A Writer's Plight

It’s been almost 10 years now since I started writing. It’s been almost 4 and half years span of running this blog. I started when I haven’t read much. I started when my grammar was really bad, that bad that I often feel ashamed while reading my old posts and I would have given a really bad review or even discourage the person to write if somebody had got my old posts reviewed from me. This will be my 89^th post on this blog, I have written various other articles on many other platforms. When I started, I didn’t know this will be the only thing I would do so consistently. Usually, I have the tendency to switch from one thing to another just being a dilettante in all. Lots of blogs mushroom around time to time, people make big plans and then stop writing after a few posts. Even I have been very inconsistent going through certain phases of my life which produced a writing block. Few days back, I crossed 20k hits and I thought it would be a nice thing to write about the whole writing experience.

Usually, whenever we start anything we go through two phases, both highly unrealistic and unpractical. First phase is when we haven’t started and we are in planning phase only. That is the high hope phase; we hope that we would reach the zenith very quickly. If it’s IIT JEE we think of getting a top 100 rank, if it’s starting of a semester we think of scoring 80+, if it’s CAT we think of getting 99.9+ percentile, if it’s coding we think of learning all the languages within a few days and becoming a top hacker also at the same time, and if it’s a blog we think that we would get a large reader base soon. Every time we will write, there will be tons of appreciation and feedback, lots of likes and sharing on facebook, people lauding you for your writing potential and you will be a regional celebrity. Of course, none of this happens.

As soon as we start, we fail to get a good score in our JEE and CAT mock tests. We flunk in mid semester let alone scoring 80+ in semester, no one reads our blog, you don’t even get 10 unique hits, we are unable to make even basic programs and fail to identify the semi colon syntax error let alone be a top coder, so discouraging are the results that we immediately sunk into the second phase and that is the being gloomy no hope phase. We stop our IIT/CAT preparation and look for easy alternatives with a firm belief that we don’t have what it takes to crack JEE/CAT. We stop programming and rely solely on theoretical subjects to get good marks in our semester exams and the bloggers either delete their blog or completely forget it, they can’t even recall their blog link few days later.  The transition between these 2 phases is so quick, it is the sole reason for most of our failures.

We fail not because we are incompatible, we fail because we stop pursuing, we fail because we lose the passion, we fail because our hopes are too high and when we don’t get appropriate response, we just stop everything. If I talk from a writer’s perspective, people think that blog is a cool thing, you will write and people will love you. You think that people would be interested in knowing about your life, your misery, your adventure but the truth is, nobody gives a damn about other’s life. Everyone is dealing with their own troubles and rarely one goes out of their cocoon to explore outer things. Nobody wants to read about your failed love life, your crushes, how you failed In JEE, what you think about growing economy or politics or the environment problems. They would prefer to chat with someone they want to pursue, or watch a video on youtube, or go through all the funny pics posted by random pages than reading your posts and that is fair only, you can’t blame them.

The post which you have written for hours won’t even get a single like on facebook, no comments and may be only 20 unique hits. Soon, you will realize the practice is as futile as doing 20 pushups daily and expecting a 50 inch chest. So, is the writing world that gloomy? Let us see the full picture now.

Little did you know, if you had continued your JEE preparation, your rank might have improved. If you had continued programming you might be a top programmer in few months. If you had continued with 20 pushups, you might be able to do 100 push up some day and may realize your 50 inch chest dream. Perseverance is the key and in writing it is indeed the most important term. Yes, some of us have that god gifted writing spark, but it will remain inconsistent unless you carve it. You would remain that Vinod Kambli who could never be Sachin despite being more gifted. Writing requires a direction and that could come only by writing. It’s a loop, you write and your writing goes better. Reading acts as a catalyst. Harivansh Rai Bacchan has said, the best way to write is to read 100 pages and then write a single line.

But, to be honest, even if you are writing brilliantly, you won’t get as much attention as you deserve leave alone appreciation. People don’t read Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Ayn Rand, so you are too far in the queue. You have to be patient that time, really really patient. If you stop writing, then it will indeed be the end of the road. If you are solely writing for the sake of appreciation and to create a buzz then don’t write. You would be disappointed only. Write because you want to write, and you want to express, and sooner or later people will relate and write for the proper audience. There is no point in writing an article on quantam mechanics for 4^th grader tea vendor, you better write effective use of cardamom and ginger in tea for that guy. Write for your audience and let them relate with your content. Lastly, writing is not tough English, people often think writing means using tough words, nobody keeps a dictionary with them always, write as simple as you can, don’t be pretentious else you would lose your audience soon. In simplicity lies sophistication, and trust me writing a simple article is far tough than writing a touch one with fancy words.

So, lastly the plight paragraph. This is aimed for the readers. Dear readers, I am not talking about myself only but about any artist who is expressing his creativity to entertain you. It really takes hell lot of effort to even produce simplest of things. There should always be a 2 way lane, a 2 way communication. Appreciation should always be done where it is due. If you like or share a picture, it may not help the hungry kids of Africa, your wishes may not come true, the person who loves you may not reveal itself at the end of the day but if you like someone’s creation, a painting, a song, an article, a video anything or share it, it will mean a lot to the creator. It is such a morale booster, it can literally compensate efforts of many hours. No one really is expecting praise from you, the expectation is just of a feedback, just convey that you have read and looking forward to reading more, that’s it.

There have been multiple times when I thought no one is reading my blog and should I stop writing ? Many posts who had got huge hits didn’t have a single comment on them. A very highly anticipated post bring almost zilch response and that is very disheartening at times. But there would always be some random guy who I haven’t even talked pinging me that he read an article and that really changed his life. There would be people conveying through whatsapp, facebook, even phone calls that they really liked that post, a post that I had probably forgotten but it’s great to know it positively impacted someone’s life. There are always subtle signs that people are reading and liking the content, but I would be happy if the connection is made more explicit.

When I had not started writing, I used to read lots of blogs and always people were literally begging for comments in every post. It sounded very weird back then, I had a perception that this people are desperate for praises and want to be appreciated. It looked very negative back then, but here I am doing the same thing, asking people to interact and now I understand why they used to ask. It’s good to know someone is reading, someone is investing their time in something you created, it’s a great moral booster, and it compels you to be more serious, to write better, to write different, to write something that can really bring a positive change.

So people, it’s a writers plight, interact with me, do not appreciate just review, do not praise just give the feedback, give me a direction and I would be more than happy to follow it.

Thank you

Be alone but not lonely !

Do you often feel cut off from the world ? Do you feel that there is no one who cares about you or would be even remotely affected by your pain ? Are your weekends are really boring and you feel that you have no one in the whole world to enjoy with? Do you feel jealousy or pain when you see photos of people enjoying on facebook or in general any group hanging out and having fun? When the world is out there partying you are busy selecting what to buy on MacDonald online menu and searching for coupon codes to get some discount. When people are watching late night movies with one another, you are downloading some old classic movie and watching it alone, updating a status on facebook which never gets even a single like. No one ever tagged you in a ‘thank you’ status on facebook, no one gives a damn even if your whatsapp status is “ I wish this pain ends with me “, in short no one bothers about your existence in world and for many you don’t even exist, you are just a blurry image. Welcome to the real world then, it sucks but you have to develop a habit of loving it.

It’s really ironical that in an era with plethora of mediums available to keep us close, we are lonelier than ever. We have facebook account but no one cares what’s on our mind, we have skype but unless one is committed there is not much benefit of it, whatsapp, twitter , hike, etc all are of no use because after a particular point you lost the will to go there and talk to some one. Call rates are very low still rarely your phone rings and you get a call from some long lost friend, most of the time it’s just some random girl named Neha who wants you to buy a credit card, loan or insurance or forcing you to switch to postpaid. With the downfall of SMS, the era of staying in touch by random forwarded messages has also ended. Your whatsapp groups annoy you so you have kept them mute for an year. The only compulsory communication you do is with your family, because if you are living outside then you have to give them proof time to time that you are alive.

So what really changed in life ? After college ends, people just lose the will to stay in touch with their friends or nothing has changed but as we are not with any of the familiar faces, we just feel lonely ? Often I hear people complaining about how pathetic their life is and how they are taken for granted, mistreated by the world, and their friends have made new friends and have moved on. Often I hear ( or felt myself ) how priorities of people changes in life and your importance become less and less day by day . Well, the bitter truth is, college is over or will get over soon for many. It’s a moving world,  you can’t keep on crying for the same thing and neither you can make someone realize your worth again and again. Some people are like this only, their emotions are temporary and so are their promises, applicable only at a certain phase of your life and you have to accept it.

