Krishna's Den - Last Updated

Welcome to the homepage of Krishna Hegde ... Nice to have you here! I cannot promise that this homepage is constantly updated... whenever I feel like it, I just put my thoughts to keyboard and voila! you have an update.

I realize many of you arrive at this page by googling my name after an email interaction. This page is part blog, part diary, part personal homepage. If you want to mail me - you can do so at krishna dot hegde at gmail dot com

I will be joining the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth beginning Aug 2004 for the MBA program. If you have any queries about applying to Tuck or about what makes Tuck so special and very distinctive among the top business schools, feel free to mail me. And yes, don't bother giving me your stats (GMAT/GPA/AWA etc) because Tuck is one school where stats are *actually* just a small part of your application. After interacting with the many wonderful people who make up the Class of 2006, I realize the Tuck Admissions committee does a fabulous job of assembling a group of people who are accomplished, down to earth and enthusiastic.

August 12th 2004
I have given in! Moved to a blog instead of updating this webpage. You can access my blog here.
August 10th 2004 As the D day nears, I changed my ticket to leave Bangalore a day earlier. Now my mom will come with me to Mumbai to see me off since I have some last minute paper work to be done there. The shopping spree continues. Suits, blazers, Indian ethnic clothes, shoes. Picked up a load of stuff at Metro thanks to a friend. Parallely, the series of good bye dinners continue. When I left Bangalore 8 years ago to go to Pilani, a couple of things were different. I knew I would be back home in 6 months time (and every 6 months), there were a group of close friends coming with me and it was still very much in India. No doubt I will have a wonderful set of friends at Tuck, but still, it is so far away from Bangalore. Given a choice, I am sure my parents would have preferred that I attend B school at IIM Bangalore.

Now that there are so few days left, there is a sudden urgency about winding up things in Bangalore. Also, given my tendency to be sloppy with paper work, documentation etc, I fully expect to have a tough time without being physically present here. Have made arrangements, but time will tell whether they work or not!

August 5th 2004 I am still to adjust to Bangalore! After the fantabulous trek over the weekend :) This trek will rank up there among my best treks. Small group of friends. All of us with our wavelengths matching perfectly. (Eg. When a cloth hung on a line was moving about in the wind, Anand said 'Look at the cloth oscillating' - and nobody found it strange!)
I would have attempted to write a travelogue , but there is no point trying to improve something that is perfectly written. Prashanth has written a beautiful description of the trek, and you SHOULD read it.Click here for the travelogue. There are some more pictures available on a separate link at the bottom of the writeup.
The trek had some moments that are not in the travelogue - like Nishi and I trying to do a Marilyn Monroe flying skirt pose in 'Seven Year Itch' (well we had ponchos instead of skirts). The results looked more like the picture on a packet of Nirma! Then there I was trying to do the jive wiggle in the middle of a puddle. The dance teacher shuddered at the murder of art. But, it was par for the course!

After the trek I went to my native place Sirsi to visit my grandparents. It was a flying visit and I left for Bangalore the same night. I would have loved to do a longer trip covering rest of North Kanara - but there just wasn't enough time.

Once I was back in Bangalore, life continued to be abso hectic. Yesterday we celebrated my grandmom's 75th birthday. It was a surprise party - and my grandmom's first birthday celebration. She was pretty thrilled about it, and was as shy as a small child!

Each passing day reminds me that I need to leave for Tuck really soon. My feelings at this point are mixed. I look forward to the experience I have heard so much about. I will be staying at Buchanan Hall. There is a very nice article about the intensive 24/7 Tuck experience. The prospect of staying on campus, in close proximity to classmates, while isolated in a small rural American town was among the reasons I chose Tuck.

Lots of shopping to do before I leave for Tuck. I hate looking at my bank account. Money just disappears! Insurance premium, TCS IPO, Club Application fees (so that 15 years later I will have a membership at a good club) - and piff, a ton of money disappears. Add to it things like air ticket, getting suits stitched, buying luggage - and the bill just keeps mounting. I shudder to think of how things will be when I will have my savings in INR and spending in USD that runs at USD1 = INR 46.

Oh yeah, before I forget, there were a few nice things that happened last week. I passed my CFA Level 1 exam, got the Tata loan scholarship and the Mahindra scholarship. But am I completely happy ? I don't know. Could I be happier? Possibly not. Well, that I guess is life!

July 30th 2004 What a week.. I have realized that for each week, I end up having a maximum of 3 dinners at home - and the next few weeks don't look to be too different. The week that went past was quite neat. Met up with another Tuckie and his wife. Went on a pub hop(2 pubs in the evening don't quite make a pubcrawl I am told). They had spent some time in Prague last year - so we exchanged notes and memories of the lovely city it is. They had visited Tuck before - and were telling me what a beautiful place it is and the wonderful community that exists there. Apparently Tuck is a wonderful place to raise a family, with excellent healthcare facilities (I think they are free for kids). Me thinks I will raise some pigs in my second year!! Like the young of all species, I feel even piglets are quite cute :)

Last night I had dinner with some friends from the HLL times. Hadn't met them for sometime. But the dinner only vindicated my belief that a friendship doesn't need constant contact to remain strong.

July 24th 2004 The weekend is here - and it is packed! Begged off one dinner yesterday to attend a friend's wedding reception. Lunched today with a friend I was meeting after 2 years. Send off this evening for another friend! And here I am in office doing a rush coding job on Crystal Reports in order to drive up the tax collections of Bangalore city! And to think, till yesterday evening I didn't know how to use Crystal Reports(not that it is rocket science ;-) ).

Many friends have asked me why I maintain this hybridised personal homepage and don't switch to a blog. I like to handcode my HTML - and so this :). But I think I will switch to a blog format soon. That will make blogging from Tuck more efficient - and encourage me to chronicle my experience better! After all, when I am old and gray and suffering from Alzheimer's, I can read my blog to take me back in time.

