Ok the break was enough for me to recuperate from the thunders. Coming back to the interview we were then asked to go for the psychometric test. It actually tests whether you are a born psycho or not because though the MBA colleges prefer a diverse profile, they don't diversify enough to select people like honorable Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Now the psycho test or whatever you call it was for 8 minutes and I found this time too less for self introspection. And the other problem was that all the questions had options which were invariably good qualities and you had to mark the one that described you the best. Now a serious problem with this type of testing is - it assumes that people have only a limited set of conspicuous good qualities. It cannot comprehend the abilities of super human like me (Duh! Here he goes off again!!) who are abundantly bestowed with many good qualities. Ok, ok please read on - you don't have to close the window. Now what was I saying, ya superhuman, no I won't say that, let me be modest, ok it could not comprehend the abilities of a modest superhuman like me. As a result of which i found the test as vague as any year's CAT verbal section. Now, we were called for the next round of interview. The time was around 5 o clock and this time the room was smaller than the previous one (it was a room and not a classroom) and my claustrophobic sensors started peeking. (Ideally, interviews should be held in playgrounds, why not the Eden Gardens?). The panel consisted of 2 elderly looking men and there were 6 of us again. Let me just put it down as a dialogue as to what happened there :
Panel 1 : Ok all of you introduce yourself in not more than 3 sentences. You must talk about yourself, your education and work experience and your biggest achievements, strengths, weaknesses etc.
Panel 2 is scrutinizing the profile sheet we had filled up. (I am sitting 5th from the left)
Me : Blah, blah, (strength - lateral thinking (now, when I said it I did not realize that this word would end taking up half of the interview time)), blah, blah and blah.
P1 : Now were there 3 sentences or 4?
Me: Sir if you remove the fullstops and put commas, there were 3. (Jinxed me, this was not the time for PJs)
P1 : Ok you said lateral thinking, hmm, interesting, all of you one by one define lateral thinking and what it means to you. (I know everybody would have been cursing me for making the interview a bit abstract).
Everyone answers, when my turn comes, he stops me and jumps ahead to the sixth person. (Ya, I knew the curses were deployed with immediate effect and "Justice delayed was justice denied")
Panel 1 looking at me : Now, what do I do to become a lateral thinker.
Me : Blah, blah, blah and a big BLAH.
Panel 1 : Ok, who is the person who introduced this concept of lateral thinking ?
Me : (Realizing that the nail is being driven up the wall slowly) Sir, Edward De Bono.
Panel 1: What did he do?
Me : He wrote a book on lateral thinking.
P1 : Ok he wrote a book fine, but what else?
Me : Blink, blink, blink.
Aspirant 1 : Sir, can I answer, he identified the "Six thinking hats" concept. (Hell, I knew it, I knew it.)
P1 : Ok, if all of you were to rejuvenate the education system using lateral thinking, what would you do?
Everybody : Blah, blah and blah and a discussion ensues based on one person's reply.
P2 (who was quiet so far looking at me) : What are your hobbies man?
Me : Sir, I read books, fiction and non-fiction and I then started talking about my favorite book.
P2 : You read only serious books man!
Me (retorting) : No Sir, I have read Khushwant Singh's joke books too.
P2 : Ah! Then tell us one joke.
(The nail has already disappeared inside the wall)
Me : Blink, think, blink, think (Wow, isn't it poetic - blink, think, blink, think)
P2 : We will get back to you, think of something till then. (I am thinking......)
after some time when I do manage to think of a Khushwant Singh's joke.
P2 : Yes, now tell us your joke.
Me : Sir, I will do it but the condition is all of you must laugh (Darn! Devil peeps out of me, trying to be funny eh?!#@$!#)
P2 : Sure, but you must tell us when!! (Bulb, bulb, bulb!)
Me : (I do tell a joke, but since I did not mention when they must laugh nobody laughs. Oh common yaar, it was an interview and inspite of my infinite jocular capabilities the tension gets on top and that is the reason they might not have laughed.)
P1 : Now, imagine all of you were to become invisible for one day, tell us two things you would do?
All of us : Blah, blah and blah.