Even if people are still close to you, may be there life is not the same as it was. People met new people, people starts liking those new people, suddenly you are no longer the top priority of your friends. Boys get girlfriends, girls get boyfriend, and those who are ‘just friend’ get nothing but loneliness. For some people life remains same, only the person changes, your friends might be hanging out at the same place but with someone else and not you and you are suppose to be understanding. Your late night chats are replaced by their dear one, and either you get a late reply or no reply at all. That’s life, love can make people close and away at the same time.

You have to accept it that there is no point in making your mood a function of other’s action. You have to accept that people will move on, find new friends and at the same time no one is stopping you to do the same. You might be lonely only because you were knocking old doors for such a long time that you didn’t realize you yourself were closing your doors for a long time. You have to take some initiative to join both the broken links and make new links. You can’t sulk alone all the time, you have to do something and if you are afraid or too tired to take initiatives then best thing, enjoy being alone and do not feel lonely.

In pursuit of happiness from others, we often torture the one person that stays with us forever and will always be and that is, ourselves. We rarely think about our own life, our dreams, our interest, our hobbies, the things that make us happy, the things that can make our own life more interesting . We never crave for our own betterment. We never follow things that can improve our life 10 folds. We never read, write or watch something worth watching. We do not travel alone or eat alone or go somewhere where there is no one except ourselves. There is no point in smothering ourselves in the crowd, better escape out from the world and enjoy staying with oneself.

This idea might look a bit absurd but the truth is that the more time you spend with yourself the lesser you will crave for company of others. It’s more or less a mental self dependence. You won’t feel the need of others and you won’t feel sad when people are ignoring you or insulting you. It’s good to stay out of the loop and just watch things happening instead of becoming a part of them. So, this weekend, buy a good book and read it all, or watch a good movie alone, google a good nearby place and travel their alone, or if you are too lazy, then just go to your roof top, sit silently and watch the beautiful sky and just try to remember all the beautiful things that has happened in your life. Learn to live alone, don’t feel lonely, because you are not alone. 

To all the busy ones

Well, it’s ironical I am writing a post for the busy ones and I doubt they would ever read it, after all they have a very busy and tight schedule, they hardly have time to breathe let alone reading a post by a not so famous writer. One of the most emotional lie people say during the end of school/college/job is that they would stay in touch anyhow, no matter what it will take, and if not then also they will at least try. It looks very convincing and may be some people really mean it. But, sadly in most of the cases, whenever a person moves to a new place, barring a few exceptional cases, he/she generally moves on from the old life and get accustomed to new place and new people. Circle of life, there is always a replacement, nothing is permanent.

Those of you who are reading this might have promised someone to stay in touch but you didn’t bother or you might have been promised the same by someone but they also didn’t. One has numerous valid excuses to justify their insensitivity, very well formed almost undebatable logic of why they couldn’t talk for even 5 mins. You can’t argue else you would get the tag of demanding and not an understanding person. People say, that a relation doesn’t require regular touch, the feelings matter even if you talk after years, the relation would remain intact if it’s a strong one. I don’t fully agree with this point, why to talk after years or months ? What is stopping you to get in touch once in a while ? Back in old days, people used to write letters to each other once in a while just to stay in touch and now in this era of whatsapp/facebook/skype it’s hard to imagine people not even finding 5 mins.

And yes, if both parties are mutually not talking to each other in months and catch up later, there is no problem. But, what if one party is trying to catch up again and again and the other party keep on saying that they are busy. One can understand once, even twice, thrice at most, but I don’t think even Bill Gates or Christopher Nolan would be that much busy that they can’t reply once in a while. So, if we circle around we would get back to the golden quote again, “ there is nothing such as being busy, it’s all about priorities”. You might be a priority for someone in the past, but you may not as they have moved on. So what’s the problem, the other party has moved on , you can move on too, but there lies the catch.

If you try to move on , you are first blamed for not understanding the problems of other person and having a big big ego, who left their friends behind. What kind of single sided relations we are having today, only god knows? Where you can neither talk or stop to talk as either you are disturbing or once again you are disturbing. Eventually, you would end up apologising to the other person as you have hurt him/her by your silly behaviour and once again the saga of being busy will start where you would always be on the getting neglected, ignored and insulted end.

It’s interesting that the applications that were suppose to bring people more closer like facebook, whatsapp etc are further inducing the feeling of loneliness in people. Everything we do is to catch the attention of other person and we are disappointed if we do not get much attention. Also, a sense of negligence is introduced when we try to talk to some person who constantly ignores us. Block the other person on facebook/whatsapp these days is regarded as a closure signal for the relation. Whatsapp seems to be further liking this conflict and has introduced ‘blue ticks’ now, so now we can openly trace who is not at all interested in talking to us and is indirectly signallying us to stay away. But, the problem is people appears in your life according to their convenience. If they want to talk or have some work then suddenly they will have ample amount of time to discuss whatever is going in their life and then they will vanish again. People have time to change their DPs and status daily, to post random pictures and videos, but no they don’t even have the time to reply that they can’t talk right now. Time is indeed a very strange entity, and so is its distribution by busy people.

It’s not a post of personal frustration, I am hardly affected by presence or absence of people around me after a while but what I am seeing is relations getting breaking up without any solid reason. People complaining to be alone and abandoned by all at the same time when they themselves never responded back to people nicely at the first place. We all have 24 hours, we can cut 10 mins easily from may be sleeping, or wasting time in other useless activity or any other thing just to get in touch with our oldies and besties. 5-10 mins is no big deal at all specially if you value a person or if you value a relation you have with a person.

So busy people, at the crucial moments of your life, your grades may not matter much,  neither the effort you put at your job, but only people will matter the most because that’s how human society work and if you are not putting any effort in being social then slowly you will lose all the treasure you accumulated once. Perhaps some year later may be on one dark alone night you will sit on your rooftop gazing the stars and remembering your past, all you will remember will be how you bunked classes to watch movies or hang out with friends, the little chit chats you had with your group, the small things that mattered the most and may be you will automatically dial the number of some old one and that feeling would be way better than sitting empty handed with a decorated degree and a fat pay check. There are things, which are so small yet very important, things we never value and never recognize their worth, until it's too late to recognize the worth. There should always be a proper balance between various aspects of life, if you focus solely on few things then on a longer run you would surely get negatively affected by it. So, open your contact list and ping someone you haven’t talked in a long time and I am sure it will surely bring a smile on your face.

Seculars and Sickulars ... !!

Though I refrain from writing about anything sensitive these days because usually my remarks result in lots of controversy but still I couldn’t resist from writing on this topic after watching so much hypocrisy of seculars these days. You can find seculars almost everywhere, they could be found with a very frustrated and annoyed look on a TV channel giving some high level knowledge about secularism and religious harmony or you can find them on any social networking site commenting on this issue with a very standard vocabulary and other high standard remarks. They try their level best to show their superiority by completely disrespecting and neglecting the religion they belong to and proving every other person who follows the rule of their religion inferior, stupid and blind.

At the core level, seculars are becoming as much trouble giving as the communal and if I observe people around me, I don’t think they belong to either category. Basically, no person is bothered about either being a secular or a communal; everyone silently follows their religion and even participates in functions of every other religion. We all are joined by only one bond and that is us being a normal citizen of a country who has to either go to school or college, or we have to go to our work station for work and as such there is very little time to invest on thinking about our religion and what is happening to it unless some communalistic person aggravates us or there is a high profile media show involving both the communal and seculars, that is the only time where we pay a little attention to this thing but the very next day we become normal again.

Society is indeed a cluster of people belonging to different religion who have very less time to think about their belief, most of us are stuck in thinking about our grades or our promotion or our shop or our duties. All Hindus wish their Muslim friends on eid and even visit their home for eating ‘seviyaas’ and ‘biryani’ while all the Muslims equally celebrate major Hindu festivals like Diwali, Rakhi, Holi etc. There exist not even a single visible boundary and all respects others religions while following their own. All the Hindus visit the dargaah of Salim Chishti and Moinuddin Chishti, and all the Muslims also equally visit the holy places of Hindus and other religion.

At the ground level, both the communities co-exist  peacefully and rarely there is any discussion about religion. School, colleges, offices etc vanishes all the communal and cultural differences and everyone is just a student or an employee, not Hindu or Muslim or some other religion. But, as they say, even excess of education corrupts you and it happens with the minds of higher intellectuals. Just to criticize the tensions that happen due to religion, they start criticizing the whole religion and the concept of religion. They show their moral superiority by claiming that they believe the world to be a self running machine that can be fully explained by science and they do not believe in any divine power.

