Chips@Cisco

Well this is what is taking most (or all) of my weekends since last many months....It is an annual conference of Cisco where people from various Cisco groups submit papers/ppt's about interesting / innovative stuff which they have done or about design techniques or some process which other teams can follow. I had submitted an abstract in the January and it got selected. The final presentation is due on April 29, so lots of time and effort is going into this.. The title of the presentation is "How to avoid getting caught in the CDC abyss". It basically talks about Clock Domain Crossings happening in designs and how to take care issues they may cause. Almost on every weekend since Feb this year, I am going to office and working on this. Weekdays are already so hectic because of the project delivery date coming closer. Just thought of jotting it down here as someday I will see this and remember :) ...

Death of a salesman

Yesterday I watched this American classic play written by Arthur Miller. A play worth watching and made us think about the life which we are living and its meaning. The play was scheduled to start at 6:30 PM in Brigade Millennium (JP Nagar, 7th Phase) and even if play hadnt been so good the place itself is worth a visit.. Nice ambience.. Calm surroundings.. I started from my office at 5:15 pm.. Hoping to make it by 6:15 as that was the time printed on tickets after which doors to auditorium will be closed... By 5:45 I managed to reach Silkboard.. But that was not good as I still had to go around 10 KM in 30 mins in the Bangalore traffic..People familar with Bangalore, understand that that is imposs.. A feeling of that I wont reach on time started sinking into my heart and this all effort will go in vain..I was going by BMTC bus and driver was in mood to cross 40 kmph even if road ahead was totally empty... When all this was going into my mind.. wht to do etc, I got a call Pocha telling me that Aditya is also on the way and we two can sync up at some place...( as he was coming on bike and I saw light at the end of the tunnel).. I called him instantly and we decided to sync up at Jaydeva flyover.. He told me that he will reach the place in another 10 mins.. So from Silkboard to Jaydeva flyover in 10 mins... I got down from bus and caught an auto...I made it to Jaydeva flyover in 15mins with Aditya waiting from me there since last 5 mins..It was 6:10 pm then.. so we had only 5 mins and some 5 KM to go.. In the meatime, Pocha had called both of us so many times telling that only 15 mins , 10 mins, only 5 mins left everytime :) .. and made both of us panic striken.. We zoomed through the bangalore traffic in the JP nagar area and reached the place at 6:20 pm.. We parked the bike and went running to the entrance of the auditorium... The play started at 6:30 with doors still open till that time.. The Brigade Millennium is a nice palce..Myself and Pocha had a small discussion that one should either live in such apartments with these amenities or to some near by place atleast.. The play was good and nicely acted with showing dreams of an American salesman (Willy loman), who wants to make it big in life by earning money etc... He worked hard throughout his life but without knowing whether that is really what he wants to do etc .. The play was presented by Aavega productions....During the intermission (after Act1), we all (Pocha, Jitesh, Aditya, Prema, Poonam n myself) had snacks and a mouth savoring tea ( I had two cups :) ) .. After the play with the lesson : follow your heart in life and dont go by the usual rat race thing, we all decided to go for dinner at Inchara but place was running full and we decided to go to Nandini instead and I want to tell u all that North indian food sucks there and it is grossly overpriced.. It is always better to take south indian food in such south indian speciality restaurants.. After dinner, we all went to L&T south city to drop Jitesh/Pocha and then Prema dropped me back to my home while coming back ... It was a lovely evening with play, drive, food and a wonderful time with all of them..

Utter Confusion ...

Why I am so confused about every damn thing ... I feel like probably I am the most confused person on this earth.. I feel like I am in a maze and I have no idea what to do, which way to go, whats the way out of this.. Be it my professional or personal life, I find myself equally confused.. Professional life has so many options .. shall I go for MBA Finance as I am really passionate about Equities.. but i dont hate my techie job either.. life is going on comfortably.. shall I do MBA as I am only a B.Tech ? .. Or that wont matter if I choose to be in this techie line for rest of my life.. Shall I go for my own start up... and what not ... The same goes for personal life too.... Since the thing is hindsight is always 20/20, so I always try to think how will I see these things say 2 yrs down the line.. Whatever I am doing today, my actions today, how will I see them some years down the line. Thats the way I try to think... The reason being as today I laugh at myself for the way I thought about the things in the past and things whcih I did. I also firmly believe that I am solely responsible for whatever I did in the past, whatever I thought about things as it was me who decided to do that thing as I felt that as the best thing to do in that situation. I think hindsight is 20/20 because in hindsight we remember only rational things, things which actually mattered at that point.. We forget about the "noise" which was present at that time and which made us to act in a particular manner at that time. So today I strive hard to think about the things after filtering that noise... Seems really hard and it is indeed so, but thats what I try to do... It takes quite an effort and I feel like a person starved of energy no matter in the end I am actually able to do so or not..