July 22nd 2004 The last week has been uneventful. Watched Troy. Went to MTR again for a lunch with a friend who is leaving Bangalore soon. This time the lunch menu had Bisibelebath. Am in the process of getting medical tests etc done for my health insurance. Oh yeah, this week saw my first late night work in a long time. Had a milestone in the project I am working on.
The markets have been good this week. In fact, I am suddenly very bullish about the Indian capital markets. The structural change the finance minister has brought about by revising capital gains tax rates and introducing transaction tax should see a change in wealth allocation patterns across income strata. The other day when somebody wanted me to help invest in Indian markets, I discouraged them coz the only tax efficient way of doing it would be through Mauritius. No more! The floodgates will now open up! If you are looking for somebody to steer your ship on this voyage, look no further :)
Thats it for the week so far. I hope the weekend is more interesting!

July 16th 2004 I am back - after a series of trips involving over 2500 kms of road travel and a similar distance of travel by train. I wish I can spend my life just travelling from place to place, meeting people, eating great food, seeing new places. But I need to work to fund my travels :(. I spent the last 4 years (the best years of my life?) working, and the last 3 months have been a sweet reward for the 4 years of work I feel. To be honest, it wasn't like I was burning the candle at both ends during the last 4 years, but it was intensive work nevertheless. The burning candle at both ends part I plan to do for the next few years :).

Okay, let me recount the happenings in a reverse chrological order - it will help me structure my thoughts better. Some day when I read through this, I can mentally relive these joyous times.

On July 15th morning I returned from Mumbai. There were a couple of Tuckies on their India trip in Bangalore. So, I set off from home bright (but not so early) to meet them. With their luggage in the car, we first went shopping for jewellery! Well, I don't even wear a ring/chain - but with two girls who have discovered that Indian jewellery is value for money, you learn to enjoy jewellery shopping. So, we hit Ganjam first. I learnt that all their diamonds are VVS 1. (We don't use any other diamonds here maam). Then we had a sumptuous lunch at MTR (where else!). Then we went off to see more jewellery. Srikrishna on Commercial Street, Krishnaiah Chetty, we went everywhere. The dazzle of jewellery is impressive. There are diamonds with a Hearts and Arrows cut (is the allusion to cupid a mere coincidence ? I dunno). Then did some shopping for cosmetics. Biotique apparently is a good brand - just in case you are equally clueless on these stuff. Shopping done, we landed up at Pecos - had some soda, soaked in the atmosphere. Then I dropped my friends off at the airport and drove away into the night to watch Hyderabad Blues 2 at Bangalore's *only* multiplex.

The trip to the city of Mumbai happened over the 4 days from Sunday through Wednesday. It was a fantabulous trip. First I landed up at Thane at my grand aunt's place. Hadn't been there for a few years, so it felt great. Before I went, I stopped at KVR & Co (Kuber Kunj?) - a famous vada pav and lassi store just outside the station on the West side. If you are anywhere close to Thane and haven't had the stuff there, you are missing out on something!
Next day after a leisurely meal, I travelled across town to meet a friend who I had just spoken to and chatted with for a really long time. We met over coffee, caught a movie (Laws of Attraction) at the Fame Adlabs theatre. It was the first time I had been to such a theatre. My earlier movies at Mumbai were all at G7(Gaiety, Gemini etc) at Bandra. The theatre told me that entertainment as an industry has come of age in India. A weekday afternoon show - and the theatre was FULL. I was happy to have put in money behind Adlabs, the pple who run the place. I then went over to the Juhu beach. Inspite of making over 30 trips to Mumbai, I had never been to Juhu beach. It is a carnival - with tourists, pple exercising, a host of eateries. After a dinner at another aunty's place, I went to yet another aunty's place to sleep. Day 3 saw me meeting some more pple. All from the Business School angle :)
During the trip to Mumbai I read up Gurucharan Das' India Unbound. It is a well writen book and the writer succinctly captures India's development post Independance, while commenting on possible reasons for the way India has developed.

Kerala - Gods Own Country (and Chennai + Pondicherry + Kanyakumari). My trip to these places ranks up there among my best vacations. Of course, accompanying me on this trip was a fellow Tuckie. And like all Tuckies, accomplished but down to earth! So off we went from Chennai, early in the morning to Pondicherry. (I had had less than 3 hours of sleep the previous night, small thanks to MGM vodka at my friend's friend's house at Chennai). The Chennai Pondicherry road (East Coast Road) is a pleasure to travel on as it just skirts the Bay of Bengal. At Pondicherry we did the normal touristy things, Aurobindo Ashram, Auroville etc and set off to Kanyakumari.
Kanyakumari is known for the sunrise, sunset, the temple, and Vivekananda Rock. The sunrise was blocked out by the clouds - but we had a good trip otherwise. Next stop was Padmanabhapuram palace. 6 acres of Government of Kerala property, within Tamilnadu. The moment you step into the palace, you know it is part of tourist friendly Kerala. Extremely friendly and knowledgeable guides don't stop at explaining the architecture of the place but also inform you about aspects of culture. The system of matriarchy followed there was quite interesting. The king had the power, but the heir was the son of the king's eldest sister.
We then went to Trivandrum. Kerala is known for beaches, backwaters, forests and massages. Though we had a really short trip there. we didn't want to compromise on any part of the experience. So, we had an authentic abhayanga massage. The masseur spends an hour tugging at muscles you didn't know exist, while you float naked on a wooden bed with a layer of oil!! Then he gives you a bath with medicated water with besan used instead of soap. The last time somebody else gave me a bath was probably my mother - when I was 5 years old!! I truly felt rejuvenated after the massage, and hope to be back for more - sometime!
The beach resort of Kovalam was the next stop. Since it was offseason, we got a great deal - we stayed at a hotel ON THE BEACH. And as the surf came on a few metres away, we chatted away into the night. It is surprising how two 25 year old guys with similar backgrounds have such similar concerns in life! If you haven't been able to guess already - you probably won't be able to guess :)
After spending some time swimming around at Kovalam we went off to Cochin where I had to attend the wedding reception of a friend. The reception was lovely, and the foodie in me was thrilled that I got to taste authentic Kerala stuff (appam etc). After dinner, we went over to meet another friend of mine who is working there. Like all trainees, he LIVES in a star hotel. Barely had we started conversation, this colleague of his floats in. For the next 5 minutes, EVEN BEFORE INTRODUCTIONS, she spoke about how her day went and we listened. None of us could even get in a word sideways as she spoke. Phenomenal! I was truly impressed!
Next morning, we did the tourist routine around Cochin. The fishing nets, the dutch palace etc etc. We made it to Ramathulla's restaurant in Mattancherry just in time to get a serving of his world famous mutton biryani. (Sidenote - When I started the trip I was concerned that food habits could be a problem since my friend was a Marwari - and hence a vegetarian. He was concerned that as a South Indian brahmin, I would be a vegetarian and hence he wouldn't be able to taste all that Kerala had to offer. But within the first 5 minutes of meeting each other, we were thrilled that both of us relished non vegetarian food!)
By nightfall we were at Kumily (Thekkady/Periyar). Next morning, we did the boat trip around the Periyar lake and spotted 1 bison + a few wild boar + some sambhar. After a walk through the jungle, next on our agenda was the backwater boat cruise from Kollam (Quilon) to Alleypey. We reached Kollam at night. If you go there, the Sea Bee hotel and restaurant (close to the bus stand) are strongly recommended. Though it is a business hotel, it has rooms suitable for budget travellers. Additionally, the restaurant has well prepared food - sizeable portions at reasonable rates.
The boat cruise from Kollam to Alleypey fully deserves the hype around it. The 8 hour cruise meander through the backwaters fringed with coconut palms. I used the time to get a good tan and read 'Freedom at Midnight'. We were the only Indians on the trip. (There were a couple of noteworthy travellers of Indian descent).
After a full day trip of Mysore, capped off with a visit to the Brindavan gardens with their musical fountains, we came back to Bangalore. And next morning, we were off to Tirupati. After a trek up the hill (3 hours was the timing this time around), we were rewarded with a good darshan. Mission accomplished, I headed back to Bangalore - for a breather before running off to Mumbai.