Extreme end of both is faulty, the moral policing of the extremist and the hypocrisy of seculars. No religion should be allowed to decide what is one wearing, what is one doing and how is one doing and also no secular should be allowed to comment on people who are following the rules of their religion. If someone is bursting crackers on diwali, let them as one day of crackers cause nigligible pollution in comparison to the pollution we create via our factories, AC, Fridge, vehicles etc. If someone wants to play holi with water, let them, saving 1 bucket of water in America won’t do any help to the water driven states of Africa, there is no need of arousing emotions just for the sake of it and also there is no need to compromise on one’s joy just because someone else is unhappy in some other part of the world. If a particular religion allows eating non vegetarian then let them eat, it shouldn’t affect you, and there is no point in showing your supremacy over them just because you are supposedly following a non violent tradition and they are doing violence.

In the recent era, I have seen many people commenting on how old fashion religions are and they apply the same old logic, that any religion who exists in majority always try to dominate the other ones who are in minorities. If I talk about India, then as Hindus form the majority, they are often and often targeted and what I don’t like is that just because some people have the freedom to speak they are really misusing it by forcefully carrying the entire Hindu religion again and again in the witness box.

If we are having a ‘tilak’ on our forehead that doesn’t mean we are showing off the power of our religion, if our respected prime minister refuses to wear a cap offered by a religious leader then that is his personal choice, that doesn’t mean disrespect to any other religion, surely there would be some person from any other religion who would deny a ‘tilak’ on their head, and all in all that’s just a matter of choice, you can’t blame a person to be extremist for that. If someone is spending money in doing a pilgrimage or in some pooja or something then there is no need for bring morality that this money could have been spent in a better way, after all it’s that persons choice how he want to spend his money, the money that he earned, why to make him feel guilty by saying he is not helping the poor and wasting money on futile things.

What’s wrong would be forceful constrains imposed due to religion or I should better say misinterpretation and selfish ignorant modification of religion, if you are beating people on valentine day saying you are protecting your culture then you are extreme fundamentalist, if you are deciding rules and regulation on with whom one should marry and with whom one shouldn’t and what one should wear and what one shouldn’t then again, you are extreme fundamentalist, a religion would remain a way to live life and never a way to control life and people should be free to live in any way they want to live.

Sickulars can’t stop us for visiting temples, for dancing in garbas, for playing holi, for eating seviyaas and sheer khurma, for giving gifts on Christmas and the so called cultural savers can’t stop us from celebrating valentine day or wearing whatever we want to wear. Both seculars and communals need to go through all the religious scriptures once, as I am sure they have never read it properly, understood its meaning properly and then comment instead of making useless rules and harsh remarks on anything.

Even if you are an atheist, then remain one, no one is compelling you to follow any religion, but don’t try to boast if off and hurt any other persons sentiments, logic is on its side but at times there are few things which logic can’t solve and where logic has nothing to do with, reasoning become absurd, practicality is unrealistic, so it would be appropriate to respect the difference in beliefs and not to hurt someone’s sentiments. Sickulars also shouldn’t pass any inappropriate comment if a person is following the trends of his religion and tag anyone as fanatic and fundamentalist just because they are unwilling to mix up with the tradition of some other religion. One could still respect every religion even if he isn't following all of them so it would be better not to tag anyone extremist just because they are not as flexible as others are.

Let us stay human, let us live and let live, let us enjoy and celebrate, and let us not judge others life by our eyes ! 

The opposite window..... !!

It wasn’t very long since I shifted in this new flat. It was very spacey and airy situated on the 13^th floor of a large multi story building in a very posh and beautiful society. Though the rent was a bit expensive but it was totally worth it, living in a lavish flat has its own advantages, at least it provides peace of mind and a certain class to your life style. As it happens in every big city, finding a single accommodation is quite hectic, unreasonable and very costly so bachelors generally tend to live on a sharing basis.

People switch their accommodation very fast here so no one quite knows the history of their current residence, who lived here and for how much time, people don’t even know their neighbours and barely there is anyone to gossip about the surroundings. People prefer to live quietly and peacefully in their apartment completely ignoring the existence of any other person sharing the same floor. I never understand the weird look which my neighbour used to throw on me on every encounter; it was a mixed expression of puzzled look with a hint of horror.

I had become quite fond of the silence that always persisted in the flat, which was occasionally broken by the soothing wind that used to fill it entirely and completely change the surroundings for a while. There were occasional sounds coming from unknown origin but I never bothered about them. In the morning there were very loud thumping sound some times, which I always somehow ended up relating with the pigeons which use to make a lot of noise, those sounds indeed broke my peaceful sleep many times and I ended up cursing those stupid pigeons.

But the most noticeable thing was the window just next to my window. All buildings of every society have almost the same structure, so my window used to face the window of the next building. For the first few days it was always covered with curtains so I never knew what’s happening on the other side but I was quite surprised the day the curtains were lifted. It was a very funny incident, whenever I used to look outside I could sense some motion, I thought a guy is living there. One day, when I was changing my t shirt I thought someone is watching me, I was shocked but then I realize that I was watching my own reflection. When the curtains were lifted, all the time I was watching my own reflection and I laughed at my absence of mind, so who stayed at the other side remained a mystery.

I had a haircut and shaving today, it was good to switch to being civilized and leaving the rock star look although the beard and long hair gives a ‘I am working very hard and immersed in my work’ kind of feeling. I came back to my flat late in the evening when it was completely dark and I had no intention to turn on the light. I looked outside and find my reflection in the window again. Suddenly I was filled with complete shock and horror and transfixed to my place; the reflection was still having long hairs and beard. I looked at it and see the color of eyes slowly changing to dark red and the reflection giving me the most terrorizing smile I had ever seen. The darkness in the room was increasing, the sounds of the morning were coming back but this time they were much more louder and scarier, I turned and suddenly my sight switched to the mirror where I can see my reflection still with red eyes, long hairs and a beard with the same smile and the last thing I remember was his eyes sparkling with dark red color and a loud laughing sound that was coming from everywhere.

To all those who hate me ....

Dear haters,

Greetings from my side and a warm welcome!!

I would have preferred a one on one conversation but as it is most unlikely to happen, I thought to address all of you in a single post. First of all, I congratulate the founders who have taken great efforts and hard work to reach such a massive numbers. I appreciate the time you have invested in promoting the brand ‘ bad Mayank ‘, the sheer amount of hours you have put on talking about me, spreading awareness and making sure that even the remotest corner knows the bad deeds of Mayank Sharma. I really wonder, if you have investment the same amount in your own betterment where you all would have reached. So a big thanks from my side, there is a dialogue from the movie ‘American Beauty’ that there is nothing worse than being ordinary, with due thanks to you people I never remained ordinary and that is really a big thing for a person like me for whom identity matters a lot.

Secondly, I would like to discuss a few questions with you though I am not expecting any replies but still I would like to do my part. I agree if you hate me there would be surely a very strong reason for that else it would be just insane to hate any person without a proper reason. May be I have harmed you in some way or maybe you just have heard the prospects of me bringing harm to you and you decided to hate me. I understand that so I would like to raise a question. How many of you I have harmed directly? How many of you are sure about my involvement in a harm that was brought on you? If you have heard I have harmed some person and you started blindly trusting that how many of you bothered to enquire about it at least once? How many of you declared me accused of something you heard I did without even thinking once about other possibilities?

I do agree I might have offended some of you in some way but it was never intentional. May be I was not knowing the context and said something which had deeply hurt you, or maybe I was not at all aware about the things you were fighting with and took things in lightly which I shouldn’t have. I have my flaws and at times there is only a single culprit i.e. situations. Still, instead of remaining silent you could have cleared up things with me, all it required was to tell me that you didn’t like this and I would have tried to not repeat the things that had affected you. How would I know what was offending and hurting you and what was not? What good it brought to both you and me by staying silent, making conclusions in your own head, developing random theories, discussing things with a third person and condemning me. All it required was a little feedback from your side and things might have worked out but still to all those who were hurt by any of my comment, my gesture, something they heard I said, something they heard I did, my sincere apologies, I never meant It and if you would discuss the issue with me I promise never to repeat those mistakes again. I agree I am a fallible guy but I expect you to play the role of bigger person and forgive me for my sins as you must have forgiven other people and must have been forgiven by someone else you hurt.

But if you hate me only because you thought I snatched an opportunity or a person from you. I made it to somewhere which you thought you deserve. Someone by whom you wanted to be praised was praising me or someone with whom you wanted to befriend was a good friend of me, then I can’t help it. Just to match the level, I can’t bring myself down and I don’t expect you to raise your level either. Life is not a competition where we fight for people. I won’t even say the best one deserves the prize as there were times when despite being the best one I lost. I have faced far bitter defeats than you have but I didn’t sulk or started hating people just because I lost. I respect my defeats and I respect myself for the healthy competition I maintained and giving the best I could to win something. Life is a learning not a race. You lose just because you learn experience to win in a bigger race. There would always be victory and defeats but once you lose a person then you lose it, the person that returns after a patch up is never the same that he was, so never lose a person on petty and stupid things. Also, I am not responsible for your failures, in fact no one can be responsible for any other person’s failure, if you failed then either you were wrongly judged or the reason was you and only you, not me. No one has any right to point their figure at me because of their failures; I didn’t sign a contract with anyone to get them through every situation. I help because I like to help, but helping others is not my duty where you can blame me for disappointing you. Never take a person for granted, strange world we live in, people stay on good terms with the fakers and betrayers, but the person who helped you 100 times on cost of his own comfort and progress fails to do so 1 time then he is blamed and made a culprit forever. Getting punished for doing goods is something I learned lately because some people accuse you of giving them expectations when they never asked any help from you and then not helping the next time.

