”, the first link is “No sexy clothes for Chinese officials”. There’s no mention of the bombing… Rediff sucks…

Is this how it is? These sites are amongst the most visited in India… Indiatimes is hooked to Times ofIndia, a newspaper… is this all we’re looking for… has our apathy really reached those limits… that we don’t even care…

It’s been a day, maybe it’s old news… really? Something as horrifying doesn’t occupy our interests for 24 hours? Why… because “only” 8 people died? Because it’s thousands of kilometers to the east? Because it’s not our problem?

Man, we suck…

In case, someone who doesn’t know us is reading this (although I really doubt it!!), I think you need a bit of intro… particularly after Goyal’s last post. Goyal is this chap who always, always has the right ideas… but somehow in trying to convey them, he sometimes ends up saying something that is so wrong that he takes your mind off the basic idea he was trying to convey… by his own admission, “[he's] not good at expressing himself”… anyways, if something in that previous Goyal post pricked your eye, try looking deeper, don’t go by the arguments too much… and he’ll start to make sense because he means the right thing…

Also, a wakeup call… in AABA format…

“Ankit, this is YOUR blog

Don’t let us hog

Stop being an IT engineer

Go kiss the frog!”

(In case, you didn’t get the joke, you really need to hear the one about the IT engineer and the talking frog)

Anyways, let’s get to the main point… money… and how important it is to us… well, this is the first time I’m out making some on my own… and when I want more, it’s not about sending an e-mail to Dad… if there’s a time in the future when I’d want more, I need to make sure I had saved earlier! And I’m still trying to get the hang of it!

In the end it’s about enjoying yourself, isn’t it? You wanna go club-hopping every weekend, you need the dollar… you wanna order a pizza every night, you need the dollar… buy an i-pod, get a laptop, you need money… it’s a fact of life… as factual as a fact can get!

So, I guess at one point in life, around the same crossroad we’re standing on now, you have to talk to yourself and decide… what is it you’re gonna enjoy the most… what will satisfy you the most… it can be sitting at home with your family and friends watching a large screen TV with 3D surround sound… it can be the look of gratitude in the eyes of someone when you help build a waterline to his village… it can be trying to find a cure for AIDS and failing (at least I tried…)… it can be the pride you feel in wearing a soldier’s uniform… or it can simply be writing a more user-friendly compiler (although that’s hardly simple!!)… it can even be writing the minesweeper program, something on every computer…

(Ha ha, I can actually start quoting Maslow’s Needs Heirarchy here!)

Reminds me of a Joey-Phoebe conversation… there are no unselfish deeds in this world… I don’t think that’s true… but if someone’s going after money, should we really be criticizing it? Is that really so wrong? Isn’t a person allowed to put his own personal self before everyone else? On the condition of course, that you don’t screw over everyone else! We’re talking ethics here!

The problem here probably is hypocrisy… that’s the only thing I’m against… it’s that student who refuses to admit that money plays an important part in his life, in his career choices… when it actually does…

I personally don’t wanna be a slave to the dollar… but having said that, I realize that I still want to be able to wear a pair of jeans and Tshirt… save a bit for the people I love, for emergencies, I wanna be able to eat a pizza once in a while… go back home in a taxi instead of taking the bus… I don’t wanna end up with a loved one in a hospital and no money for the bills… and therefore, am I not already a slave?

The way out I see is that I combine my work interests with money making interests, find a middle line and go at it crazy now… so that in the latter part of my life, I can sit back and do the things I would enjoy, help others if I can…

I haven’t got it completely figured out yet… if you got any ideas let me know… I guess this is my quarter life crisis!

A few days back there was this big discussion back at BITS on Is IT it?



And I thought , now that’s an interesting thought. But today i read (read it here) this article on Rediff on how the IIM and other B-Schools showed an inclination for engineering students or atleast the admission patterns do. And this thing flashed in my mind? Has an MBA degree gained more importance all of a sudden and why? Should the question now not be Is MBA it?