Also couple of things which I have learnt from the past are : words can help you express what u feel but sometimes silence or a pause is what you really need.. there is no substitue for a well timed pause.. So not saying something is what is really needed sometimes... The other on similar lines is that sometimes the best thing to do is to do nothing... We all have this perennial desire to make things better and do something.. we dont know how to sit tight.. forget about not acting, we dont even consider not doing anything as an option ... but sometimes the best thing is to leave the things the way they are... learn to give up... Sometimes giving it time is what is really needed..

Coming back to the confusion thing, I wonder the way our life is affected by the people around us is upto us to choose or if something happens then it was always destined to happen that way.. Questions likes this comes to mind so often.. Can I really control the outcome of the events happening around me or it is just that nature conspires for them and all I can do is to act in the manner I am supposed to .. Also I feel like this is the most turbulent stage of my life... this late 20's .. I feel like after getting married, things will be so much better as one of the biggest event of life would have played out the way it was meant to be.. Being so passionate about markets, I can correlate this with the way markets behave to uncertainity... Markets tell us a great deal about how humans behave to uncertaininty .. feeling jittery.. factoring future into the present..doomsday predictions when things go a lil wrong..

Sometimes I feel like whether it is really good to achieve control of things as basically that is controlling emotions and becoming a stoic.. for sure i wont be taking pain, I wont be going through agony but i will also forget abt what is joy, ecstacy.. so emotions are like addectives... they give u a kick when u feel happy...but u feel like u r dieing when they work d opposite way.. so, is life worth living with keeping your emotions under control.. just living a plain life without any ups and down ? Then what comes to my mind is : is there some element in each one of us which wants life to be in constant state of flux and sometimes we desire to feel sad... sometimes we really want to be intentionally sad .. we want to hurt ourself ..we want to purge ourselves as we feel relieved and happy after being sad for sometime.. we want to go through the pain (emotional but I think some people may like physical pain too) and we desire for those emotions.. so sometimes do we all behave like masochists ?


The one thing which is very clear to me even in this state of utter confusion is that I will get the answer of all these things couple of years down the line .. As for the rear view mirror "Objects in the mirror are closer than what they appear" thing, I think rear view in life is not only close but clear too ...

We all change for the one we love

Kudos to Canara bank who has captured this idea so well and it so appropriate for their brand image change campaign .. I am so impressed with their campaign that I am thinking of opening a account with them.. Not only the slogan is so good but also their ads ... The one in which a south indian old lady is shown that she is trying to learn punjabi as their bride is a punjabi kudi.. the other one in which the wife tries to learn about cricket as her husband loves cricket etc..

I Loved Taare Zameen Par and equally so Saare Zameen Par ...

Apart from giving Aamir Khan the due respect for making TZP ( this is one movie which everyone should watch)... I think Saare Zameen Par will be an apt line to remember Jan 2008 Stock Market Crash for the years to come .. Stocks came to mouth watering levels and my patience paid off .. I Loved Taare Zameen Par and equally so Saare Zameen Par ..

Jaspreet's Bachelor Party ..

Yesterday we (myself n my team memebers at Cisco) celebrated Jaspreet's bachelor party at my home.. It was a great party and we all had so much of fun and the patry mahol was similar to the one shown in the Mcdowell's latest 8 ke thaad commercial.. People cracked all sorts of jokes about marriage... Basically as bachelor parties always provide this one too provided a vent to the "supressed" feelings of all the married n unmarried guys present there... Music,drinks,food,dance and fattebaaji rocked the celebrations... Jaspreet cracked a a couple of jokes : people say marriage is a place where the Guy loses his Bachelor's and Gal gets the Master's. One more : marriage party pe music is not needed as daaru pe ke baraati to generator ki aawaz pe he dance kar lenge.. LOL :).. Much needed fundaes (or Gyaan) was given by experienced n married ppl about married life like what to do,when to do,what not to do etc.... The evening started with light music and general discussion about marriage n life after that .. Then we talked about Jaspreet's past experiences with gals...After that the party was in full swing and we had an almost 1 hr session of dance to numbers like "Dard e disco" .. "Hare rama Hare krishna".. "Koi kahe"... "Kya mujhe pyar hai".."Pyar karke Pachtaya"... list n the party went on .. None of us would have ever expected that this party would be so much fun..Everybody was in full mood and just savoring every moment of the party.. Well i dont have any photos of the party to put here as when all this was going on everbody agreed that there will not be any record of the deeds done during the party... Manoj, Kishor, Raka, Sangeeth, Jaspreet and Myself had a memorable time..In the end there was a talk on insomnia and its probable benefits after marriage.. The party,for sure,bought each one of us closer to each other (literally as well as we had 2 mattress's opposite to each other in our hall with 3 ppl sitting on each)..

