Finally no worries on report front, it is safely with printer and most of the website work is done. Tomorrow is crucial, I have to work on the presentation for the main event. After controlling the urge to shop for almost 3 months, today I did some shopping. Hmm.. not some shopping, a lot of shopping.. but most of the stuffs were needed. My waste size is increasing at fast rate making my existing clothes useless. 

This week is probably the most hectic week of my life.. working like a real asshole. Finally I negated the delay caused by other people to a large extent but have to wait till Friday to have the final of this effort. I am learning new things, some professional knowledge and a lot of practical wisdom. 

I am just back from a tiring trip to New Delhi. The trip started very badly, I missed the flight by 5 minutes and then had to wait for 4 hours to get the next flight. Luckily the person we were supposed to meet agreed to postpone the meeting, but that was not our day. Once we reached delhi, our traffic time calculation failed and we started late for the meeting (had to go to our hotel before we started for meeting.). and as we were to reach the meeting place it started raining cats and dogs. It rained 7mm in 1.3 hours. Result. The roads were flooded. I literally swim to my meeting place. Luckily we had a productive meeting. 

Another super busy day of crunching numbers.  The number of hours clocked for this project in last 3 days confirms that I can still slog like an asshole. Hopefully a few more days and I would be done with this, till the launch of the final report.
Today I got a phone call from a former colleague seeking to fill a vacancy in her organization. It was a pleasant surprise as I worked with her for a brief period only, yet she traced me for the job. The tentative offer put me in a dilemma, the position being offered is quite big and the money is quite attractive there. But I love the job I do here. Feels awkward to again follow the money and the glamor.  Though I am yet to affect or reject the offer.

Yesterday I did not like someone's behavior who was very close to me.. or probably still close to me. Felt bad, my mistake. I should not have undue expectations from people.

Was supposed to finish the Chapter before the deadline, but spent the whole day talking to friends and reading. There are few other things troubling me but I need to put them on back burner. Hopefully they would be manageable even after two-three weeks. 

Today was better. Though did not achieve as much as I wanted to, but still was properly on track. Not much distractions and got some clarity about things. Discovered that my twits are being Re-twit and felt good. Twitter seems to be the buzz word.

Tomorrow I need to start the chapter for WRI Report, there is enough material here and there, written in bits and pieces... I need to put them together.  I need to get more focused for next 2-3 months. Hope to overcome distractions and be more productive.

Yesterday, I had a quite a bit of emotional upheaval and it resulted in something that I abhor. Sacrifices, love, artificiality, expectations, friendship, purpose of life.. these words were explored to find the true meaning and sometime even were redefined for different context. In this world full of artificial values and morals, if something comes afresh without the muck of selfish desires that thing is regarded with a lot of suspicion. Probably I became a prey to the same thing.
Causing someone pain is never my intention and probably the consideration 'no pain to anyone' is very core of my moral setup. Yet, most of the time I cause mild pain to avoid far more intense pain.  I am not trying to put myself on higher pedestal, yet I do it again and again. And more often than not, I cause immense pain for myself.
Today, I explored many things, ventilated some absurd baseless fears. I do not know whether I should share or not, sharing one's inner feelings to someone always has the risk of getting misinterpreted or that person becoming judgmental.

Professionally, I have a lot to finish this week and probably once these stuffs are out of my plate, will resume the GMAT preparation.

The last 15 days were hectic, first an offsite for three days at Mahabalipuram and then a super hectic field visit in Bihar. The retreat at Mahabalipuram was an exciting one as I reiterated my life mission to myself (though it was part of organization building exercise but fortunately I work for an organization whose objectives coincide with my life mission). So what is my life mission? I do not want to sound pedantic, but in very simple words, I want to make poor people realize their potential. I want every household to be capable of reaching its maximum potential. They should have access to proper resources to reach this goal.
I spent most of my childhood in penury and living with people who were fighting to get the basic amenities, their dreams were not big. Simple people with simple dreams, but even those dreams of having their kids in school, giving their kids proper food, seem to be distant, unrealistic dreams. A little help and they could have easily realize their dreams. But most of them never got that help. I had experienced most of these problems in first person and I empathize with these people.
I have been working directly or indirectly on improving condition of poor household (mostly through market based solutions) and realized that there is a lot which requires proper attention. The  'fortune at the bottom of pyramid' seems very elusive and even if that is there very few people know how to realize that fortune. While my professional commitment is towards making people realize that fortune, the personal passion makes sure that I make the people at the bottom of pyramid fortunate at the same time. I know I have a big dream, but I have always dremt big and fought very hard to realize them. I will fight for this as well. Though the focus is more narrow, I know I cannot change everything, I need to pick one thing and go all guns blazing.
The Bihar Trip
After the retreat, I rushed to a remote village in Bihar to meet some entrepreneurs and get their perspective on government policy. I was accompanied by an intern, a foreigner of Indian origin and first time visitor to Bihar. She has some 'good' image of Bihar construed from books like 'In Spite of Gods' and 'a very Bihar friendly' print/electronic media.  We drove 900 kms in heavy rains and defied car break-down on deserted Bihar road around midnight to reach to that village. The interactions with different people reconfirmed the horrible truth of government bureaucracy and corruption marring development initiatives. I fail to understand how glaring examples of inefficiency of government machinery and flagrant violations of code of conduct go un-noticed by authorities and media. Though the recent development initiatives assured me of slow but sure growth of my home state.
At the end of field trip I went home and spent a couple of days to meet family and friends. I met a couple of education entrepreneurs trying to set up their own shops of education. The quality is never a concern. It seems no body studies here for knowledge, right from the first class the focus is on getting a job. :( They fail to realize the loopholes in this strategy. The education system, as well as the mentality of students and parents, needs an overhaul.
I think I forgot to mention that I met someone who reminded very strongly of some past days.. very strongly and vividly.
Delhi
Finally I reached Delhi and finished a few pending works and nudged the NGO setup work a bit more. Hope to get that done soon. The very brief Delhi stay was eventful. I think too eventful, it highlighted certain things which I was completely unaware. Some of these things were pleasant, some very painful.