Besides, I am much thankful to people who never let me felt bad about myself. There were times when I literally felt very low and bad because of the way my personal life was made a source of public entertainment but there were some people who always believed in me more than I believe in myself. Luckily my life is like TCS recruitment, there is always an extra addition in the people who consider me good in comparison to those who consider me bad. There are times when I think about completely leaving the social life and to live an isolated aloof and alone life but then these people remind me that I shouldn’t punish all due to crime of some and I shouldn’t punish myself too.

In the past few days, I have met many people who told me that they have heard lots of bad things about me but once they came to know me they realized that they were wrong in judging me beforehand without meeting me. Sometimes I do feel the way I am described behind my back, I am more frightening than lord Voldemort, who knows they won’t even use my name, I am “ he who must not be named” the ultimate villain. I am glad those who came to know me forgave me for the sins I have not done and those who already knew me always made be aware of the things that are running behind my back.

But, what I can’t understand is, we have entered a new phase of our life. A phase which might act as a pillar to our future. What’s the point in random gossiping, blaming, abusing and accusing, why to waste our precious little time in things so petty and which won’t generate any productivity at all? How could people waste their time in such lame things and feel good about it? Lastly, I hate the hypocrisy. If you hate me, then hate me like a man, let me know that you hate me and I would respect you for that. Don’t try to act smart and disguise yourself as my friend and bitch about some other one in front of me? You think I don’t know the names and acts of all the people who are running the ‘Mayank awareness program’ behind my back. But, thanks to all haters, who because of some reason revealed one another’s name and acts and at least I know from whom I should stay away.

There are people who after years of bad mouthing come to me, say sorry and say we were wrong about you, we were immature and we hope you would forgive us. Can you undo the damage you have already done? Because of you and your temporary emotional immature outburst, 10 other people dislike me without any reason and now you expect us to be nice friends just because you admit your fault. There are people who hate me because they think I am just a showoff, even my facebook statuses and blogs look a show off to them. I really had a nice laugh when I see them posting pictures about their new college or new car or putting status about their first salary or getting any other achievement. If you are doing it then you are sharing things with your friends, if I am doing it then I am show off, great logic. If you are posting a poem or a song sung by you, you are sharing your talents and getting acknowledged, if I am doing that then I am trying to prove all other lesser and myself better . I am not the reason the world treated you inferior, it was always you, you made and allowed the world to treat you as inferior. I was always the small town guy, weak in communications and even grammar, I just made my way because I fought, I learned and I improved myself instead of crying every time that the world doesn’t accept me for what I am and it is being unfair to me. It takes courage to stand up and not to cry, it takes strength to stay normal and act calm when your world is falling apart and your soul is getting torn into pieced. You cried every time for your weakness, earned the world’s sympathy and bragging everywhere now about your small achievements and if I stay strong and stay normal then I am just faking strength, I couldn’t be more amused by these logics.

If I have hurt you intentionally and made fun of you for the sake of being a sadist you have full right to hate me and even propagate it. But if you hate me just because you tried to make fun of me and I just defended myself smartly and your plan backfired or you don’t like me putting status or writing a blog or you don’t like me taking some initiative to improve myself as a person and getting praised for it or you hate me just because other people love me or you hate me because it’s a fashion and it’s really cool to hate Mayank and your friends hate me so you also want to join the party, then I have nothing but sympathy for you. Grow up and be mature and I hope one day the world will treat you better. I am not responsible for anyone’s failure or frustration. In Schendler’s List, Schendler tell Amon Goeth that the real power lies not in punishing but in forgiving so I have no intention to take vengeance of whatever bad that has been brought on me but if I have to then I would defend myself and I won’t follow any diplomacy or silence that time.

How many of you know me in general? How many of you have talked to me even for even an hour once? How many of you know my struggles and the challenge I face in life? I am literally proud that I could be of any service to you and could be used as a permanent feature of social entertainment. I am proud by blaming and accusing me, you made your entry into some groups and get huge respect because you hated me the most and tried to humiliate me behind my back in the best manner possible. I am glad that my image could be used to cover your own weakness and drawback and lastly I am glad because of me many who had differences shared a common platform and get united. But do think once that what did you earn? I know many hates me but those who loves love me intensely and had blind trust on me. Even if due to some reasons I stop talking to them they would stay loyal. Do you have any such people with you? How many of your friends would stay loyal to you just in case you are villain zoned by someone as I was by you?

 I know my limits and I know I am not a perfect person. I try to be the best I can. I have been declared both, angel and demon. People have compared me with god and satan. Some says I am the best that has ever happened with them, some says I am the worst that has ever happened with them. Some say I am too nice so I am targeted, some says I have many faults so I am targeted. I don’t know neither I want to know. Social life is just an aspect of my life; I have many things to be bother about. I have no interest in what others are talking, saying or discussing behind my back neither I have any interest in what is happening in others life. I don’t like gossiping or telling something behind someone’s back and neither do I care when my name is dragged in some issues. If people want to hate me they would eventually however nice I may appear to them and if they want to love me then they would no matter if I act as jerk. I am proud of the brutal honesty I live with; I don’t fake or wear any mask just to please someone. If you can deal with it then it’s fine else it’s better to remain at a safer distance with each other and without throwing mud on each other. The time we spend on making dirty someone’s life could be well spent on cleaning ours.

In the end, a special thanks to all those who have defended me in my absence, who remained loyal, who left their diplomacy to some extent just to fight for me. Special thanks to those also who despite being in good terms with their so called friends trusted my maturity and told me everything that always goes on behind the scene. And haters, I promise you I would try to live up to your expectations, even if I want to feel ordinary, you won’t let me, you won’t accept me as a normal guy in your community, so be it. I would try to work hard, work different, work smart and be in the league that is universally hated. Thank you, you all are the biggest motivators, you constantly push me to keep on learning and moving ahead and with all your help and motivation, I hope one day I would reach sky heights so that you can hate me more forever.

PS: I know even this post would be misinterpreted and would be seen as flamboyancy or emotional outburst but I would humbly request try to look out at the positive aspects instead of seeking another reason to initiate a war( of course behind my back).

STOP PROCRASTINATING, START DOING !

How often it happens with you that you make a very nice plan in details about learning something but you do not even complete 10% of what you planned? You make a schedule or a timetable and try really hard to stick to it but can never follow it for more than 3 or 4 days. You screw up the beginning of your activity and just because of it you are not able to complete what you started. You keep on thinking that you are not in right mood or not in the proper mental state and keep promising yourself that from tomorrow onwards you would definitely start but that tomorrow never comes. You plan for jogging in the early morning but you never wake up or even if you do, you are not able to go for more than 3 days and keep on thinking that you are tired today or it’s raining outside and you would go tomorrow. You never hit the gym, you didn’t learn the language you thought of learning years back, you have pending assignments and homework, your preparation for any exam is lagging behind by a great amount and still you are not able to start. If you suffer from all this, then like me and like most of the human beings you are also a procrastinator.

To err is human and to procrastinate is for sure human, because an animal never thought of going to hunting the next day and sit today, doing nothing because he is not in mood. Telling a procrastinator to develop a routine and sticking to it is like telling a chain smoker not to smoke or disconnecting internet connection of a Facebook addict, some things are not possible because they are not just bad habits or lack of determination, they have deeper psychological roots and require hell lot of efforts for any improvement rather than mere words. We really enjoy the planning phase; it is so much fun to gradually imagine all the improvements we will have once we will start following our plans. We stay so much energetic and optimistic and we are so sure that we are going to follow all the plans, it gives us a very genuine kind of happiness when we create an outstanding plan for a task but not for once we think that what are the odds of us following that plan.  

Procrastination is one thing in which we are naturally expert, but I guess the worst effect it has is not the fact that we failed to complete something important but the guilt of it. We all feel bad if because of our own laziness we are unable to finish something, we feel really guilty and that guilt traps us into a vicious circle. I was reading this article where it described the procrastination loop. The steps were pretty easy. We plan to do something but we think that our mood is not good right now and we should wait for some time to get the proper physical and mental power to complete that task, the wait never gets over and this further screw up our mood as we aren’t able to do what we planned and as our mood is bad we can’t start the task and we keep on forcing it on tomorrow.