A party which I will never forget for rest of my life ..

Wish you a Happy Married Life Jaspreet !

Lessons from Jan 2008 ...by Udayan Mukerjee ..

The thing about life is that one makes mistakes. Many mistakes were made in the second half of 2007 and those sins have to be washed away by blood, such is the way of financial markets. Some participants will go down under and never be able to get back to the market again but most will survive. The pain will linger for many months, maybe years but lessons have to be learnt. Every such debacle has lessons for us and the sooner we forget them the more we suffer.

The first lesson is not to let stock price performance become the sole reason for buying, a mistake which was made in abundance in the last 3 months. What couldn't be explained by fundamentals was credited to liquidity. The present lost all relevance as people chose to focus on the distant future, perhaps simply because the present could never justify those ticker prices; only a hazy dream of the future could. Traders and investors had no time for fundamental analysts, in many cases they were labelled "cribbing fools". Chartists became the most celebrated tribe on the street as only they could see and predict the one way run to glory for many of the hot stocks even as fundamental watchers cringed at valuations....till the music stopped. Don't get me wrong, charts do work in trending markets but once stock prices veer away completely from fundamental value, people need to get careful. But they never are. Now that the blinkers are off, people should ask themselves why stocks like RNRL, Ispat, RPL, Essar oil and Nagarjuna fertilisers have lost 50-70% of their value. It is simply because their stock prices had snapped all connection with underlying business fundamentals, earnings and value. Their stock prices became the only reasons for buying them which works for a while but not forever.

The other big lesson, one which should have been driven in earlier in May 2006, is the danger of overextending oneself in the futures market. The lure of stock futures is easy to understand. Put in some margin, take a big exposure on a fast moving stock, make a killing when prices shoot up. Repeat exercise. Just that people forgot that prices may also come down and at a pace which noone can even imagine, maybe their friendly stockbrokers forgot to tell them that part of the story. The result : unbridled speculation that ran into lakhs of crores, excesses that we are paying for today. Even this fall will not cure investors of their love for futures speculation but if at least some amount of caution is injected it would have been a worthwhile learning. Futures are not toys for amateurs, they are time bombs in the hands of inexpert and inexperienced traders, it's only a matter of when the fuse runs out.

The other learning which I hope will play out in the future, as it has in the past, is that it pays to be brave in times of panic such as these. If I was allowed to invest myself , which I am not, I would have no hesitation in deploying serious money into the market today, knowing fully well that prices may fall more tomorrow. And I would be standing there tomorrow to buy more of the same, till my money ran out. India is going to be a terrific stock market story for many years to come, even an intermediate bearish patch cannot shake that conviction of mine. At best, one will have to wait a bit for the returns to follow. That's alright. You are happy to put money in a bank FD and then wait for one full year to collect that measly 8%, aren't you? Then why does the stock market need to give you 20% every month? In the last one year, I haven't seen so many good stocks trade at such mouth watering levels. Forget trading, avoid the duds which were fuelled up by operators, just go out and buy those bluechips. They will deliver, even if there is a global market meltdown for a while, and if you are a bit patient you will be rewarded. But do remember January 2008, as history will repeat itself again in the future. Just that our memories tend to be too short and our greed too much.

2007 : The year that was !

It is time to bid adieu to 2007. Just thought of recollecting some things about the year this was.. totally random insane musings ..

