11 December 2013

An inspiring meeting!

Had a brilliant time over a drink with Milind last evening after a full day’s worth of work. I had the opportunity to work together with him – nearly ten years younger to me – in i2 many many moons ago. There were some 10,000 employees that had worked at some point of time in i2. By my experience – and feedback from those thousands of i2ers who went and joined a lot of other companies – it certainly was an exceptional place in terms of an unbelievable number of really really smart people coming together under one tent with an incredible “whatever it takes” attitude.

Most all of them have moved on to other companies following great careers. However, I have always wondered whether we created enough entrepreneurs who would go on to start their own companies. For such an entrepreneurial environment, it strikes me as though we might not have had our fair share.

Milind is certainly the most successful entrepreneur I know of from i2.

Having created a company which, in its short history of seven years (last five have generated revenue) has reached an annual revenue generation of nearly $200M, he probably produces more revenue than all entrepreneurs from i2 put together.

What a great success story at such an early age.

We talked a lot about the challenges of growing and sustaining a company. The challenges of building coherent teams and a deliberate culture. Great discussions. Very inspiring.

Hope to see many more young men and women from my past create value in this world like Milind has.

Then he floored me with something.
I did not know this but early in his career, apparently he worked for a Swiss gentleman named Mr. Hertig who had moved to Mumbai and had created an eponymous company to make fine writing instruments and sell there. Milind has a few fountain pens saved from those days.
He had read about my fascination for fountain pens in a previous post and guess what? Since that day, he had saved a pen set for me waiting to meet me some day. That day happened yesterday!

Here’s to many more successes to you, Milind. So much so, that none of my fountain pens can ever finish writing about them!!!

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Category: Fountain Pens, Intersection Points | 8 Comments on An inspiring meeting!
10 December 2013

Central Park Run

5K run with Amy in Central Park early morning. We worked together in our last jobs. It was nice weather… till we sat down for breakfast. And then Boom! Heavy snow started!! I am glad we had finished our run!!
Caught up with her travels in Africa. Was intrigued by her description of Ghana. Apparently poor but very happy people and tourist friendly. Sounds like the African version of Costa Rica!!! Need to put it in my bucket list!

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Category: Running | 1 Comment on Central Park Run
9 December 2013

King of Hearts – a quiz

So, here I am sitting in a much delayed flight to New York. Hope to take off at some point of time. Time for a quick quiz question. I was discussing this with Sharmila during our date night yesterday. And no, she was not referring to me as king of Hearts… We were talking about cards.

What is the one distinctive feature of King of Hearts (physical feature) compared to other Kings in a deck? Try guessing without seeing the cards. Then look at the cards and see if you find it.

Do not post the answer in the comments section.

If you notice carefully there is another distinctive feature of that card compared to the other three kings. Can you find out what it is?

Category: Puzzles | 8 Comments on King of Hearts – a quiz
8 December 2013

“Omuk jinista dhukchhe na” :-)

In an absolute nose thumbing to the traditional Bengali fear of “Thanda legey jaabey”, the Chalupa group showed up to run in cold AND RAIN!! What is amazing is that our two youngest members – Ilu (two or three years old?) and Stuti (five or six years old?) showed up and got out with us in the rain!!!

I missed taking a picture of Arup before he left early but the coffee “adda” at Starbucks made up for the misery of running in the rain. Check out the picture of Stuti playing on her phone and Ilu painstakingly trying to see what she is doing. She was standing on her toes watching her sister all the time. What a great sisters’ moment!!

Also, note the disapproving look on Joyjit’s face watching Baisakhi eat a cake. Eventually he could not help himself admonishing her “Porey bolbey na omuk jinista dhukchhey na, tomuk jinista berochhe na”. (roughly translated – “don’t complain later, this thing is not going in and that thing is not coming out”). I took a few seconds to realize what he was trying to say – then I almost spilled my coffee I was laughing so hard on the floor 🙂

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Category: Humor, Running | 2 Comments on “Omuk jinista dhukchhe na” :-)
2 December 2013

Puzzle!

Not exactly going home – in fact am headed to New York from Boston – but have not posted a puzzle in some time…

Try this…

How many squares can you spot in this diagram (of any sizes)?

It is OK this week to post your answer in the Comments section since you will not be explaining the answer. I will send you a personal message whether you are right or wrong.

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Category: Puzzles | 25 Comments on Puzzle!
21 November 2013

Birth of a morning

Finished my run, grabbed my Starbucks and sat outside the coffeehouse in slightly strong winds. And then watched the morning struggle to break thru the canopy of clouds till it was clear that a new day was upon us. Reminded me of an old poem (forgot the author’s name) that I had once read and copied down….

“So stop waiting until you finish school,
until you go back to school,
until you lose ten pounds,
until you gain ten pounds,
until you have kids,
until your kids leave the house,
until you start work,
until you retire,
until you get married,
until you get divorced,
until Friday night,
until Sunday morning,
until you get a new car or home,
until your car or home is paid off,
until spring, until summer, until fall, until winter,
until you are off welfare,
until the first or fifteenth,
until your song comes on,
until you’ve had a drink,
until you’ve sobered up,
until you die,
until you are born again
to decide that there is no better time than right now to be happy…”

Category: Running | 5 Comments on Birth of a morning
19 November 2013

Interesting unintended consequences. And a puzzle.

Part of an email I got from my good old friend Jyotsna from Singapore:

“Btw your puzzle format on FB was an inspiration to the math teachers at the boy’s school. I had asked the teachers to look at posting puzzles in a forum so that kids can help out each other and gave your puzzles discussion as an example. It is the second week of this discussion on the school forum and the class kids seem to love it!! So you are pretty influential in far away Singapore! :-)”

What started as an exercise to get rid of boredom on a flight back from DC a few years back has certainly had some unintentional – but highly welcome 🙂 – consequences. Thank you Jyotsna!

This puts pressure on me to post the next puzzle. This one is dedicated to the kids in Singapore and elsewhere. And also adults.

(Again, do not post in Comment section; send me FB msg; I will respond)

A few days back, I was cleaning my pool and talking to my another good friend Kuntal over the phone. He had posed a question – “what is the last digit of 19^19 + 99^99”. Over the phone we discussed our answers – he had taken an elegant way to solve it – I had used a short cut.

So let’s try that:

1. What is the last digit of the sum of 19 to the power of 19 added to 99 to the power of 99. (19^19 + 99^99).
And an extension..
2. What is the last digit of
9^9 + 19^19 + 29^29 + 39^39 +……+ 99^99

3. If you have an younger kid – or you are stuck yourself – try with the following simpler version – and then the above two become easier. What is the last digit of 99^99?

Category: Puzzles | 10 Comments on Interesting unintended consequences. And a puzzle.
17 November 2013

Hill runs

16K (10 mile) run in the hills of Milton. After my last disastrous long run two weeks back, this one was much better. I had to slow down to almost 10:30 min/mile pace to make sure I could complete the run. The hills made sure that I did not become too adventurous 🙂

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