June 28th 2004 I am off on my South India trip in a couple of hours! I go to Chennai today, meet a friend I haven't seen in over 2 years. Tomorrow morning, another Tuckie from Calcutta will join me and we are off to Pondicherry, Kanyakumari, Trivandrum, Cochin (to attend a friend's wedding reception), Alleppey, Varkala, Kollam, Thekkady, Munnar and finally Tirupati via Bangalore. It promises to be a really interesting trip - and all these are places I have never been to before!

I *may* be checking e-mail intermittently during this period - but do not expect to receive any replies just in case you happen to mail me.

June 25th 2004 I suddenly get the feeling that I am wasting my life!! Hopefully it is just a feeling :)

The last few days have been quite varied. The past week I did some good Excel modelling and macro programming. It had been years since I did any programming, and I felt happy that I hadn't lost touch. What started off as an attempt to validate a hypothesis for option arbitrage ultimately ended up being used for checking out the appropriate tax rates citizens of Bangalore city will be paying next year for their property. The city corporation is moving from an Annual Rental Value (ARV) system to a Capital Value System (CVS) and I modelled the impact of this change for properties of different sizes and in different locations in the city. The local government officials were quite thrilled with what 'computers' can do!! This I think is what I had in mind when I decided to do volunteer work in order to make an impact! Extremely gratifying.

However, my option arbitrage hypothesis didn't work :) - probably goes to prove that there is no free lunch. It needs lots more work before I can put money behind it.

Now that I have almost decided that a hedge fund is where I want to be for my summer internship, pple who are in hedge funds seem to be popping up all over the place!! Maktub!!

The weekend promises to be more socializing and Monday I am off on my South India trip!! I sure am looking forward to that one.

June 18th 2004 The past week has been rather nice. Met up with a few of my teachers from High School at the MES Kishora Kendra alumni assoc - Kishora Smriti meeting. A friend and I have offered to volunteer to put the quiz competition together. Kishora Smriti has been around for almost 10 years now - but I have not been able to contribute because of the timing of the events. This year promises to be different.

After the alum assoc meeting, I rushed across town to meet a friend (was able to spend all of 15 minutes - but quality matters more!!), then went off to watch Hum Tum with another friend. Hum Tum is an eminently watchable movie. On Sunday I watched Mona Lisa a Kannada movie. The quality of Kannada movies seems to be in the pits. This movie lacked any semblance of a storyline. The director (or is it the audience?) seemed to have a fetish for the navel, and every two minutes, the heroines washboard abs were flashed on the screen!!

Last couple of days, I travelled to Shravanabelagola, Belur and Halebid with a wonderful friend from Mumbai. The trip also saw me going to Hassan and Chikmagalur. Chikmagalur is quite a nice place. We went to this hillock which has been developed into a beautiful public park. If not for the 2 rupee fee at the entrance, one could mistake it for a premium private resort. Now, on to another weekend!! It looks packed and exciting.

June 12th 2004 After the CFA exam, all the pressure on me has kind of disappeared and this feeling is absolutely fantastic. Well, it was till I saw the Tuck Calendar. Now it looks like it is just a couple of months before I am back in the pressure cooker :)..

Day before yesterday there was a party at Oblivion Clubs to bid farewell to a summer trainee who was part of my erstwhile team at HLL. Oblivion Clubs is actually a combination of a lounge, a disc, a pub, a closed eating place and a terrace dining area. Had a really wonderful time since the place was absolutely empty!

This afternoon there is an alumni assoc meeting of my school - and I got to know of it late last night!! Terrible!! Anyway, given the amount of time I have on hand, atleast this time I should contribute my bit to make the alumni organised fest a success.

Later this evening I hope to meet an old friend who was with me at BITS and later at HLL. Then am planning to watch Hum Tum - the movie is supposed to be a copy of 'When Harry Met Sally' minus the restaurant scene!!! I loved it when the lady at the neighbouring table in the restaurant says 'I will have what she is having' after watching Meg Ryan's performance (sic!).

June 8th 2004 Am done with the CFA exam too. I hope my exam went fine and I will pass. The trip to Mumbai was fantabulous. Landed up at Mumbai on Saturday night and went straight to my aunt's house. After a bath (the train journey left me all tired and dirty), hopped over to Siddhi Vinayak for a darshan, made lots of phone calls to friends in Mumbai and had a good night's sleep. Next morning, Ashwin picked me up early in the morning and I was at hotel (oops examination hall!) by 8:00 am. The number of people appearing for the exam was more than 1000 - and considering that the exam isn't exactly cheap at USD 800, I was rather surprised.