It was definitely a 007 style bond year and I dont know why I get this feel that it was a good year for most of the people I know :) .. Thanks 2007 for spreading joy and happiness around.. For some of my friends it was the year they got married : Chirkut, Hemant and they entered into a new phase of life .. For some it was the year they passed out with their PGDBM's and joined the bandwagon of corporate world : Lappa,Nilesh,Fugga,Hemant and other IIT M batchmates. For me , it was another year with another new job (I just hope there is not another job change is in store for me in 2008). It was the year in which I started my matrimony fite with full steam. I purchased paid membership plans of Jeevansaathi and Punjabimatrimony.com. It was the year when I moved back to Bangalore which bought an end to my short stint at Delhi. It was the year when my nephew Harsh celebrated his first B'day. It was the year when I almost decided to quit my job and thought of doing something of my own. Mondaya dream is still afloat.. It was the year when I stayed mostly out of equities ( and didnt make or lose much money).. It was the year when I thought of sueing a company cause they didnt pay me my last month salary till almost 3 months after quiting the company..It was the year when Raka, Daddy, Pocha and Myself had those wonderful talks about the things can be done.. those discussions.. those mails on We_will_do_it ! .. It was the year Budget policy changes on Cement pricing and MAT for infrastructure companies made my portfolio nosedive that day and for next some days .. It was the year when everybody paid so much attention to what Fed has to say in their next meeting.. What will they do with interest rates in America.. It was the year when Subprime Shock hit the financial markets across the world.. and pushed US towards a recession...It was the year Sensex achieved 20K mark .. It was the year I made a small F & O trade for the first time in my trading history .. It was the year I tried some more sitcoms : scrubs.. futurnama .. It was the year which made its begining with myself totally out with booze and watching a movie in a PVR in Faridabad with Sumit, Sunil and Raka .. It was a year when I went to a trip to Nainitaal and Jim Corbett Park .. And that Transwitch trip to Ranthambhore in Rajasthaan .. It was the year which taught me so many lessons on Professional and Personal front and made me a better person in the end .. In the later part of this year I stopped reading ET (Why, I dont know.. just slipped into background ?) .. time to get back to it in 2008 .. It was the year I didnt write CAT :) and took a break ! .. It was an year when I made some new friends in Bangalore and I must say I am lucky to have found people like them in my life.. It was the year when everybody in world said : Chak De India with Indian economy on a roll .. !!!

Things which I do so often

I dont know from where this idea came into my mind. I just thought of listing some of the things which I do daily.

1) Watching Friends : I just love to do this and every time I watch this show I feel like what will I do when I would have seen all of the episodes of it? South Park and Futurama are in the line.

2) Watching CNBC (No not because of stock market update, but because of Mitaali and Shereen Bhaan)

3) Browsing Bloomberg (Yeah this is purely for stock market updates, unfortunately no females to look around here)

4) Seeing how my Portfolio and stocks in my Watchlist are doing on ICICI Direct.

5) Opening Gtalk ( talking with a golu molu frnd ;) ) and checking Orkut so frequently. I need to do something abt this. This has started taking so much time.

6) Reading Domain Maximus blog at www.whatay.com

7) Checking email on Yahoo to see if any matrimonial response has come or not :) .. Nowadays, I used Yahoo id only for that purpose.

8) Having dinner at Shanti Sagar (because they accept those tax saving meal coupons).

"Brokers Excuse" ads given by Brokers

After so many days of non stopped browsing through the sites like Magicbricks.com,99 acres.com and Bangaloreproperty.com, I have finally found a home. Well I will explain how continuous and thorough my browsing was.

A 2BHK in Bellandur, which I would be sharing with Raka will be my place to live for the next at least one year or so. So with this the first and undoubtedly the most difficult step towards settling down again in Bangalore is successfully taken. The house reminds me of the owner of the house. No. Dont take it wrong. He is a HE.Ok, first of all let me tell you why and how did I get that house. I got the house because the house owner wanted to give it to me. Yup without even knowing me, just because I was the first person to call him up since he had put the house up for rent. This proves that how vigorously and how frequently I was checking those sites for updates. I called him within an hour of him posting the ad. It was a Sunday afternoon and he was in Pune at that time but he made sure that we meet on Tuesday eve when he comes back from Pune as now he will give the house to me only. Since he was so much interested in giving it to me although because of superstition, I went there to meet him and have a look at the house. House is definitely good, well ventilated and has an airtel broadband connection. What else could I ask for a rent of 10K (inclusive of maintenance) in Bangalore. But as they say with great luck comes great responsibility. The owner has given me a big responsibility of an aquarium which he has in his house and he wants me to take utmost care of it once I move to that place .Because the fishes there in the aquarium are so dear to him as he feels they are the source of all the wealth which he has created in last couple of years or so. Well no doubt abt that as he is in early thirties and owns a flat in bangalore at such a small age.

Searching for a house was a nice experience in itself. Talking to so many people and trying to convince them that although I am a bachelor I would be a good tenant.
The most surprising thing which came to me during this whole exercise of house searching was ads which clearly said "Brokers Excuse" which were given by brokers itself. I called up the guy but came to know that he himself is a broker and when I asked him why he has put "Brokers Excuse" thing in the ad. He told me that he has put it there to avoid other brokers calling him up for that property. Looks like these broker people have formed a cabal and there is a tacit understanding among them. And they all very well understand this "CODE OF CONDUCT".

Laut ke budhooo ghar ko jaaye :)

I think the title to this post says it all. I am goin back to Bangalore after a nice little stay of 9 months (before u guys start raising any questions, let me make it 10 months :) .. ) in Delhi.

