What doesn't kill you makes you stronger

It’s always good talking to you Mr. Reader! Especially now that I have hardly anyone to blabber to (how I miss you, insti!) You see I am enjoying my last few days home (you could say months but I am going to pretend not to hear it); I have got admit from HEC Paris for their Masters in International Finance Program! My class commences in September and meanwhile life’s left me to indulge in some (well-deserved?) unlimited leisure. Now, HEC comes with its own campus, hostels and restaurants and hence the cooking lessons have been indefinitely postponed by me. Good as I am at doing nothing (ok that’s different from good-for-nothing!), I am hardly upto anything these days. That’s if you agree that spending endless hours on TV, reading novels, watching movies and laptop-ing amounts to no work!

I have never been out of India. Plus if you know me, I am hardly a brave heart. Even a cockroach can scare the hell out of me and a 5^th grade boy could get the better of me. On the face of it, I am quite hopeless. But look again Mr. Reader I have aged a lot more last four years (almost an exponential curve if you ask me). Particularly my last semester brought about an uprooting mental upheaval. Nothing had turned out as I had hoped for. I went through a frustrating break-up. The idea to apply for MS – finance courses had caught my attention by then. And you won’t believe Mr. Reader just about how many twists came as each of my admit results came one by one. It felt like Life were unravelling an intense thriller, a world of so different possibilities opened with each one. My results came in almost an ascending order, the final one was the most awaited and the most promising. To give you a quick snapshot, the deadline to accept IE Business School was 25^th of May and my HEC Paris results came on May 24^th! If my life were a story book you would have hanged on until the very last word of this apping chapter! I guess it deserves a separate blog post of its own. Anyways, the point is a hundred emotions danced in my little poor heart last semester and a thousand of them in the whole four years of my IIT.

I have learnt some hard- earned lessons, most prominently how weak man is to the will of God. I have seen my life smouldered to dust, dreams shattered to crumbs and it all seemed so unreasonable, it just did not make any sense. And then quite unexpectedly out-of-the blue I saw my life resurrected beyond my wildest imaginations! Oh dear Mr. Reader what can I say it felt so surreal, like my life were a movie unreeled. After all my hopes dashed, all that I had hoped for was lost, I got success I had never quite believed I was capable of winning.  Yes, I am talking of HEC! It is ranked first world- wide in MS Finance courses. I am a seven pointer. Well I believe my profile had its own perks. Actually I had hoped to sail comfortably in the placement market. But life caught me unawares, it hit me so sudden, so hard, I fell head down on the floor! 17 interviews I rambled on desperate for a job but luck did not strike until 6^th of December 2012! Bless you Holy Mother of Lord! The sheer huge overwhelming relief! But the job wasn’t getting me excited. For sheer heck of it I thought of apping. Where? Amsterdam ofcourse!By then I truly thought I had no better chances than this new unranked private school (the school had its own pros and cons but let me not bore you into the details). It left me speechless when more results followed and I made it to some really good schools. Some even offered me funding. And then of course finally HEC happened too. It was the very same profile, Mr. Reader, the very same resume and yet Life painted two contrasting pictures for me.

At the end of the day I felt Life had dragged me to the destiny, fate had chosen for me. Like it were all meant to happen. I had thought my heart would give away, throbbing with so much heart- ache. But amazingly I discovered that it didn’t, that I was capable of living even after the one who had become my life was gone. . I still miss him, oh yes I do I do but I have learnt to swallow the bitter tears.  All my pride and shame has vanquished away. I have learnt perseverance. A hope still shines in my eyes but I won’t crumble again to dust even if  my dreams did and Life threw me down deeper dirt next time.  For you see, I would be a big girl now. A girl still you can bet, but a big girl I do!