If we plan to study till 2 AM and feel really tired at 1 AM then we think that perhaps I should sleep now and wake up an hour early to study and as I would have better focus in the morning it would yield better result. But we aren’t able to wake up early in the morning and we keep on thinking about the 1 hour loss that happened because of our laziness and we aren’t able to study for the whole day thinking about that 1 hour. This scenario can be generalized to any other thing not only study. So, we can easily see the problem is not only the habit but also the inability to tackle the guiltiness properly and letting it hamper our next day tasks and plans.  

So, what’s the solution? Interestingly, I have written on the same topic 4 years ago and I don’t think I quite followed what I thought back then. http://mayankviews.blogspot.in/2010/11/kal-se-pakka.html.

Anyway, I guess we underestimate the problem of procrastination as a personal weakness and it keep on haunting our life, making us sad and guilty for no reason and affect our performance. Even right now, I thought of finishing this article at 9 PM and I am far behind my schedule but anyway I am happy that I am not procrastinating the blogging anymore. I am far more active then what I used to be, but only for the English blog, I keep on delaying the posts for Hindi blog and it’s been 2 years almost I have updated it, the posts are getting piled up inside my head but I am yet to give them any shape on the paper. I tried to create a generalized plan and I hope it would help not only me but all of you, fingers crossed people, let’s hope for the best.

1)      First thing, always make a goal that is practically feasible. If you haven’t touched your book for ages then you can’t suddenly start studying for 10 hours a day. If you are not exercising then you can’t do 50 pushups in a day. The primary reason for procrastination is that we set up our goals too high when we make the plan but when it comes to following it, we are daunted by the unrealistic odds and keep on delaying it. So better, make a plan that gradually increases the efforts and that is realistic and doable. At the end of the day, fancy figures won’t help you if you are not putting any efforts and keep procrastinating with the thought that one day I would study this much or exercise that much.

2)      Always keep a margin for uncertainty. You may have to do some assignment at college, or some guest might come, or you have to stay late at office, there might be some social function you got to attend, or you are sick. There are multiple reasons that might prove big hurdles in your plan , so better keep a margin for them also instead of regretting that you wasted lot of time in that issue.

3)      If you are planning to do something, do it now, there is no such thing called proper time. No your focus won’t improve if you will sleep, your coffee might not help you, talking to a friend won’t improve your mood and you would suddenly start working hard. Don’t delay the work for lame excuses, your brain has become an expertise in tricking you and deviating you from the right path. It would always tempt you to listen to 1 song or watch an episode of FRIENDS before studying, a half hour nap before exercise, accessing the facebook once before start working. Don’t listen to it, your brain is a trickster, it would keep on making your hopes high and stab you in disguise. Be very cruel to yourself and start doing whatever you are supposed to do without any deviation.

4)      Instead of a daily schedule, make weekly goals and plans and try to distribute your time accordingly to finish all those tasks in a week. A daily schedule is very hard to stick to because there are various uncertainties in life but if you are determined you can easily distribute your entire tasks wisely and adjust for daily losses or gains and finish the tasks in a week.

5)      If you are preparing for an examination, or hoping for a healthy body, or trying to learn a new language, the best motivation is self motivation. Try to think about the scenario of the end result for 5 minutes before starting, it will surely boost your moral when you will see yourself without a tummy, or as a student of your dream college or company or speaking a new language and impressing others. This 5 minute process can surely motivate you enough to go for hours.

6)      Don’t be unreasonably harsh on yourself in the beginning or for catching up if you are behind the schedule. You can’t start on with 100% efficiency, starting should always be slow and focused rather then forced efforts and if you are lagging behind many days, you can’t cover up by giving efforts for 12 hours a day, it is unrealistic approach, you would exhaust yourself soon and quit forever. Don’t panic, just increase the daily quote of hours by 20 to 25% and give yourself proper time to get back on the track.

7)      I am not saying to abandon social networking but if your task is high priority and time is less, reducing the frequency to once or twice a day if you spent a lot of time on these things would help a lot. It would keep your mind really refreshed without any deviation and you can focus properly.

8)      Try to maintain a routine; especially for the bed time and wake up time with at most half hour uncertainties, it would really keep your mind in a far focused state than an ad hoc random routine where you yourself don’t even know what you are going to do in the next half hour.

9)      Take breaks at proper interval daily, weekly, monthly to recharge and refresh your stamina. You are not a machine and even machine needs oiling. If you stuck in a routine it would result in boredom and you would start procrastinating again and you won’t even enjoy that non productive phase so better have a pre plan for enjoyment.

10)   Lastly, try to focus more on consistency then concentration, efficiency than hourly efforts, retention than learning a lot and proper revision than aimlessly moving forward. Learn to forgive yourself, if you are not able to follow your plans no point in reproaching and accusing yourself and thinking that while others are studying/working I am wasting my time. No one runs on 100% efficiency and no one is that much dedicated or always motivated. Everyone has issues, so do you, forgive yourself, pat on your back, and start from where you left at the last point instead of planning again.

All the best people, I promise you all that I would definitely stick to my plans and won’t procrastinate and I hope you would do the same. Stop procrastinating, start doing !

PLACEMENT EXPERIENCE 3: The dreams ( Adobe and Amdocs)

Let’s continue from where we left in the previous post. Just a week after day zero, I was to appear in the CMAT examination but I couldn’t because of some health issues and which effectively halted my MBA preparation. Although I did appear in other 3 exams, I appeared in all MBA entrance on my instinct, got very miserable score in CAT which might be because of my own inability or as some people say because of CAT 2013 discrepancy and the normalization problem, failed to clear IIFT entrance by 1 mark, but finally ended on a good note by scoring 96.56 percentile in XAT. I didn’t apply for any colleges though because by then I was pretty tired of all these and had no motivation left for any kind of new preparation specially travelling throughout the country for interviews, also I find something missing or lacking, don’t know what it was still it didn’t seem like a perfect time.

I had a really nice time in January and February, January was Accenture training so it was a bit hectic still it was enjoyable and February I focused on things I always wanted to do. I did freelancing projects, read many novels, wrote many poems, and most of all what I always wanted to do , I did nothing, just rested, watched FRIENDS again and let the thoughts ran freely in my mind but took no action. Taking rest once a while is really good, really recharges you.

So now let us come back to our topic. The dream companies, dream company is one where you are allowed to sit despite having other placement offers. Generally, if you are placed in any company then you won’t be allowed to sit in any other company as it would be unfair for both the company and for those students who are yet to be placed but still dream companies give a comparatively higher package and take significantly lesser number of people based on very rigorous process, hence everyone prepares for dream companies properly.

I had the privilege to appear in 2 companies, adobe and Amdocs. I cleared the latter one, but failed in the former one. Let’s start with Adobe, though you might only be using only the free products of Adobe like flash player, shockwave, reader etc but yes Adobe had a significantly large number of licensed products and as such is a very nice company to start your career with, it gives significantly high package and other perks and also life and work culture at adobe is different from mass recruiters. Adobe generally used to come around September in my college, but after lots of confusion whether it will be coming or not it finally came in the last week of March.

ADOBE:

Adobe gave us lots of shock. The written test kept on preopening and in fact there were few people who failed to come back in the town and weren’t able to sit in test. It happened much early then the original date and most of us weren’t done with their preparation by then so it’s always better to take some uncertainty factor into account for tests date, things may get pre-pone or postpone. The test contained 4 sections, 2 were of analytical ability and quantitative ability, third one was technical, these 3 were objective the final section was subjective with 4 c/c++ question where you are suppose to do coding.

The questions weren’t tough, aptitude question were more of paragraph type question rather than being single question type. Technical questions were usual, finding the error or determining the output or whether the program will execute or give compilation error. The 4 theoretical questions were also very basic like generating a random number between a specific range, program for matrix multiplication, conversion of binary into decimal etc. Due to some reason Adobe didn’t change the question for the next batch and all the questions were same. People say only 2 people were selected from 1^st batch and 18^th from the second, I was in the first batch.

Anyway, so my journey ended in the first round but I was there throughout the interview processes of other candidates just to support some friends and as I have already said that even if you don’t get selected you should be there in the other rounds just to get the experience. Anyway, the interviews are much more rigorous and far tougher than any other company. Interview last for more than 1 hour, there are three or four rounds. Some people were rejected after 2 rounds (1 tech and 1 HR) and rest few had an extra or 2 extra technical rounds. Adobe asks different type of questions like how much total memory MS word consumes while running, difference between 32 bit and 64 bit system, difference between FAT and NTFS, logical puzzles, pattern generation program, questions related to JVM etc various programs of which you have to give an efficient answer so better brush up your C/C++ skills and coding skills if you are appearing for adobe interview.  Adobe selected only 3 candidates from our college and at the same day GATE results were announced too which further enhanced the gloomy atmosphere, I tried to cheer my friends up by this poem.

http://kaahiankaahi.blogspot.in/2014/08/blog-post.html

AMDOCS:

Anyway, in less than a week we were supposed to sit for AMDOCS written test. Not much people has the strength and well power left to prepare for it, many didn’t appear and those who did just come without any preparation like me. Amdocs written has 5 sections, quant + some passage round + technical language + programming round + SQL and Unix. Written is followed by 2 interviews, technical and HR and all the 3 rounds are elimination rounds.