A hectic day and quite useful as well. Presented one of the projects  I have been working on since 2008 to my colleagues and it was quite an experience. There were some good suggestions, some not so palatable comments and some good points to work upon. Gave me a taste of what I have in store when I will make the final presentation to media and other stakeholders.

Next three days are going to be at an offisite to discuss workplan, mission and vision of the organization I am part of. I have no doubt that it is going to be an experience to talk about for quite some time.

Was too tired to read, tried reading one of the short stories by Manto could not finish even a 4 page short story. :(

Long and hectic day with a meeting that was scheduled to last for 5 hours, luckily we finished it in 2 hours flat. Result deadlines that stretch you to your limit. Though some good things came out of that meeting as well, I scheduled my holiday plans and got a chance to visit my native land. :)

I am visiting my state to learn about some renewable energy policies along with an intern and planning to take a couple of days off to pay a visit to my family. It has been long since I visited. 

If I get power and resources to change one thing, I would like to overhaul the primary education system in India. Quality of primary education has been pathetic to say the least and last one year I have been working on finding the ways to contribute towards improvement of rural education. The recent comments by Kapil Sibal and other articles in media have given some hopes but I think we are yet to see any concrete steps towards that. The organization I am setting up is going to have education as one of the core focus in initial years.

I must confess that the progress on the front of NGO registration has been very very pedestrian. I hope to get it done by the end of next month. Probably quitting the job and giving full attention to the upcoming organization would have been ideal but I am not yet ready for that. And this is more to do with the lack of resources and some other constraints.

The GMAT and GRE preparation have been the last priority in this week, I don't know if I would ever get the required time to prepare for these tests. And inadequate sleep is also sapping my energy level in day time so this I need to fix as soon as possible.

A hectic day today.. Had a meeting for NetImpact, but could not go and did nothing else apart from chatting and visiting a few friends. Met some seniors and visited landmark and tried my best to not buy any books. So just restricted to my supply of magazines and came back.

Though this is one of the most significant day in my life. Something changed today.. or probably ensured that thing will change in very quick time. Probably 20 years down the line, this will remind of many things.  A personal failure. I think a very significant one.

In last few weeks I completely destroyed my sleeping patterns and now it has no fixed pattern. Sometime I go to sleep at 2 am, sometime at 3 or sometime do not sleep at all. And now I am witnessing the impact. 3-4 hours of sleep is not sufficient in any case, so the first thing on my list is to get back to normal sleeping routine. The erratic sleeping pattern did not allow me to do any phyical exercises and result is an ever increasing waist size and belly fat. The frequent parties and eating out sessions are also not helping much, I think now I have reached a point that I should respond with an emphatic no to any request to eat out and parties. Probably turning vegetarian would be a good idea, considering all my friends are die-hard non-veg fans, as it will reduce my going out options.

Updating here after a long gap... :(. Again failed to keep a promise of regular update on this blog about my life.. but anyway.. nothing much happened in between. Yeah, I turned 31 on 5th July. So now in 30+ group. :)

After last year's debacle, I am again thinking of GMAT and do not want to take any chances. Though a full time research (and some really related accouterments)  job does not gives ones a lot of free time available, I am willing to put 3-4 hours a day. Also, I am seriously considering enrolling for some classes for GMAT and wondering whether I should go for weekend classes or go for regular classes. Regular classes have some strong incentives as they will force me to get up early (they start from 6.30 am) and will be over in 5-6 weeks. I know that there might not be a lot of value additions in terms of learning but surely this will make me disciplined and apply peer group pressure, going by past records I perform quite well in peer group pressure.
On the other hand, I am seriously thinking of considering Ph.D as well. Seems a very good fit for my kind of life style, the only negative is that I have to spend 5 years on it. Hmm...

Lets see how things move.

Recession had its impact; I was expecting a meaty hike but had to settle wafer thin hike. But I am not that much disappointed considering the market situation and my organization was generous enough to give me a decent bonus. Felt good, this is my third year here and I have been top rated researcher for each year.

Last week I got opportunity to visit inaugural Sankal Forum for social enterprises and investors. It was great experience as most of the people behind this were alma mater and the social entrepreneurs provided a strong nudge to my sleeping entrepreneurial ambitions. I am already in process of setting up my own NGO and hopefully I would get it done by the end of next month.

I am not much into acquiring assets (or probably not have enough cash to do so) but there are certain things I have always been longing for. Apple MacBook was one of them. Right since I started using computers and came to know about Apple Computers/Steve Jobs I wanted to possess one. And this desire become more and more strong in recent years with a lots of people around showcasing this excellent piece of technology. So a just a day before yesterday, I decided to give in to the temptation and swiped my already overloaded credit card for a brand new MacBook. :)
Yes, finally I have a Mac. Its amazing.
Though in this time of recession (and my bonus and salary hikes are yet not certain) I wanted to save some money but the temptation was too strong. I was nudged in office meeting to go for it. Moreover I always feel that I do not need much money for my sustenance so no need for saving every penny for future consumption. Immediate consumption seems to offer more satisfaction in this case.