Post exam, we landed up at Cafe Mondergar to meet up with fellow Tuckies (there was even a T'07. Tuck has given people admissions for people to begin studies in Fall 2005!). Had a great time. Then trooped across half of Mumbai for some work, was back home at 11:00 pm!. Another refreshing bath and I was in bed by midnight. The train journey back was interesting. The copassenger was a guy who studied with Hariharan (the singer), at Don Bosco Matunga. He was telling us how he used to get the first prize in singing competitions and Hariharan always stood second. And now Hariharan is a great singer and he is a great bathroom singer!. The remarkable part was, there was absolutely no envy when he recounted the whole story.

So now it is back to Bangalore. A busy time ahead. Lots of meeting up with people.

Boo Hoo.. I missed the monthly Sunday card game with uncle and cousins :(.. and my dad told me about it once I was in town this morning. Not that I could have helped it - what with the exam and all that...

May 30th 2004 Passport stamped with visa reached. I am now totally relieved that this process is done and I can concentrate on more meaningful things. The first thing on my plate is the upcoming CFA exam. My state of preparation is rather bad - and I will be extremely lucky if I can clear the exam. Let us see. Am putting my best foot forward.

The other priorities for the next couple of months are a. Make a more meaningfun contribution at eGovernments Foundation. The visa process and CFA exam have prevented me from devoting as much effort as I would like to. Now that these are out of the way, I should be able to do much better. b. Build up my stamina - either by running/gymming. The Ooty trip made me realize that my stamina levels are at their lowest in the last few years. Need to concentrate on building them up. c. Learn golf. I hope to take a few golf lessons so that I atleast know the basics of golf before I go to Dartmouth. d. Read up books on Indian freedom struggle and post Independance history of India. My knowledge of these is rather superficial. e. Understand and appreciate economics and accounting. I like these subjects - but haven't been able to study them with some time on hand. Hope to do that now.
Let us see how many of these I succeed in achieving over the next 2 plus months.

May 28th 2004 Visa interview is done! What a relief. I think the hype around the process is more than what it should be. Nevertheless, it went off very smoothly. Spent the rest of the day in Chennai meeting up with friends an partying. Evening was spent at Speed - a nice pub in the Grand Orient (this is on Mount Road). Had a fantastic group of friends coming together - one of them I was meeting for the first time, and another for the second time. But, going by the camaraderie, it looked like we knew each other from ages.

Last weekend, I spent a fabulous 4 days in Ooty. (Okay - not in Ooty - but at a place called Parson's Valley, 1 hour drive from Ooty. Ooty as a place is too touristy and crowded for my liking). The jungle resort we went to was absolutely marvellous. Set in the middle of a green valley, it was a 20 minute walk away from a watering hole for animals. We managed to see some wild boar, wild buffaloes and sambhar. It was a welcome break from the city life in Bangalore. The pictures of my trip will be here soon. We took loads of pics, a way of trying to relive the experience later.

We drove down to Ooty in two vehicles. The group consisted of my uncle, aunt, cousins, dad's cousin's family, and a bunch of second cousins. 15 people in all. And of the 15 - 8 were below 15!. Kids of today are a fascinating bunch. They are so different from what I was as a kid. There was this cousin who is in 6th standard talking about how snake poisons are haemotoxic or neurotoxic. I don't think I could spell these words back then leave alone understand them. On the way to a wildlife sanctuary, a sambhar darted across our vehicle. A 3 year old cousin recounted this to her dad thus 'Pa, when we were driving, rasam crossed the road!'. Well, rasam, sambhar - all the same :-D

Another wonderful aspect of these trips are the conversations. My uncle and aunt are doctors. So the conversation covered a variety of topics. Eg. How in current day India, the life spans of women is more then men. So, it makes sense for men to marry older women (and not vice versa). Then the discussion veered towards how current day pressures of work and career are impacting family life. Apparently, the best age for women to have kids is 18-21 :-D. Coupled with the first hypothesis, guys should marry when they are 18 and they should marry girls aged 21. Damn, somebody should have told me this 7 years ago. Then we discussed career options, (considering that my sis, and a cousin both finished 12th standard this year). I was horrified to learn that the fees for a PG degree is approx Rs.3.5 lakhs per year. Phew, Tuck looks reasonable in contrast ;-).

May 20th 2004 India's future is bright!! Manmohan Singh is gonna be prime minister. In fact, I am feeling so good about it that I am off to Ooty tomorrow morning for a 4 day break!! Actually I am going to a small resort close to Ooty with uncle, aunty and a bunch of cousins. The USP of this place is the food is great!! Initially we were to take 3 vehicles including my car, and I was all charged up at the prospect of my first road trip. But now we aren't taking my car - so I will have to be content with watching the scenery and having some great conversation.

My CFA studies are *just not getting anywhere*. I am concentrating on the ethics part hoping to get all the marks in that section. Figured out that it has the ideal ratio of effort to rewards. Looks like I will be studying GIPS in Ooty too :). But then again, mixing business with pleasure will not hurt in this instance ;-).

Next week is my visa interview in Chennai! 27th is the day. I am going with the tack that I should be able to repay the monstrous loan I am taking by working in India. Let us hope I get a visa - coz the rest of the day at Chennai is packed back to back meeting friends and it will be a bitch if I don't get a visa.

May 17th 2004 The carnage on the Indian stock markets continues. I am afraid at this rate, my complete portfolio will be wiped out in a matter of a few days!! Anyway, I guess I will debit my losses to my learning account and move on with life. I am actually happy that I learnt a lesson on the impact of politics on the stock markets quite early. Going forward I will ensure that there won't be another election where I go in with a huge unhedged long position. Expensive lessons!! After my CFA exam, I will spend some time changing my portfolio into a market neutral fund. June and July will be litmus tests of how I perform!

Most of my time is now spent studying for the exam. Statistics is something I never quite appreciated at BITS, (notwithstanding the fact that I made an A in the course). I could never fathom how to define a null hypothesis. And now I am trying to digest concepts like ANOVA and homoskedasticity. Guess I need to spend more time on these concepts and make sure I understand them well atleast this time round.