I have seen in my batch a mob mentality among students to try out their hands at CAT even if they don’t have a fuckin’ idea about management. Ask anyone of them and they give that same old bull crap about how they always wanted to do something that has to do with management rather than writing a “stupid” code. I mean I am sick of the nonsense. Would anyone still take up management jobs if they paid some 4 lacs per annum or if “stupid” software jobs paid 12 lacs. I bet my ass they wouldn’t. I mean give me a break guys. Will none of you ever do something original? I mean you say you got into the “stupid” engineering thing because of the parents. Now aren’t you getting forced into doing an MBA degree just because you cannot resist that fat pay check. I have this EEE friend who was a very enthued EEEite till about a year back. He would not take up a EEE job because he is not interested in EEE now. He will not take up a stupid software job beacuse he doesn’t wanna be one amongst the crowd. But he will ghot hi ass off for CAT doing those stupid numbers to get in there. He will go for a Schlumberger interview because he feels the job is challenging. Cut the crap and have the guts to accept the fact that all you care about is the fuckin’ money. Will anyone ever do what he/she wants in this seemingly god forsaken country. We have the brightest minds in the country who have graduated from engineering college’s throwing down 4 years of education to tarin for next two years as a manager and work for some foriegn company and make big buck’s. Where will we get the R & D coming in from? Why fuckin’ waste an oppurtunity? No one would want to be a teacher (though I guess it’s challenging) coz its not their style (or for the truth, man they pay what?? chillars). I have renewed respect for Prof. Cherian and our very own VedP.

I mean people do things because its the hep thing to do or for money. I guess it does not require a rocket scientist to figure out why we have a measly number of Nobel Laureates and world class scientists. Or for that matter small number (an overstatement) of world beaters in all walks of life. There aren’t many Tendulkars to give up education because he knew all he wanted to do was to play. There aren’t many VedP’s who would give up everything coz maybe he loved teaching.

Are there????

I would like to agree and disagree….

Agree to the fact that Indians do care about anything just before it….long term planning is a joke to us…..and sport management a bigger one…..i believe that cricket is doing as well as it is because it is managed professionally and minimal political interference…..i read in the SandP 2004 that the best thing politicians did about Neuron was to stay away from it…btw if you haven’t checked it out do it (here)……i mean those stupid idiots can give away money for idiots who went to iraq and got captured despite foreign ministry’s warnings …..i mean that too after paying money to get them back as if they were heroes……and then we also do not denounce Islamic terrorism due to our secular government…..and they don’t have money for our shooters to buy bullets and guns….they dont have money to hire a good, professional and young weightlifting coach…..i mean what loads of crap……..

But then don’t we think that there is some fault with the way the players approach the events…. i mean i agree that more than saying that anju didn’t win a medal we should take a look at the fact that she bettered her personal best…..but then we also have people who have underperformed …. say for example our much hyped hockey team….i mean last two lympics….it was a heart break for me in sydney…..and also gave birth to a lot of anger….can’t they do the basics well…..i mean look at the cricket team…..always trying harder and bouncing back just when we tend to give up hope……but i guess we have this is due to the fact that we are satisfied at being amongst the top and not the best…..i know there is a anju george and lee-hesh here and

there but do we really have committed people….

We need a complete overhaul…..both of the system and the indian psyche…..we need to have that itch to be the best….i know trying hard matters but so does winning….maybe have a killer instinct….as of the system….we can do better without….india is an example of how things where govt hasn’t stepped in has done well….. cricket…. BPO…. software….. potential stuff which are still under government have wilted….. tourism….. sports…. industries….. labour reforms….. the list is endless……

But then how does it matter……next olympics is 4 years away…..till then anju’s, malleswari’s and the rathore’s will be forgotten…….and also god knows how many stupid elections before it…….

Anyone listening?????