About Early Rising - on Nostalgia Lane

OT to Mktg.

Ran into some janta in the Goel Hall remarking I was an early riser. I am and not necessarily by choice. Sleep to me is a primal force of nature that I gave up trying to fight long ago. It literally overpowers the will. Something the Mrs never quite got as she's always found it somewhat difficult to fall asleep.

Even in my MBA days in Joka, Kolkata I would crash by 10 pm and rise by 4.30-5 am. And not because I wanted to. I mean, I missed a lot of the good stuff in the student hostels that only really starts at like 11 pm. The birthday bumpings, the mishti fights, the antaksharis and movie screenings, the card games and footer volley in the hostel quad, the smoke sessions and daru parties.... I slept through it all most of the time.

It also meant that I wasn't particularly popular as a project team mate - I wouldn't/couldn't show up for most project meets only. Even otherwise was more of a loner then, relatively speaking.

Anyway, the nice part was that I could get to wake up reeeally early, when most other janta would be crashing off reluctantly. Serene mornings by the Joka lakes..... Used to practise pranayam those days, have lost the good habits along with the bad ones I guess. My hostel name in those days was 'Monk' and has partly to do with my meditative attempts pre-dawn. Of course, there is also the 'Old Monk' connection.... And then when I troop down to mousees - the 24/7 roadside dhaba just outside the IIMC gate for puri-bhaji and chai, most janta would be trooping back from mousees to crash for the half day.

Almost never missed a class but almost always missed the party - admittedly not a braggable attribute. BTW, IIMC those days had no 'compulsory attendance' policy. Dunno about now, all tyhe IIMs implicitly accepted and copied the 'superiority' of the IIMA strict-regimen format. And the 'no compulsory attendance' suited everybody - separated the interesteds from the disinteresteds from the uninteresteds.

Another issue was that IIMC class profile those days (even now perhaps) was different - skewed towards younger people. Avg work-ex would be like <1 year. Close to half the batch had 0 work-ex. And what IIMC's lack of regimented structure did was it allowed people who should have known better to slack off. I have seen otherwise good people waste away because there was no structure to guide them, no pressure to meet some minimum in performance thresholds. Which is why I'm wiser now. And thankful sleep overpowers me the way it does. It helped me back at a time when I wouldn't a have known better.

Anyway, long ramble. Time to logoff. Shall be back in office today most of the time. Have lunch at Prof. Rishtee's place, so will be away in the afternoon 12.30-2 I think.

Sudhir