Compared to quantitative theory, I find equity and debt investments more interesting. Swaps was something I didn't know about - and now have a much clearer idea. Pity the Indian markets aren't as mature/deep as the American markets. There are lots of places where I want to test out theory by putting in some data - but can't.

May 14th 2004 Another week gone by - not much progress on my studies :(. Anyway, have realized it is now or never and have started studying harder from this morning. Hope it tranlates into results (unlike the NDA!).

Spent part of yesterday browsing through the Tuck Resource Guide. Am amazed by the kind of activities available there. And give the outdoorsy person I am, I just hope I am able to try out everything - from horseback riding to canoeing to skiing to golf to snowboarding to running to using the climing wall! Time will tell :).

The Bangalore weather is just fabulous. While the rest of the country is either muggy or very hot - Bangalore is nice, cloudy and lazy. No wonder it is the most livable city in India.

May 9th 2004 Now I am perfectly fine!! Phew, the flu was a harrowing experience. The antibiotics left me quite weak. Anyway, I hope it doesn't recur!
Now I need to make up for all the last time and study diligently for the exam. Yesterday and today I was able to put in substantial effort. Read up a load of statistics, probability etc. Guess it will take one more reading before I internalize the nuances of using a Students t-statistic vis-a-vis a Z Statistic. I have just 20 days of study left for the exam!! Hope I pass.

Also managed to go to MG Road/Brigade Road last evening - just browsing around. The last 1 week Bangalore weather has been absolutely lovely. I feel like just sitting outside in the garden - and eat hot pakoras with pickle!. Food reminds me - this afternoon I cooked my own lunch. I was cooking after a really really long time. Felt very happy with the exotic fried rice I prepared. Don't know why I suddenly stopped cooking sometime back. Anyway, looks like I am now back in the kitchen with a vengeance!!

I got a Gmail account thanks to Mukul. So, you can now send me all the attachments you want to send - without worrying about flooding my mailbox! Gmail is a pretty elegant solution to managing email. Love the ability to assign multiple labels to an email. Tagging emails using Outlook always got me in a bind - because there were some emails the content of which spanned subjects. Ultimately, I ended up archiving mails just by time - and didn't classify them by subject. If I had Gmail equivalent functionality in Outlook - it would probably have made my life easier!

May 5th 2004 Today is the last day of my antibiotics course - have been taking a 500 mg dosage of Azithromycin to beat back whatever was causing that fever and sore throat. Hope to return to work tomorrow - but I still have some chest congestion.

The last few days saw some confusion on my I-20 front. The required documents hadn't reached Tuck and I was in a hurry to get done with my visa interview. Finally, this morning, it was confirmed that the docs reached - so I am a bit relieved.

I haven't opened my CFA books since returning from Mumbai - and time is flying by :(. From tomorrow, the great CFA ghot will start and will finish only when the exams finish :). The motivation of 4 days of relaxation at Ooty a couple of weeks from now should ensure that I sustain the momentum on the study front.

Marriage - This is what my mom asked early this morning. Apparently somebody was asking my grandparents back in my native place whether I was looking to get married. Well, I am looking to get married - but NOT NOW. *May be* after a couple of years - if not more :). My mom thankfully got the message and conveyed the same upstream. One easy way to 'shoo off' elderly people fishing about is to talk proudly of the boatload of debt I am taking on. And as I attend more social events over the next few months, I expect exploit this strategy to to the hilt ;-).

May 2nd 2004 :( Am wracked by a fever + sore throat + a cold. I hate it when I am out of action :(. Guess it will take a couple of days to run its course and I will be fine. But for the day I am grounded!! Looks like I will miss the monthly card game tonight :(. In fact another of the foursome is not attending - so it will be rather terrible if we have to break the tradition of the monthly family gettogether - just coz of my flu.

Started doing the groundwork for my visa interview on May 27th. I am looking for an F1 visa so that I can start studies in August. In case you already know, I am taking over a boatload of debt to do my MBA. Thankfully, the school is ponying up most of the money in the form of a loan. My obligation is just to repay it!!

The results of the IIM entrance exams are due over the next couple of weeks. This friend of mine has taken a small gamble by passing up an admit at another indian B school with the intent of attending the IIM - and I am hoping he gets in to the place he wants to attend.

On the academic front my CFA hall ticket has arrived - and I am none to happy with my level of preparedness. So, need to fire all cylinders. The exam is on June 6th in Mumbai - I plan to spend an extra day there catching up with cousins, friends and relatives. My list already has 6 pple I plan to catch up with - and is only growing!. 1 day will probably be too little - but I will try to squeeze things in.

My travel plans for June are filling up rather soon. It is just May - the month has a couple of trips have already been planned - Chennai for the visa interview, Ooty for a 4 day outing. June - it is Mumbai + Tirupati + Kerala (I need to flesh out details of the Kerala trip today) and possibly a trip to native place.

April 30th 2004 Today is my second day at work @ eGovernments Foundation. The last 1 week I have been travelling like crazy - and I spent yesterday catching my breath. First it was Vijayawada. The place was not as hot as we expected it to be. Thank god for that!! The wedding was one grand occasion. I now know where all the gold reserves of India are located!! The food at the wedding was umm.. lipsmacking. There was one particular dish I just loved. "Ulava charu" - is the dish. I have also been told of a particular restaurant in Bangalore - Eden Park - that makes this. So,will try it out sometime.

My Mumbai trip was also smashing. Spent time on the onward journey reading up Financial Statements Analysis. Was able to spend good time with my aunty catching up on my cousin's wedding details. Then had lunch with a close friend of mine. In 15 years time we plan to have a hedge fund going from our native place :)

Then I went on to the Tata Scholarship Interview. I think it went off okay. Will know the results in July. Hope they give me some money. We then went over to Cafe Mondegar (I hadn't been there though I have visited Mumbai over 50 times so far!!). Picked up some books in Fort and then returned to Shiv's place for a small party. Early in the morning I took the train - but not before hogging some misal pav at a joint near Dadar Station. On the train I read up some Lila , some India Unbound and slept lots!! Now it is back to good ole Bangalore.