First round was easy, I attempted initial 3 sections nicely but the 2 programs that I had to solve were very tough, I had no idea and I wasn’t able to write anything productive at all. Both, SQL and UNIX were never my favorite subject, I had zilch knowledge of Unix and very basic knowledge of SQL, so I attempted this round mostly by common sense and elimination method. As I knew both my programs were wrong so I wasn’t expecting to clear written but I did, guess there weren’t sectional cut off here so it’s always a nice feeling to clear a test when you are not at all expecting to clear it. Even if you are not knowing anything about question still instead of random guesses, look for some hits and apply a little common sense, you would definitely be able to solve few questions.

The interview were postponed again and happened almost 2 weeks after written test between our final exams just a day after control system paper. Barring some few very studious highly sincere no life people every CS guy has screwed the paper so again tired by the exam studies we don’t have much stamina to prepare for interview. As Unix and SQL plays an important part in Amdocs and I wasn’t having much time to prepare them I downloaded lots of videos and PPT, watch them throughout the night and made a word document to revise all the commands and theoretical concepts so that I can revise it on the interview day. Transiting to PPTs and videos is always a good option if you don’t have enough time for preparation and it’s actually a nice way to learn.

The technical interview started with programming only. I was asked to make 3 programs, to find length of a string, to reverse a string and to check whether a string is palindrome or not. Rest followed by simple SQL questions like JOINs and all and lastly a few basic UNIX commands. The HR round mostly focused on whether you would be flexible enough to work on a 24*7 schedule ( Yes I am facing that now :P ) and she was quite impressed by my role in the college level startup I was part of, so yes having a diversified profile indeed helps, rest it was just normal question. Others follow the same league, simple programs + basic HR questions. A few people who were the high scorer in the written test, their interviews were taken by a director, rest of us have our interviews by managers. My interview ended around 1 PM, we waited around 11 PM before the results were announced. I got in along with 26 other candidates, my joining was on 26^th May, and since then I am having my new life at Amdocs. Quite different work culture here with lots of free and subsidized food which is very nice. Free snacks, sandwiches and fruits twice a day. Flexible working hours, no formals, access to all the social networking sites. So new life, new adventures, new experiments, new challenges, it’s a new world it’s a new start.

That was it from the placement side; I hope you enjoyed all the posts. All the best to everyone who is appearing for recruitment processes. Always remember, no recruitment process can tell your potential or judge you correctly so never be down because of few failures, it’s a big world , just look for the perfect place you will fit in, keep trying and you will definitely make it to somewhere really nice in your life. 

PLACEMENT EXPERIENCE 2: The mass recruiters ( Accenture, Infosys, Wipro)

Last year, almost at the same time, I had a lot to thought to. I had to continue my MBA entrance preparation, I didn’t have any job offers yet and by looking at the way I was rejected on both occasions I had a lot to ponder over. Day zero was approaching soon, where you are allowed to sit in multiple companies. In my case, I had to try my luck in Accenture, Infosys, and Wipro. It was a tough time, dilemmas were hard and there was always a state of conflict in mind for which way to choose. On one hand, I could have continued with my MBA preparation and relied solely on luck for day zero, on the other I could have devoted few precious and crucial moments from my MBA preparation time to day zero preparation. Finally I decided to go for more secure option and prepare for day zero first, as it would be ok not to get into a good b school but getting out unemployed would be far tougher.

I was planning to devise a strategy that could work for both the MBA preparation and placements and I guess I planned for more than 20 days and ended up with nothing, riding on 2 boats, sinking again and again and somehow still manage to continue the journey. When the final dates were announced for day zero, I made my mind to switch to the technical studies again. The ‘Let us C’ book I bought in 10^th standard was opened again, Sumita Arora of 12^th class for C++ was also searched, then we have our reference books for BE subjects and all the PPTs and PDFs. It’s like you have to study entire engineering in a week and you don’t know how to start. If you ask your seniors, all they will tell you if it is your day then you will crack it and that further confuses you as instead of a luck factor you are searching more for a set formulae which you can follow to assure your success.

ACCENTURE:

Accenture is always the most preferred company in my college and cracking it is comparatively easy as it always takes the major chunk. Another relief was that all those who got above 65% in 10^th, 12^th and graduation have to appear in only 1 interview, rest people followed a more rigorous procedure of clearing a written first and then appearing for separate technical and HR round.

Along with resumes and mark sheets it’s always better keep the originals of all your identity proofs and their photocopies. It’s better to apply for passports and have them with you though they are not necessary still you have to apply for them sooner or later so better done before. Interview days are more like war preparation. You iron your formals a day before, search for a good tie, search for a friend who makes the perfect knot for the tie, polish your shoes, shave and cut your hairs. You mug up many important things that you have never thought about like “about yourself”, “ your strength and weakness” and while preparing lots of funny answers come into your mind but you try to focus on interview preparation. You receive lots of ‘all the best” messages and when you finally arrive all you can see is plain and tensed faces of many other people wandering here and there with their folders and resumes. All the modern tip top girls are well dressed in suits and all the cool dudes look decent and sober. Formals become such a fascinating things for college students, that they start taking random pictures of one another and selfies to later update it on facebook and whatsapp.

 

You can feel your heart ticking when people are called for their interviews and those who come back are chased by so many; at times the person gets fed up by telling same things again and again to many people. Anyway it’s always a good practice to ask others what they were asked as many questions are repeated and you will have an idea about what kind of questions are asked and you can discuss answers with other people so just in case even if you are not knowing anything you would have an idea on what to reply on that. Some people make really big notes about common questions asked in interviews but I would advise against it. I would rather say prepare bullets of important point as in this manner you would be able to cover all the important points you want to answer and you would be able to speak in more interactive and convincing way instead of trying to remember the big answers you have written.

The waiting time is like going through ages, you keep on reviewing your resumes and documents. You check whether you are looking perfect or not. You take deep breaths and think about the worse that can happen; even the atheists start praying for a while. The terrifying experience of others daunts you and you are already nervous, there is sweat on even the pores of your fingertips. You put yourself into an imaginary interview trying to answer all the questions nicely. I guess 10^th Sept was the day we gave our Accenture interviews.

Students were getting call in order of their college aggregate. My name was supposed to come around 1 PM, indeed it was called to come out of the hall but then not for the interviews. Many like me were stuck, and we had no idea what is going on then we found out that our forms have been lost. So, after some ‘hungama’ we had our forms and then lunch time was called. So we got to wait for 1 hour, this 3 hours delay indeed made my mind a little unstable, still as the moment arrived I calmed myself. Finally my name was called, I went in the room greeted the gentlemen sitting over there who would decide my fate today.

They asked normal questions like,” how are you feeling”, and I replied normally like excited with a little ornamentation like “This is the day we wait for throughout our college life and I am happy to be part of it now” making sure I won’t cross the over smart line. They asked me “Why Accenture”, I said the same conventional answers “It is a big brand , growth perspectives are nice and stuff” with a little bit of my inputs like “ I talked to seniors and they are very happy in Accenture”. The fellow asked to elaborate seniors’ experiences, now here is the catch I didn’t know any detailed story so I used my mind at the time, made up 2 stories of praising Accenture and the interviewers were happy. Then there were questions on my project, easy one though.

I think in every interview there comes a deciding point where you can assure your selection. It would definitely pop up and you got to realize it. My deciding point came when the technical person asked “what if I gave you a task and you are not able to solve it, there are no solutions in book or internet” what would you do then? I gave some general answers like “would ask seniors or would ask you “and he kept on cutting every point like “I am not picking your phone, I am on vacation and all”. Finally, I relaxed for a while, took some time to thought and replied “ I would implement a partial design making sure all the important requirements are covered and rest when you would be back I would ask you to help me to complete it. He seemed satisfied and I was relieved that at last I had one normal interview in my life. They ask you questions like whether there would be location issues or timing issues and for a safer site it’s better to reply that you would work anywhere for whatever time.