I came to Delhi from Bangalore with so many dreams in my eyes like

No .1 ) there will be so may cute punjabi gals out there and if the lady luck plays her part well then i will not remain single and ready to mingle kind of guy for long (failed miserably here as nothing of that sort happened.. going back to Bangalore as an unreceived mail goes back to the sender .. people dont even see whats there inside) ,

No.2 ) cheap but good north indian food ( Although I enjoyed Haldiram parties a lot and will miss them for sure ... but maid@home sucked big time here.. ),

No.3) proximity to my home (well I went to my home only thrice in these 9/10 months .. what a lazy bum I am) and Lucknow (went there only once to meet good old school pals), and

No.4)last but not the least some good work with a few extrabucks

Nothing gonna change my love for U (Bangalore) :)

The one thing for which I will miss Delhi and Transwitch a lot will be the
FAD CAB .. (Faridabad Cab) .. The pick and drop cab facility .. not because everyday i had a good 30 mins drive in an A/C Indica but coz the the gang of friends who are there..

JJ , Harinder, Archana, Gaurav and Raka :) .. This Combo is Simply Fun Unlimited !!

When I think of Bangalore, the first thing which comes to my mind is awesome weather and the cool zephyr which keeps on blowing 24x7x365 (what a commitment) ..... and then I have so many good pals there .. batchmates and flatmates Chir and Pocha, Old buddies : Amber, Lepcha and Nishant, Goli, Chau and everybody at Tejas .. then comes my morning breakfast at Shanti and *Sagars .. I miss my idli and vada breakfast so much :) ...

I am looking forward to be back in the City of Gardens !!

StartUps

Practice the qualities of clarity, competence, constraints,creativity, concentration,courage and continuous action until they are as natural to you as breath.

Take these steps to get going on your business goals.

1. Decide exactly what you want in life in each area, and write it down. Make your goals clear, specific and measurable.
2. Specify the most important skill you could develop to move you into the top 10 percent of people in your field. Then do something immediately to begin developing that skill.
3. Identify the major constraint or limiting factor inside yourself or in your world that is setting the speed at which you achieve your most important goal, and begin working on removing that constraint today.
4. Determine your single biggest problem or obstacle in your business or personal life. Then focus all your time and attention on the possible solutions.
5. Make a list of what you would want to be, do and have if you had no limitations and you were absolutely guaranteed success.
6. Accept complete responsibility for your life. From this day forward, refuse to make excuses or blame anyone for anything. Instead, take action to make your goals a reality.
7. Reaffirm and visualize your goals of financial success, excellent health and personal happiness as a reality. Remember, the person you see is the person you will be.

For more, click here

Guns and Lays :)

This pic was taken during a recent Nainitaal and Jim Corbett trip.

Will post more details soon !!

Words of Wisdom

"People are most credulous when they are most happy”

"Corporate financial statements are like bikinis .. what they are show are very interesting ; what they hide is vital"

"The fact that people will be full of greed, fear or folly is predictable. The sequence is not predictable." -- Warren Buffet

"If you were to walk into this fine book store and make an offer to the owner that, "I want to buy your store for the amount of the cash in the till plus the money that you have in the bank or money market mutual funds", he will throw you out. But the stock market periodically allows you to make such kind of offers”

"An equity share representing the entire business cannot be less safe and less valuable than a bond having a claim to only a part that of"—Ben Graham

“The task of man is not to see what lies dimly in the distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand”—Thomas Carlyle

"Those who will not face improvements because they are changes, will face changes that are not improvements”—Munger

“The moment I leave something on luck. It runs away.”

"This is a world inhabited not by people who have to be persuaded to believe but by people who want an excuse to believe."

“Whenever you think that some situation or some person is ruining your life, it’s actually you who are ruining your life. It’s such a simple idea. Feeling like a victim is a perfectly disastrous way to make go through life. If you just take the attitude that however bad it is in anyway, it’s always your fault and you just fix it as best you can – the so-called “iron prescription” – I think that really works”

“Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards"

“Understanding both the power of compound interest and the difficulty of getting it is the heart and soul of understanding a lot of things”—Munger.

“Those who will not face improvements because they are changes will face changes that are not improvements"

“Willingness to change is a strength, even if it means plunging part of the company into total confusion for a while”—Jack Welch.