April 21st 2004 I now join the legions of unemployed graduates in India. Damn, I should have voted for the Congress - now that I can identify with their advertisements. Was told this morning that the link I had put up for my new photographs didn't work. So have tweaked it. The perils of handcoding a web page!
I am off to Vijayawada day after tomorrow. A friend is getting married there - and I haven't seen him in 5 years! I return from Vijayawada on Sunday afternoon and then take the Monday morning train to Mumbai. Boy! I love travel.

April 20th 2004 Second update of the week! Wow!. Shows that I don't have much to do :). Went early this morning and cast my vote. It is a pity I couldn't vote in the previous election though I was eligible (was away at Pilani). The rest of the day was spent trying to study - finished Financial Statements Analysis - I. Pretty interesting stuff. Now I can appreciate differences between the US GAAP and IAS GAAP treatment of Statement of Cash Flows. And to think GAAP means Generally Accepted Accounting Principles :). I think accounting is infinitely more interesting than trying to find solutions to the deadlocks in distributed operating systems :).

Tomorrow is my last day at HLL. Need to send out some more farewell mails and come back. Next week, I am in Mumbai on Tuesday - 27th for a scholarship inteview. Am looking forward to meeting a couple of my future classmates while I am there.

April 19th 2004 I came in this morning knowing that it would be the last 3 days of work :), and was immediately told that tomorrow is a holiday because of elections, so people will be working on Saturday instead of tomorrow. Since Wednesday is officially my last day, I don't think I am supposed to come to work on Saturday :). So, I get an extra day's holiday - just like that!

On Saturday, the group I am part of hosted a farewell dinner for me at Samarkand. In case you don't know already, Samarkand is a specialty restaurant that makes wonderful central asian food. The chandni kabab just melted in my mouth. Folks also got me very thoughtful farewell gifts. I am going to miss working with such a wonderful set of people - but I guess that is the way of life :(

Yesterday we had a family potluck lunch at Lalbagh. Had a wonderful time - just chatting up with the uncles and cousins and everybody. For those of you who haven't visited Bangalore, Lalbagh is a HUGE botanical garden built by Hyder Ali/Tipu Sultan.
Last evening, I watched a movie - Murder with a couple of friends. The first part of the movie is almost a skinflick - but the second part has a story. It can be watched once.

April 16th 2004 At work, I am almost done on all fronts. Tying up some loose ends, some administrative matters etc. Went to Chennai yesterday for some handover related stuff. Spoke to another of my future classmates there - cool guy who calls himself a complete techie. At times I reflect on my journey of life - I almost became a lawyer (from National Law School!), came close to becoming a doctor (from the best Medical College in Karnataka), finally became a computer science graduate from BITS, Pilani - did hardcore technology courses and electives (heck! I even did Advanced Operating Systems - a masters level course, out of sheer passion!), chucked all my technology likings, and chose a job that had more of a business component than a technology component - and now am planning to switch into a totally non technology career! Wow!! I just hope this constant change continues to be continuous!

One of the people I met on recent trip to Pilani talked about a beach trek - from Goa to Karwar. It is just walking along the sea! I was fascinated by the idea, and plan to do that sometime over the next few months. My uncle is also enthusiastic about this, and am sure will have a nice small gang in place for this. Promises to be fun - whenever it happens.

Kerala is another place I have always wanted to go - but have never made it inspite of opportunities. I hope to go there too before August.

April 14th 2004 The CFA studies have gotten some momentum and the June 5th exam seems kind of achievable IF I sustain this momentum. Since this is my last week at HLL, there are some dinners lined up. Last night I had been to Citrus, the restaurant at the beautiful Leela Palace . The desert - Black Forest Gateaux was simply awesome. Since today is a holiday and I have been mostly at home, studying, I thought it is a good idea to upload some of the pictures I took over the last week. . Before you click, be warned that there are 5 pictures and may take some time to load - depending on the speed of your connection.

April 11th 2004 What a week! As different as any week I have had so far. The highlights of the week were my farewell at HLL and the MES Kishora Kendra class of 1994 reunion. First the reunion and my reflections on that!

After two weeks of email exchanges and phone calls/SMSes, the reunion happened yesterday. It has been 10 years since all of us finished our high school at MES Kishora Kendra - and went our respective ways. It was fascinating to meet 23 of the people with whom I spent the 3 years that consisted high school. Many of our classmates were unable to make it because they were out of the country/city/had prior committments. While more than half the people in attendance did something in the IT/ITES industry, it is fortunate that we had some diversity in the group, with a couple of researchers, an architect, a doctor, a banker and an accountant in attendance. The get together started off at the appointed time of 1:00 pm, and slowly picked up steam. Some introductions happened. Lots of people had not changed in appearances, some had changed tremendously. I apparently fall in the latter category - though I didn't risk asking people whether the change was for the better ;-) .

The nostalgia in the space was visible to everybody. We were all joking and laughing like a bunch of teenagers. Imitations of actions of teachers were in abundance. However, I personally realized that 10 years is a long period of time, and blurs a lot of memories. We talked about how teachers took classes, some of our classmates, the time when a fellow student came to class with his head partially shaven (after his thread ceremony), the Saturday I wore shorts to school (Man, was I embarassed that day when I realized I probably had crossed the fine line of appropriate dressing!).

After lunch at Eden Park, we shifted to Corner House for some dessert. If you ask me what I had for lunch, I (the quintessential foodie!) have a very hazy recollection - coz food was not the objective of the gathering. Corner House had a good play area for kids - and unleashed the kid in many people. Folks were playing on the swing, the slide and generally having a good time. In all, we must have taken atleast a 100 photographs. We can make a wonderful album to capture the occasion. I had to leave before the whole group broke up because I was running a tad late for a prior committment (something I had put forward a couple of times as the afternoon wore on). However, the glow of the having met my classmates will stay with me for sometime.