If they ask you “Any questions for us”, then do ask questions that are not stupid or very general. Just explore the company’s site or search on net and come up with a good question that should look like general and personal like “I am good at this and this technology so whether I could get projects on this”, “I am good at poetry and singing so will this company provide any platform for this”, and never ask questions like “What you think about me or how well the interview went”. Keep calm, stay smiling, don’t get nervous, they will try to make you nervous; they might bombard you with multiple useless questions still think calmly and come up with a logical answer.

INFOSYS:

We didn’t have much time to speculate about our Accenture results as we have to be ready for INFOSYS. I guess it came on 13^th September I don’t remember exactly. Now there is no such privilege of direct interview in Infosys, everybody has to clear the written test. The good thing is they recruit a major chunk of all the written selected candidates so it plays a key role.

Infosys has a very annoying online form that we have to fill first. It works on only internet explorer and it searches into database after every entry you are filling so it takes at least 2/3 hours to fill that big annoying form and it would be advisable to use a very fast internet connection for it else you would be stuck somewhere in between and have to start afresh.

Infosys written test is of very good level to be very honest. It’s not as easy as generally written tests are. You would definitely require some practice and you would definitely need to work on your speed if you want to clear this test. If you do not have an MBA preparation background then it would be better to have at least a week’s preparation to be on safer side instead of playing with luck. Many good candidates were eliminated in the written test which seriously shook their confidence so I would suggest not to take it lightly.

Those who clear written go for HR+technical round. HR happens first, one thing I would like to say is that I had my best interview experience with Infosys. The interviewers are very polite and friendly and they really treat you very nice and make you as much comfortable as you can. HRs was very experienced, everyone was 45+ and they all talked very decently. The HR person started with saying “It must be really hot and uncomfortable for you people outside”, it’s good to see someone is empathizing with our condition.

After the usual questions, he came to my hobbies which he has seen from the resume. We started talking about chess and he asked me how to teach a person chess who knows nothing about it. I started with very basic steps and the main purpose of the game and then gradually upgrade of that person to higher tricks and allowing him to retain what he has learned. Then he asked me 3 strategies to win the game in few steps which I knew luckily. Then we started talking about few of the skits I narrated, directed or took part of. It was enjoyable as hobbies are something fun to explain and the interview becomes very comfortable.

After the HR, it was time for the technical interview. The technical person scanned the form we had filled and also he had the rough sheet that I had used for the written test. He pointed to some rough work and asked me the question, luckily that question screwed my mind a lot and I read that multiple time during the test so I was able to recite it as it is, then he asked few more questions of test which also I was able to tell him. Then he came to my project, which was a profiler collecting statistics for JAVA programs and displaying them as charts. He asked me what’s the use of this, I replied we can tell whether a program will run on a particular system or not and how well it will run, still he wasn’t satisfied. He asked the same question in a more complicated way, I replied taking a little more technical perspective that if the profiler is saying you require 512 mb ram and u are having only 256 then you can’t run that program on that system and I took an example of GTA SAN ANDRES game which recommends a minimum 512 MB of RAM, he asked how to resolve the issue then now if we now the problem. I replied “ We can compromise on some other parameters to make it run at least like in SAN ANDRES we can reduce the resolution and then we can run it on 256 MB RAM too”, and bam he was satisfied only a 2 minute technical session and all we discussed later was “ who could be a better prime minister, Narendra modi or Shivraj Singh Chouhan”.

He gave lots of points against Modi which I gradually and patiently countered. At the end he said by the way I want to tell you that I am a die hard Modi fan, I said “Yes I know, that wasn’t hard to guess”. He told me that I can leave now but as soon as I reached the exit he called my name again “Mayank, come here, one last question for you”. He asked me if I have to choose what will I pick “Accenture or Wipro”. Now, it was really a trick question and I was almost about to spit out my gut feeling but suddenly my brain said “Halt, stop , thamba ! There is some trick in the question, why he asked it explicitely”. I then replied “Given any choice, I will choose Infosys but if the choice is between Accenture and wipro then I will choose…( Again I paused a little thought for a while and then replied) Wipro”.

“Why Wipro” He asked clearing catching my bluff. I replied because I would like to work for an Indian company first and secondly Accenture gives joining very early but I would like to take rest for a while after college, again Infosys is the best which generally gives its joining around October and Wipro in January (That was the trend that time). Now, the trick is whatever the obvious or logical answer may be, whenever you sit into an interview, all you got to show is that you are interested in only that company only and would choose it at any other cost and won’t prefer any other company. I left again and again he called me at exit “ MAYANK” , “yes sir” I replied, “ Enjoy your rest of the day”, he said with a very teasing kind of tone and I understood what he meant.

WIPRO: Wipro gave a last minute shock, earlier everyone with 75+ aggregate had to sit for direct interview but then they increased it to 79+ something at the last moment. So we all prepared for the written test too, it was an adaptive test with 5 sectional and there was a minimum attempt range decide for every section so one has to manage time pretty well, also once attempted you can’t go back to the previous question. Many who failed to clear Infosys written test cleared this once and many who got through Infosys didn’t make it here.

My wipro interview will remain something I am personally proud of because it was one interview I think I cleared because of sheer presence of mind and common sense instead of knowledge. It was a 100% technical interview, not even a single HR question unlike others who were having HR weightage greater than technical. I was asked to make programs of Linked List, trees and other data structures which by that time I had forgotten. But I somehow recollected the 2^nd year memories, started with algorithm and with the help of interviewer himself made many new logics for all the programs which really impressed him. So again that is one very crucial thing, unless you are asked a very specific question and you have no clue never reply “I don’t know”. You have to find a way to attempt, it may be very odd or abstract way but still somehow you have to approach the problem given and try and give a satisfactory answer because many a times they are not at all looking for answers all they want to see is how you will approach a problem that you don’t have much clue about.

I was asked all the forms of normalization of a database in the end and I got stuck at the 4^th one. The interviewer asked “What happened”. I said “I don’t remember it is Boyce Code or Backnus Normas”. He had a huge laugh then and asked me “When did you study database”. I said “6th sem” . “What sem is now “. “ I replied “7^th sem”. He again laughed and said “You forgot it pretty soon. I said “Database is not really one of my strongest subjects”. Again it’s ok to accept your flaws within a permissible limit, because even the interviewers know that you are but human and you can’t know it all. “Any question for me”, He said in the end. After thinking for almost 30 seconds I said no. He again laughed and asked “Why no”. I replied “Because I am very tired and completely blank right now”. He told that I can leave now.

I wasn’t expecting to clear Wipro interview, Accenture and Infosys I was but not at all wipro. There was a second round also and the news was that those who were called for the 2^nd round are rejected. Anyway the judgment day was 17^th Sept, we all gathered in our college hall. Individual names were announced for every company and it was a relieving moment to hear my name in the Accenture list, followed by Infosys and surprisingly in Wipro. A perfect 3 on 3, I remember earlier we used to think that we won’t take placement from mass recruiters and as they take a huge chunk they are easy to crack but once you go through it you know they are not. There are lots of factors and variable and a single little silly mistake can really cost you a lot. You have to be very careful yet calm at each step.

The worst thing about placement is that most of us can’t enjoy if you succeeded because there are many who were deserving, even more deserving and talented than you who didn’t make it. You have to be with there with your friends and make sure that they won’t lose themselves and it’s not the end of the world. Many hearts are broken after the placement time because most of the people have their eye on mass recruiters and all in all one become very mature after going through it. There are people who updates their status as “The harder I work, the luckier I get”, well hard work indeed pays of but surely luck has its role in life too and that you can understand only when you get through something you were not at all expecting or you didn’t make it to something you thought you were the most deserving person to get to.

In a nut shell, good marks would certainly makes a good impression but they are no sure shot gurantee of success so don’t run too much behind college marks instead focus on developing a sound technical knowledge. Communication skills, huge benefit in mass recruiters, if you are able to speak then even if you have zilch technical knowledge, there is high probability you would get selected. Extracurriculars, if you don’t have then there is no disadvantage but if you are having then surely you can divert your interview to them at any time and make a better impression.It's a good think to understand the name of the meaning of every company, their logo, their tag line, and the names of people who are at key positions. For more details you can refer to this link : http://mayankviews.blogspot.in/2014/07/placement-guide-for-freshers.html

Even those who aren’t allowed to sit in the placements should stay with their process throughout as there is a lot to learn and experience on such occasions. It’s one experience of life you should never miss and you should be there to cheer up your friends. It’s a day long process, and the participants are really tired, a little help at that time would really strengthen their moral and cheer up their spirits. Anyway, that was day zero, I would wind up the series with the dream companies, Adobe which I didn’t make it and Amdocs where I am presently working.