P1 : Thank you all, you may leave.
Finally, I was as tired as I am right now after having typed for soooo long. We came out and it was followed by a one hour psychometric test, now this one was not of objective type and we had to write answers in detail and my handwriting abilities came back to haunt me. By the time I finished, it was around 8 o clock in the night.

The interview at SPJain was one experience I will cherish for a lifetime. One for the reason that it was the first time I had traveled by an aircraft and second I managed to get through the first round. Here we go. Yours truly lands at Mumbai at around 10 in the morning. First on the list was S.P.Jain at Andheri (I want to know why it is called Andheri, it is actually a very well lit up place). I take an auto and it manages to reach the place at around 11. It is a huge Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan campus and the SPJain building inside was not a hi-tech funda kind of building and all, but nevertheless it had all that was necessary. I go inside the registration room and am lucky to find another Tamilian (the place was actually swarming with Tamil people). He tells me you have to drop your photo at the registration desk and they will call you. I do that promptly then go out to put on my tie. Now I am no tie expert, did not know how to put on even a single knot but had got two ties knotted up back home. The problem here was the first tie was quite long, it came out like Godzilla's tongue and the second one was kissing my knees. And being a descendant of the great Pallava dynasty, I could not trade the pride I had and ask one of the fellow shortlisted candidates to tie it for me. So, I had to be satisfied with a plentiful tie and it was brought to a 'plentiful' state from an 'extravagant' state after almost half-choking myself to death. I resumed my seat at the registration desk and was done with the mark sheet verification and all other formalities. In due course I realized that the Tamilian had come with a gang of four, all from the same school, same college and staying at the same room now. Whoa, considering the fact that of all the people I have met in life so far - one fourth I haven't been able to keep in touch, one fourth decided it is better not to keep in touch, one fourth are suffering from mental disorders and the last one fourth faithfully and sympathetically trudge on. As a gang of five we had quite some fun when one of the admin guys announced that 1:30 was my interview and I could go and have my lunch and come back. Now for some strange reason, God knows why I sat in the registration room till 1:15 and then my hunger suddenly overtook me. Normalcy gave way to eccentricity and I marched out onto the streets of Mumbai clad in a foolish looking tie accompanied by a lot of onlookers. And then an interesting incident. I go to a hotel and ordered Pav Bhaji, waited for some time it did not come. Then there was a lovely aunty there, I told her "Aunty, interview jaana hai, thoda jaldi ho sakta hai kya". And there we go, she shouted to the person at the counter, "Interview jaana hai jaldi karo", the counter person shouted to the kitchen, "Interview jaana hai jaldi karo" till it reached the final person responsible. Yours truly had attained stardom (Ya, I know you are asking, in Mumbai too?? Wellll, actually, fortunately, ugh ugh....) I had my Pav bhaji, the hotel wished me the best (so nice of them) and there I went to the interview. It happened in the third floor, it is a group interview and there were 6 of us. We were made to sit outside for some time, where we just got to know each other (as luck would have it, three of them were from my company and there were three of us from Chennai). When we were talking I accidentally asked what are the places for sight seeing in Mumbai which was followed by surprised stares, hmm. (And I did not press for racist charges there!!). We went in, it was a big classroom and we were asked to sit after being divided into groups of three. The panel consisted of two ladies who welcomed us with big smiles and this was very encouraging (considering last year yours truly was intimidated by anything and everything related to the S.P.Jain interviews). There was a short discussion on "Nano" and then a few questions like, tell me about yourself , why S.P.Jain, rupee appreciation and all that. Basically, they were testing us for our confidence levels and even though I threw in a lot of crap and junk data, I was loud enough which accidentally ended up in giving an impression that I was confident. We went back to the registration room and in around 10 minutes the first round results were out, I was selected for the next round. (And a number of other things happened like it started thundering and raining at the same time, Mumbai witnessed snow falls as I raised raised my hands to my mouth and shouted Ye! in typical Miss Universe style and all other fellow shortlisted people came and hugged me. Phenomenal, but I wouldn't go into the details of that for the greater good of the humanity.) To be continued.............