The reunion provided a good opportunity for me to reflect on my time at school and pre university. As I look back, I realize I was such a different person then. My current mental mindset is in contrast to what I was then. As a teenager, I was very immature, childish, and a tad insecure. There are certain things I did that in hindsight I wish I hadn't. I am not about to bare my soul and share with the world at large my screwups. But I am apologetic about them. Then again, I guess as a child, everybody makes their mistakes. Sigh! C'est la vie

The reunion has been a good beginning of getting the class of 94 together. We now need to channelize the energy of this group so that we can do something worthwhile for our school.

The other significant event of last week was my farewell at HLL . I was apparently the first person to take photographs in a farewell function. But, the company has meant a lot to me, and I believe will have a significant influence on my life going forward. My boss gave a very touching speech about my stint there. At the risk of repeating myself, if I were to turn the clock back to 2000 and start my career again, I would still choose to take up the job I did. That I guess should tell you the wonderful time I had at HLL.

Now my CFA studies have started off in full steam. My days are filled with studying macro economics and micro economics. The topics are very captivating. Instead of debating whether ROLAP or MOLAP is better, I now wonder whether fiscal policy changes are better than monetary policy changes for tackling an overheated economy :)

April 5th 2004 After a nice weekend, I realized time is just slipping away. Started off with full dedication on my CFA studies. Am really enjoying it. Read corporate finance this morning. Somehow I didn't enjoy last evening's dance class. Was feeling rather low. Am angry with myself coz I don't know why I was feeling low. Anyway, was all pepped up once I returned. Yesterday being the first Sunday of the month, we had the family card game. It was really good fun - and we managed to finish 3 full games in 2 hours!! The week appears to be packed. I can see my 'At home 7:00 pm onwards" rule being broken atleast twice during the week! I am not complaining :)

Oh yeah. I got my computer. Athlon 2400+, 256 Mb RAM, 40 GB HDD, 17 inch Monitor, 52X CD Writer, UPS etc. So, now I need to go about installing software etc.

April 3rd 2004 We are having a reunion of my high school class. The MES Kishora Kendra class of 1994. When I finished 10th standard in 1994, I had no idea what I would be doing in 2004. But time flies so fast! It will be great to meet up with the people with whom I studied for 3 years. A few of them I have kept in touch with - but have lost contact with most of them. Am looking forward to the reunion.

The last week was spent coordinating this reunion. Getting agreement on a place and time is not as simple as it sounds :). But now we have a place and time decided, I am sure we will have a great lunch together. In fact, given the amount of time & energy I spend on the BITS Alumni Association activities, I sometimes wondered why I don't do the same for my high school. May be 4 years of living on campus with a set of friends makes you much passionate about the institution. May be it is just that I met a set of people at Pilani who I could relate to much more (primarily due to the fact that we were all much older then). Regardless of the reason, I hope to get more involved with the alumni activities at my high school - atleast over the next few months before I go to Hanover.

The next few weeks will be spent making the transition from HLL to eGovernments Foundation where I will be working as a volunteer for sometime. I am all charged up for this assignment. After a long time at a top private sector organisation, it will be a very different experience. Even though it is a short stint, I am sure the learning I will gain will be tremendous and I will be happy for having contributed in a small way.

This afternoon I went and ordered for a desktop computer. The computer I currently use comes with the job (and hence goes with the job ;-) ). Prices of computer hardware have fallen drastically. A good machine is costing me just over Rs.26000. Next week I need to order business cards. Ashwin sent me a classic design which I have decided to copy with pride!.

A lot of my interaction nowadays is with my future classmates. One of the top reasons for my choosing Tuck School of Business was the community. Every person I interact with reinforces my thought that the folks at Admissions have chosen an exceptional set of people. Each person reaches out to the other and makes substantial effort to help! The wonders of technology means many of us haven't even seen each other. Just connecting over email and telephone, we have a community in place that is spread across the corners of India! Some day, I will write a big post on the business school application process!

March 30th 2004 The end of March. Time flies so fast!! There must be some way to slow down the march of time! (Pun unintended). I woke up this morning and realized that the CFA exam is just over 2 months away - and my preparation is IN THE PITS. Time to start studying hard. I have decided to curtail all forms of evening entertainment - get back home by 7:00 pm and stick to studying. If you read this and still send me an invitation for an evening out - you will be blamed if I flunk my exams! Don't tell me you weren't warned.
Last week we had a mini BITSAA gathering at Zero G - a pub(?) in Bangalore. It was the day of the historic India win over Pakistan (in cricket!). The gathering and the camaraderie was great and capped off the BITSConnect launch very well.

March 22nd 2004 Last weekend I went to Delhi and Pilani. That was the high point of the week and what follows is a description of the trip.

My trip to Delhi and pilani was decided at the very last moment. My farewell at HLL was planned for Friday and this clashed with the press conference we were organising at Delhi. During the course of my conversation with a BITS alum who is a director at HLL, I mentioned that I would not be travelliong to delhi. He insisted that I speak to the head of my department and offered to speak if there was an issue. Of course, the super boss didn't have any issues and I was able to make the trip.

On Thursday night I took a flight to delhi. Reached Delhi and was immediately inundated with phone calls. The wrong address had been printed on the folders. An interview with CNBC needed to be set up. NDTV wanted to do an interview. So I did all the coordination on the way to the guest house.

Had a punctuated night's sleep. Working across timezones meant that I was part of conversations with the other person either in the US East Coast or the West Coast. At ten, I made my way to the venue of the press conference. The whole event was organised virtually. Other than the people from bangalore and the director of HLL to whom I had made a couple of presentations - I met everybody else at the hotel. This was a team that had studied at bits at different points over four decades, and now lived at different places across the globe. When I first met everybody I had NO IDEA of the mindblowing 48 hours I was about to experience.

The press conference was well attended by both electronic media and the press inspite of the India Pak match that day. Then all of us travelled to Pilani in a cavalcade of cars. It was quite a motley group consisting of wildly successful entrepreneurs, marketers, managers and a writer. Disparate people - united by the common bond of having attended one of the best engineering schools in india.

As we came closer to Pilani, I could hear my heart beat louder. It was four years ago that I had walked out of these hallowed gates. A wave of nostalgia swept through me. As I saw the familiar Sarvi, the Bhagat Singh statue and Panchavati, I reminisced about how the wheel of time rolled by. I relived in that ride to pilani, all the various delhi pilani trips I made. The tension when you realize the bus has had a puncture. The joy of meeting your wingies after a vacation. The mess food you curse while on campus - but begin to miss when you are go away.

