Inside the mind and heart of Venkatesh Sridhar

Trrrrriiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggggggg!!! A hand comes out of the blanket and tries to see what time it is, the clock shows it as 6 am. The hand punches it down and the hand pulls the blanket, the body turns over and goes back to sleep.

Is this is a scene from a bollywood movie? What do you think …..

Actually not … The hand and the alarm that I was talking abt .. both were mine …

This is the normal start of the day at Villa No 53, Room E, Bed No - 2.

Then your’s truly gets up at 6.30 am rushes to brush and then yells at anyone who is in the shower to get his a$$ outta there. “Abbe bahar nikal saale, jaldi kar.”

Then finally I jump into shower and have a very quick shower and rush out, then wear my jeans n tees in a tearing hurry…. and run to the kitchen take out the strawberry flavored milk from the fridge gulp down very fast.

Then we have the morning lecture at 8 am in which depending on what lecture we have, heads start drooping. Then at 9.30 am the lecture gets over and everyone goes in 1 big gang to the closest pastry shop, ‘Hot Breads’. Toss 2 dirhams and ask for a veg pan pizza, non-veggies relish the chicken versions of everything. We poor veggies have limited choices to make.

We trudge back and start reading up on what the prof. plans to teach us. We have to give an online quiz at the start of the lecture.( I prefer to spend the 1 hour break that we get to read about so that I am ready to go for the quiz)

After another lecture sometimes interesting sometimes boring not because of the faculty who are excellent but because of the subject matter.

Then it is lunch time and I am personally amazed at the speed with which I eat. I am one of the slowest eaters when I am in Mumbai but it seems the first thing you learn in a b-school is to have your lunch fast.

I think this is an oppurtune time to cut down the blog and post the other part later…

“Abbe P2 uth be, saale 6.45 baj raha hai”

That was Kuldeep my roomie waking me up. Now you might be wondering why was he referring to me as ‘P2′. You may wonder has Venky gone to Dubai and rechristened himself…. The answer is ‘Obviously not’.

This is my new nick name, specific to Villa No. 53 and Room E. For others I am still good ol’ Venky.

Yeah you guessed right. The villa where I stay is Villa No. 53 and the alphabhet that specifies my room is E. On unofficial terms since the place where we stay is away from the city and is a very quiet and slow moving place all of us very fondly (sic!) call it The Central Prison of Meadows.

” Which villa do you stay in?”

“Villa No. 53.”

“What’s your khaidi (prisoner) number?”

“E-2″

Lol… NO! this is not a conversation between two jail inmates. This is a convo between two S P Jain students. As I said, we have developed this new lingo of asking for the room nos in an unique manner.

Now you may say, “All this fine. But what’s with P2?”

Well You see my room is E and the bed no is 2. There are three of us in my room. In order of bed nos it is - Kuldeep Dudeja, Your’s Truly, Parth Kikani.

So this makes Kuldeep - P1, Me - P2 and Parth - P3.

Now you may wonder what is this obsession with the letter ‘P’. P is actually a(n) (extremely) condensed abbreviation for ‘Partner’. Parth arrived later than me and Kuldeep. So previously it was just P1 and me. So we used to call each other ‘Partner’. Now, Parth arrived so when either me or Kuldeep said, “Partner” . The other two would turn and see. So then we devised this scheme of calling each other by our respective bed nos.

Now that I have given a background of what we call each other and a little bit of a background as to what happens in Villa no 53 and Room E, I will tell you about the ‘real’ hostel life and a typical day in the life of a b- school student. So till the next time it’s Venky signing off… Take Care. God Bless.

Continuing from my prev post …

The pilot announced ” I feel glad to announce that we have arrived 1 minute early and since there is no parking bay that is free at the moment. The airport authority says it will take approximately 7 mins after which we will be allotted a parking bay.Thank you for flying Air India.”

I said to myself, “Thank you for flying me safely.” I had mentioned in my prev post itself that I was kind of jittery with the engine shaking.

The Dubai airport is a humungous airport. The airport at Mumbai would be one terminal here, it is that huge. We had to walk with all our heavy luggage for atleast 3-3.5 kms till we reached the immigration counter.

The immigration officer looked at me (stared would be an apt word) and then thankfully stamped on the visa. My heart had almost stopped beating. Then we went and exchanged the currency at the airport itself….

NOTE: A tip for those travelling abroad NEVER and I mean NEVER EVER exchange your currencies at the airport you dont get good rates.

I was looking for a phone booth to call back home. But, here there is no concept of STD/ISD booths like in India. For some things India is still the best. I had to buy a calling card it costed me 30 Dhms ( 360 Rs. ) Another NOTE: If you are coming to Dubai DONT buy these telephone cards from a big store you will get them at 30 dhms in small shops u would get them at 27.50 or 28 dhms.

Then we waited for our bus to arrive and then we got onto the bus and WOW!!!! what a view it was … All big buildings being built, the Dubai airport expansion site., the Mall of Emirates - the world’s biggest mall all of these are being built at a breathtaking speed.

We sighted the Burj Al Arab hotel - the same hotel on whose helipad Agassi and Federer played that most famous tennis match. The entry fee is 250dhms approx 3000 Rs.

Then we reached our villas. It was good and posh. I hope I can own a home of this kind in India. Will post some pics of my villa and room.

My next post would be on the life of a b-school student. Till then you take care and have fun

The day was 9th june 2005. The time was 10.40 AM .. Met up with Sandy and Amresh before I went. Couldnt meet Giri he had gone to some place. Took some photos. Got my luggage down and climbed the sumo, asked mom to get a x-ray done as she had a fall the day before.

You may be wondering where was I leaving to…Dubai - The city of Gold to do my Masters in Business Administration at S P Jain Center of Management, Dubai

I was taking an Air India 717 Flight to Dubai. The scheduled departure from Mumbai Airport was 14.45 PM IST. I got myself a window seat, there was a problem with luggage where I had about 35 kgs over the limit and haggled with the AI guy and paid for only 10 kg at a rate of Rs. 215. My dad was pissed dat I paid when the other guys walked without paying an extra buck - he felt I wasn’t street smart enough, but I had no other way out but to pay .

I got onto the flight and despite asking for a window and making it clear that I did not wanna b near the wing. I was seated at a place from where I could see the engine. It was an Airbus A 300. It is a twin engine plane. I could see Dharavi, Asia’s Largest Slum to my left. The plane taxied to the runway and to my shock found a dog running on the runway. After the dog got off the runway, the plane started its run and I could feel the plane shaking as the concrete on the runway was bad. The takeoff was tremendous, too sexy.

Food was ok. I met a female from my college who was an air hostess on board. It was amazing to meet someone when you least expect it. The landing was too good. As we approached the coast of UAE, the pilot reduced the altitude and I could see the sea, then sand and then mountain ranges which were full of sand!!

What was even more amazing and surprising was that I could see patches of greenery!!!! YES GREENERY in the midst of the DESERT!!! Dubai Airport is such a beautiful airport … very amazing, will write about in my next part.

P.S: My posts will now be in Dubai time i.e. GMT +4 hours i.e. 1 hr 30 mins behind IST.