“When we are unsure of ourselves, when the situation is unclear or ambiguous, when uncertainty reigns, we are most likely to accept the actions of others as correct”

"The test of the first rate mind is the ability to hold two opposing thoughts at the same time while still retaining the ability of function”—Scott Fitzgerald


“When I disagree with a rational man, I let reality be our final arbiter; if I am right, he will learn; if I am wrong, I will; one of us will win, but both will profit”—Ayn Rand

“Extrapolation may give you the ability to see what’s coming down the street but not what is coming around the corner”—Henry Kaufman

"Take care of the limitations & the advantages will take care of themselves"

"One can evade reality but he cannot evade the consequences of evading reality." Ayn Rand

"Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing" -Buffet

“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler” -- Einstein


"The price you pay determines (your potential) rate of return"
"The price you get determines (your actual) rate of return"

In the words of Warren Buffett, "It's only when the tide goes out that you learn who's been swimming naked."

It is always better to be somewhat right rather than precisely wrong.

"Corporate financial statements are like bikinis .. what they are show are very interesting ; what they hide is vital"

Fear is the foe of the faddist, but the friend of the fundamentalist.

"I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years."


In the words of Warren Buffett, "It's only when the tide goes out that you learn who's been swimming naked."

"It is always better to be somewhat right rather than precisely wrong."

"Corporate financial statements are like bikinis .. what they are show are very interesting ; what they hide is vital"

"Fear is the foe of the faddist, but the friend of the fundamentalist."

"I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years."

"Life can only be understood backward -- but it must be lived forwards"

"Those who don’t learn from the past are condemned to repeat it”

"It never was my thinking that made the big money for me. It always was my sitting. Got that? My sitting tight! It is no trick at all to be right on the market. You always find lots of early bulls in bull markets and early bears in bear markets. I've known many men who were right at exactly the right time, and began buying or selling stocks when prices were at the very level which should show the greatest profit. And their experience invariably matched mine--that is, they made no real money out of it. Men who can both be right and sit tight are uncommon"


My all time Favorite :

“In the short run, stock market is a voting machine and in the long run it is a weighing machine”.

Happy Diwali

It was so nice to celebrate diwali at home after such a long - long time (almost 6 years). I hope you all also had a great diwali. This diwali was kind of special for me as I celebrated it with my little nephew ( bhanje saab) and it looked like he also enjoyed his first diwali. It was fun and I really had a great time. I enjoyed this little break of 4 days to max and I am feeling at all peace now. More on this trip and break to come shortly......

Smelly Cat-Smelly Cat, what are they feeding you ?

I am back to writing after a long time. The reason for this break being, I tranSwitched my job and was busy in adjusting myself to this new place. I left Tejas Networks Bangalore (just have a teeney tiny look at the post below this one and that sums it all) and thought of pursuing my career at another company called TranSwitch,Delhi. Well if there is any soul out there who also thinks that this company will be in business of making Transformers and Switches (as the name for sure suggests, then do contact me). She could be a perfect frequency-mate of mine as initially that’s what I also thought too (Please note “She” in the beginning of this sentence, sorry guys, “It” is not yet legal in India !!). Only when I cleared the HR interview and got the job offer, I came to know that they actually make Asics and the funda behind this misleading name “TranSwitch” is that a Transistor acts like a Switch and Asics have transistors in them. Is there anyone who still says: What’s in the name?

Anyways after doing a little bit of Brownian moment for a couple of weeks or so I am all settled here. Settling down here was not as difficult as I though it would (or can) be. Thanks to so many wonderful people here. I miss my old pals there in Bangalore to the "nth" possible degree.
Each night before going to the bed, the good old house at SA-53, Bangalore comes into my mind. No not because I loved it so much and we (myself and my flatmates, Pocha and Chirkut) had a wonderful time there. That’s true but the main reason being; here in my new house I don’t have any bed at all. So naturally that bed comes to my mind. I seriously miss the time I spent with Amber (Our GrandPa, Sirji), Mithilesh (Meetu), Jalandip (Locha) and Nishant (Neeshu) during those lunch and sutta sessions we guys had together for almost 2 years or so.