Finally we were at BITS. We checked into the VFAST hostel. It is quite a swank guest house - complete with a data port in the room! We then went over to the music club. I had never been there during my time on campus. Then I went over to the Centre for Entrepreneural Leadership and spent some time with the boys and girls there discussing their plans for the internship program. Boy! I feel old! The people were full of ideas and enthusiasm. Untempered by the harsh realities of the professional world.

I spent the next hour roaming alone on campus. Just soaking in the great feeling. The seem to be many more girls on campus. I also got the feeling thatthe current lot more focussed on studies. I then landed up at the night canteen with a couple of students and had SAM CHAT. It was delicious in a way only a pilani sam chat can be!

We then went over to the institute 'C Block'. Going through the corridors of the computer science group felt great. Except I could recognise only a couple of names on the rooms.

The next day, first thing in the morning I went to C'Not. The barber shop I used during the time at BITS was open. Since it wasn't time for a hair cut, I asked for a head massage. Felt heavenly!

Later in the morning was the inauguration of BITSConnect. In the previous week we had rebranded the gigabit network project as NEURON and repositioned BITSConnect as the umbrella movement of alumni partnering with the institute. However, there seemed to be some gap in communicating this within BITS. On the way to the auditorium I travelled in a car with the Cisco top brass including Mario Mazzolla.

The inauguration was a formal affair with different dignitaries speaking about why BITS is different and way forward.. Met quite a few faculty members who had taught me.

After this we went to the new lecture theatre complex. I have never seen such an impressive facility. It compares favorably with the lecture theatres at INSEAD.

The new library is huge and looks more like a swanky mall. Of course it is wireless enabled!

Like a true BITSian I bunked the next lecture and went to Sky lawns with a couple of others. The institution called Pappu continues to dole out shikanji and cream rolls. After a few shikanji's and discussions about memories of BITS we headed back to the guest house for lunch. Most people's memories of BITS seemed to revolve around their girl friends. I had my crushes - but never had a girl friend on campus. Comparing notes with the others (91 batch and 75 batch people respectively) I realized that my Pilani experience would have been very differernt if I had been going psenti. But I think I love the way I spent those golden years.

After a sumtuous guest house dinner - complete with fruit curd, we headed out to listen to talks by Gulu Mirchandani,Prem Jain and Mukesh Chatter. Then it was back to Sky for more shikanji. Chatted up with a few residents of Malviya Bhavan. I realized that folks on campus are not leveraging effectively the resources that exist in the form of a huge and helpful pool of alumni. Now that BITSConnect as a movement has gained some traction, I feel we can do something to mitigate this.

Later, I went over to a faculty member's house and caught up with the latest developments on campus.
That evening we had dinner at RB mess. After dinner we went over to the auditorium for music night. As usual the music club had everybody swaying to their tunes. Since it was a formal event there was no dancing. Nevertheless we danced to the last 4 songs. Papa Kehte was played, but I didn't have a friend I could tango with :-(.

We then spent the next two hours bonding over samosa and chai. 10 Bitsians from across four decades. We discussed the unsightly sight of people drying their underwear in public sight. We decided that the music club folks were actually not huddling. 'It was more that 30 seconds. So it wasn't a huddle' said the authority on VLSI. We decided that it was a cuddle. Others huddle, BITSians cuddle! I fell asleep at the night canteen and had to almost sleepwalk back to the guest house.

The final day of the trip - morning we went over to the Saraswati temple. Countless evenings spent here came back to my mind in a flood. The birla statue in front of the temple now has a canopy covering it.

After breakfast, I bade goodbye to BITS rather hesitantly. Not before promising myself to return for another trip down memory lane.

I live in Bangalore. You can mail me at ...krishna dot hegde at gmail dot com...

My Postal address and my contact address when I am at Bangalore -
Krishna Hegde,
No 9, Type V,
CPRI Colony, New BEL Road,
Bangalore - 560012

Ph. + 91-80-23600353

I joined Hindustan Lever Ltd,(The No 1 Fast Moving Consumer Goods company in the world!) in July 2000. HLL is an amazing company and the people are just wonderful. The kind of work I have done in the last 20 months and the learning I have got is unbeatable. I have grown personally and professionally at a rate which amazes even me! My assignments have seen me work in different places in different functions. I am currently handling a couple of datawarehousing projects and supporting a call centre... work is fun... involves a lot of travel.. (not the kind of travel I like though... it would be another matter if we had all our offices in the hills..)

I worked at INSEAD, Fontainebleau , France from Jan 2000 to June 2000. These 6 months changed my life!. I saw a new world. Listened to speakers ranging from Anthony Burgmans to Julie Meyer. The Financial Times and WSJ Europe formed my staple diet. And then, there was Paris - a city unparalleled in luxury. Any mention of INSEAD will be incomplete without telling you about the wonderful evenings spent playing foosball at the bar. We even managed to beat some Italians!

The years I spent at Pilani were the most memorable years of my life. My wingies from various parts of India were my companions as I undertook this trip. We spent some time studying, more time playing cricket and 28(a card game) and lots of time putting laccha(Pilanese for idle gossip). If I can call myself a complete Indian today, Pilani is responsible for it. Thanks to BITS, my Hindi is now better than my Kannada... and I can actually relate to the error messages Windows throws up - with all the register values :) (After all I did a degree in Computer Science!!)

And BITS is where I became addicted to movies. Govinda movies rock. I found out that watching Hero No. 1 the night before a MechSol openbook helps you crack the test!

MES College was where I met Subhash,Prashant and Nikhil - part of the Bangie gang @ Pilani... also the place where I met Prashanth and got to know Ashwin well....College was fun, coz we attended classes just for the heck of it...(dunno what I would have done without tuitions! I can hear a few others shout their approval)..

These photos were taken in Nelahozeves. The objective of the pictures is to highlight my new hair style!

. This is my new blogchalk:
India, Karnataka, Bangalore, Bangalore, English, Hindi, Krishna, Male, 21-25, Travelling, Stock Markets. :)