PS: Shortly after day zero, I became ill and had to quit my MBA preparation: P :P

PLACEMENT EXPERIENCE 1: The downfalls ( CSC COIN and MU SIGMA)

Last year, at the same time I was searching for individual placement experiences to get a better insight of all the companies and their recruitment process. I talked to many seniors and many other people already placed for their experiences. It’s quite a hectic process to search placement experiences on the internet and most of the time you do not get what you are trying to search, hence I thought to write up all my experiences in a series of posts to help the juniors and other aspirants. I have already posted a generalized procedure to approach the placement process. Now I will share my experiences, earlier I wanted to write about only those which I cracked but then I thought it would be better to write all the experiences as it will help others to pick out my mistakes or things I shouldn’t have done and device a better approach.

A brief summary, I sat in total 6 recruitment process, got select in 4 and rejected in 2. I also sat in CSC Coin Project training process back in third year where I got eliminate in the last round. This post will be having the experiences of 2 rejections i.e. CSC coin and Mu Sigma because it’s better to learn from a failure’s point of view also after all a successful one can teach you what to do and a failure can tell you what not to do and at times the don’ts are more crucial then the do’s.

I have already dedicated an entire blog post to CSC, so I won’t go into much depth on this. You can refer to this post for that http://mayankviews.blogspot.in/2013/01/csc-rejection-and-beyond.html All I could say now, after almost one and a half year of that event is that rejection was necessary for me. In fact, everyone must go through one harsh professional rejection in life whether because of their own fault or by some other reason but rejections are must. They make you feel good about yourself once you are over them. They not only help you to explore your weakness but also your strength and you don’t feel nervous, scared, insecure ever again, once you are over with a harsh rejection. In retrospect, if I have to give that interview again after clearing the written, I would have answered in the same way, with the same attitude. At the end of the day, what matters is to remain honest and find a place for yourself instead of adjusting into every place for the sake of security. Still, what I think I shouldn’t have done to get rejected would be not to be over expressive. I was very comfortable in that interview and too much of casual attitude might go against you. I was showing real desperation and projecting myself as very apt candidate that could have been avoided. It’s better to act a little normal and play safe when majority is going to get select and few are going to reject. Don’t try to show yourself that you are different and better, just play it normal and cool and you would make to the final list. I was 1 of the 24 among 350+, but not 1 of the 20 among 24 so keep in mind how many are going to select and how many are going to reject and decide your strategy and attitude likewise.

Now, coming to MU SIGMA, it was one company I wasn’t much attached to or aiming die hard to clear it, though clearing it might have helped me in pursuing my other aspirations but still I have learnt not to get attached to things after my CSC experience so I had a neutral attitude for it. Before the official process, we were supposed to fill a big form by signing in from our Facebook or LinkedIn account. It’s better to create a LinkedIn account and complete your profile properly as it’s a more formal approach. The form was though very informal and contained questions like 3 fav movies, 3 fav novels, one event that changed your life, your strength, your weakness etc. You were also supposed to nominate one other person (I was glad 4 people nominated me :P ). Many people find the novel writing question very hard, in fact I filled their form and explained the summaries of 3 novels to them. So if you are aiming MU SIGMA, it’s better to read 3 small novels just in case this question is repeated. I would recommend ‘who moved my cheese’, ‘ jonathan seagull livingstone’, ‘1984’, ‘animal farm’,’ to kill a mocking bird’, ‘Anne Frank’ etc as they are short and simple.

 The process started with a written test I remember. I think there were 20 questions over all and I had attempted only 16. It was a mixture of aptitude (15) + technical (5). I wasn’t sure about whether I have correctly attempted all or not so I was little uncertain about clearing the written. My friend on the other hand had attempted all 20, there were many with more attempts than me so it was advisable not to be confident of clearing written test. The results came around late night and were shocking. Many students who were good in both aptitude and technical and had already cleared GRE or performing well in MBA mock tests or GATE test series didn’t make it to the next round. One more conclusive proof about uncertainties of placement when you see people much more hard working and better prepared than you not making the cut.

Next round was in IPS academy, a college little bit away from the city and we had to reach there by 8 am. The night before was hectic and busy, we were told to bring 4 xerox of all our certificates and most of the photocopy shops were about to close at that time so quite a running for everyone. Thus it’s always advisable to keep at least 3 sets of copies of all your certificates and your latest resume ready so there won’t be any last time rush. Also keep a soft copy of your resume in your draft just in case you need to edit/print or mail it on the spot. Those who cleared written slept in nervousness, those who didn’t sleep in sadness. The next morning started quite early for many as most of us were not able to sleep. We all reached to the campus around 7:30 waited for almost 3 hours when the PPT started and immediately the next round began. I don’t remember the exact order though.

ROUND 1: It was video synthesis round. In this round, a video clip is shown to you and you are suppose to write what you learned or understand from that clip instead of what was shown. We were shown a clip from the movie GANDHI, then we were suppose to sum up the experience in few lines ( there were 3 sets of 3 lines each as far as I remember). There are no subtitles so you got to listen very carefully. It’s better to make it a practice by not using subtitles whenever watching anything in English. Also, better to practice beforehand by writing concise and short statement which can fully represent the meaning of an entire event as there would be very limited space, you won’t be able to write more than 6/7 words per line depending on the size of your writing so better to practice beforehand instead of doing some mistake later.

ROUND 2: It was a case study round of some android app, various parameters and past data was given and you were supposed to add your own insights and ideas. The important thing is you always need to think from business point of view in such rounds and your ideas should be something that can bring impact on a larger mass. More different certainly would be more better, don’t write something you have already heard or read somewhere, better formulate something by your own so that it would be unique and you would be able to justify it later.

ROUND 3: It was a GD round. We were given the topic “whether mobile phone should be banned in college and school campus or not”. Before that we were asked to suggest a topic, I suggested “ women’s reservation bill in parliament” but the co-coordinator didn’t approve it as he wanted something simple as the topic. Most of the people were in favor of mobile phones except 2 people I guess. So, in the words of the coordinator himself the GD was lacking aggression. It’s a better approach to not go with majority at times as you would have more visibility. It’s better to listen first, decide your approach and then speak and be very patient but make sure you have raised your points time to time at regular intervals. Many people who weren’t able to speak were later given chance to sum up the entire conversation and most of these people made it to the next round. Nowadays, even if you are not able to speak, the coordinators give all those people a chance in the end.

On a personal note, I was suppose to clear this round with ease but I was eliminated after this round ( I wasn’t surprised :P ). I didn’t like the fish market that was getting created again and again and the fact that some people were not at all getting chance to speak. I proposed a way of speaking turn by turn and complete at least one circle so that everyone would get a chance to speak. The coordinator didn’t like my approach of trying to regulate the process perhaps he liked the fish market better. So it didn’t come as a surprise to me when I was not selected unlike others. Funny thing, many who got selected always thanks me that I am the reason they got selected and many who didn’t blame me that because of me they didn’t get selected . I would like to apologize to those people who think that I came in their way of selection. Anyway, the crux of the matter is if you want to be on the safe side, don’t pull any stunt like I did, just focus on speaking on the topic given and you would be fine. Besides, there is no such thing as those who can speak better or fluent will crack the GD round and those who are not good in communication skills can’t. There were many people who were exceptionally good in speaking but didn’t clear this round while many who doubted their abilities made it. So it’s a good thing not to go with a pre-occupied mind in any placement process as your performance at the spot matters instead of your theoretical capabilities, so never be overconfident or under confident.

As I was eliminated in this round, my personal experience stops here. My friends participated in the next rounds. There were 2 rounds and interview of every person varied. Some were asked questions about their project while some were asked questions about their extracurricular. Some interview lasted for 50 mins while some ended only in 5 mins. It’s a good practice to solve many puzzles or at least device an approach to solve them and able to express it for a company like MU SIGMA as they lay more stress on approach than answer. It’s further better to explore the company’s site and their vision and future plans so that you can justify your interest in the company. Also learn about the designation that you are getting so that you can justify how you would fit in the role perfectly. Total 21 people were selected from my college and I along with my friend order 2 cheese burst pizza to celebrate the failure of 2 of the most hyped personalities for this company and we both updated our status as “NOT PLACED IN MU SIGMA”.

I do not mean to flaunt, all I am saying is it’s better to have a sporty and live spirit after rejection. It’s a part of life, no matter whether you were deserving or not. I have seen people losing their faith and confidence after this process. I have seen people taking months to come out of this failure as it was their first one. I have seen people putting their entire future on stake and doubting each and every of their capability afterwards. Many who didn’t make it to MU SIGMA made it to other good companies, or to good PG colleges. The important thing is trying, learning, observing, making a note of weakness and faults, improving them, and with the same or more enthusiasm facing the next opportunity. Don’t lose hope is the moral of the story.

That’s all folks. I would write about the day zero experience i.e. (Accenture, Infosys and wipro in the next post where I made it to all the 3 companies). Questions, queries and feedbacks are welcome in the comment box.