Guys that was all real fun and I long to relive that past. Who can forget those There-is-No-tomorrow-Quake-Sessions at Tejas and those TT and Bady games played with Amber & Nishant. Talking of TT, Amber used to challenge me every other day that he will beat me this time but just managing to increase the final score in a simple arithmetic progression like 5/21 to 6/21 in each of the next game (Please bear with me if this is not funny). The same was almost true for Bady also the only difference being I respectfully lost the first game to Amber (score was 10/15 or something) and then never looked back (to this score being my personal best score against him) and many a times the game ended with a perfect score of 0/15 in favor of Amber. Amber, literally speaking I need to settle scores with you. Just replace Bady with Quake in above story and it goes perfectly well for our dude Nishant. This prodigy at games (be it TT, Bady) really amazed all of the Quakers at Tejas by his Quake learning abilities. In barely a month or so, he mastered the art of Straffing and from then onwards he never looked down (as we all always saw him flying in air in DM6 arena). Thanks to this abilty to fly which he acquired and mastered in Quake Areanas, Nishant is on cloud number nine these days albeit for some other reason this time. Locha must be all busy with his little lap-devil he had purchased recently. I recently came to know about the mystery behind this new laptop which this guy has supposedly bought by himself. Actually he has not purchased it. Yes...my agents there told me that all the girls living in the NGV area has gifted it to him. This is so because now he will always be busy with this little devil and they all can live a peaceful life (and have a good evening walk t too) after 7 PM in evening. He is a well known in NGV for his ability to accost people (mostly to girls having an evening walk). Hey one sec this reminds me of dear Chirkut. Actually he has also bought a new laptop within a few days after moving to Kormangla. I sense something fishy here. Chirkut has become a sybarite and is busy in seeing movies on his new home theatre system. Now comes our cool-dude Pocha. A hardcore techie at heart, he is busy doing TechConsultancy at Elina Networks in “IIM Bangalore” these days. I don’t think he would have accepted this offer had Elina’s office been at some other place than IIM B campus.

About my life here, all I can say is I am “coming back to life”. House and other related stuff is all settled. Living alone is a nice experience as such or I should say it is not as bad as I used to think. You know only after I have stared living here alone, I have realized that they are “actually” 24 hours in a day. There is so much time to do so many important things in life be it writing a post like this, watching Friends or South Park. Yes that is all what I do these days and by now all you Friends lover must have got the funda of the heading of this post.

Let me tell you how a typical day of my life goes these days. The pick n drop cab service has taken away almost all the pain from the life as commuting is usually the biggest pain in big cities like Delhi. A pseud Tata Indica (A/C, and a 6 way parallel and surround speakers .. dont ask me what does that mean ..but it is awesome and heavenly sound comes from those) and with some of my really good friends like Jagmeet, Archana, and Gourav comes to my place at around 9 AM in the morning. With that the day begins to roll. I must say that these people in my cab are 100-percent-fun-guaranteed kind of peple. Luckily me, who took a house in Faridabad and opted for this cab facility. Otherwise I would have missed so much fun. I am a firm believer of the fact that as such we all have an endless ability to crack PJ’s but that is nothing compared to the perennial pj cracking ability this gal Archana has. I genuflect Archana. This gal (a music freak too) has an amazing ability to make people laugh and believe me this ability of her is much more infectious than leprosy (or think of the name of some other highly contagious disease you know). So going to the office with these guys is the most wonderful part of my day. As such work load and office life is cool (See I am posting this stuff on net in office hours). It is not as hectic as it used to be in Tejas. People believe in “taking their own time” in doing things here. But looks like it will be a good learning experience (atleast a different experience). Then is the time for the usual lunch session and then the post lunch fattebaaji with my friends Sumit (a nice guy from Lucknow, he is trying to recover from a recent heart break he got after coming to TranSwitch), Bapi (being a bengali implies that he is footer crazy and Dada centric. Let me just quote a thing here which he said to me yesterday. Bapi : “You know Satnam, India will loose today’s cricket match against Australia as Sourav Dada is not playing“. Incase some serial like Desperate HouseHusbands will ever be made, he is sure to get an anchor role in it. He is pinnacle of how desperate a man can become after getting married. And then comes Sai Kumar (or rather Shy Kumar as most of people call him here). Then the usual time pass and browsing. By this time it will already be 3 in the afti and I begin to feel like “abe aaj bhi kuch kaam nahi kiya, only 3 hours left to go back home..kuch to kaam kar loo yaar” and I start to do some work. After working for a couple of hours or so, at around 5 in the evening we go for an evening walk. By the time I come back to my desk from the evening walk, security guy comes and gives me the good news that my cab has arrived. So without wasting a single sec, I lock my computer and run out of the office. While going back home in the cab the whole story of morning PJ sessions and endless fattebaaji repeats and with a feeling that “life is so beautiful” I reach home back by 7 or so. Talking of weekends, I go for marathon sessions of Friends (now u got the heading of this post, right ?)and South park. That’s all how my life is going on here. Incase you are one of those fellows who are blessed with so much patience that you managed to read till here (congrats, u have passed my most difficult test of endurance ever designed for humans) then please don’t forget to leave your comments as you all know that they are the only thing for which I do all this.

I never thought :: My last mail at Tejas

Hi all,

After doing my B.Tech when I came to Bangalore and joined Tejas (please bear with me for myself feeling nostalgic today) :

I never thought that : working in an organization can be so much fun.

I never thought that : people can be so friendly that you feel like as if you are a part of family rather than just a team

I never thought that : some day my manager will be working and putting nightout with me in lab

I never thought that : managers can be so supportive and candid and it feels like as if they are your friends

I never thought that : I would be given so much of responsibility within such a short span of time

I never thought that : I would make so many good friends here

I never thought that : events like Tejas Bash and offsites would be so fun filled and similar to the hostel parties we all had during our college days

and finally,

I never thought that I would be sending a mail like this to all of you one day.

I think by now you must have guessed that today is my last day at Tejas. I really had a wonderful time here and thank you all for the support ( or shouldn't it be Omnibers and Nodes :-) ) you guys provided me in the last 2 years.

Wish you all the very best for your future endeavors.

Will respond back to you if buzzed at : notsatnam@yahoo.com or 9342539827

Sigh..ning out

--- Satnam

It is time to believe in India Story and put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With rising reserves of Forex,
With so many companies going for Capex,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With listed companies forced to make disclosures in detail,
With big boys like Reliance foraying into retail,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With many board considering share buyback,
With market showing resilience and sharp bounce back,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With global community worried about rate hikes,
With emerging market falling like 9 pins whenever crude spikes,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With Indian economy marching ahead on growth path,
With Dalal street witnessing scenes of bloodbath,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With dividend yield falling below the bond yield,
With world's focus moving from stocks to footer field,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With most of analysts predicting US stagflation,
With people concerned about rising inflation,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

With Indian economy's splendid growth one can't ignore,
With fundamentals of companies which one can only adore,
It is time to believe in India Story and,
put your money into Nifty and Sensex

By Satnam

Time to sit back and evaluate the opportunities

I think currently our market is in its highest entropy state which (if I remember my thermodynamics fundaes correctly) stands for a state of total madness. Otherwise how can one describe a 10% fall in CNX Nifty Index on one day and then an equally strong 10% bounce back on the very next day. On last Thursday we witnessed one more session of complete bloodbath on dalal street and as soon as the pundits started saying that we are in bear market, we have breached the 200 EMA levels and hence the markets will fall further, and what not, we had a great comeback on Friday. Bulls were back in action with equal vengeance on Friday. Friday witnessed one of the strongest rallies we have seen in recent times. As any techincal analyst would say, it was mainly a techinal pull back as on Thursday our market ventured into the oversold terrioty.

The global picture still remains mirky and the nebulous environment of interest rate hikes across the globe will not allow equity markets to settle down in near term. RBI's rate hike on repo and reverse repo rate on Thurday will act as the last nail in the coffin of already struggling equity markets.

The way the market cracked in the later part of the day is really a matter of concern. Just at the moment when we were about to come into green the utter lack of buying and large short selling by institutional investors pulled the market down heavily. Huge selling pressure was evident across all the sectors and especially banking as all sectoral indices lost more than 3 to 4 % each. So all in all it was once again a painful session for dalal street with nearly no place to hide from the carnage. Our markets are particularly vulnerable to more correction as even after this correction, most of the analysts believe that our market is still overvalued. So some more pain is clearly there in the system and it is better to be on sideline for the moment rather than to try and bottom fish etc. So let the market setlle down and in the meantime evaluate the good companies ideas which are now available at great prices.

Quote : "The fact that people will be full of greed, fear or folly is predictable. The sequence is not predictable." -- Warren Buffet

Take a break from Market and watch the World cup

I think the best thing which one could do at this point is take a break from stock market and enjoy the world cup scheduled to begin from today. Markets are expected to bounce back today as technically speaking it is in oversold zone. But most of the people believe that it will be just a technical bounce back and investors should use that as an opportunity to exit. Marc Faber in his recent report has said that markets are expected to fall further even from these levels and he has suggested his clients to be on a holiday till this October. US markets were also down by almost 1.4% in the after but a technical bounce back later in the day lead to a smart recovery towards the end and the dow jones and Nasdaq closed almost flat. Yesterday global markets were also falling like nine pins as Russia corrected by 5% etc. One should keep in mind that this correction or meldowm in equity markets is lead by changes happening at global levels like hike in interest rate which most of the central banks are currently doing. Our RBI has also followed the suit and all of suddedn it increased the interest rates by 25 basis points yesterday. Bank of Japan is also expected to raise interest rate from current zero percent which is there at that level for the past 5 years. Also, global inflation is at 10 year high at the moment and this has made all the banks across the various countries to hike interest rates. This may definitely hinder the growth of their economies. Gotta go for lunch... so I would suggest you also take a break from markets and get a life.