amit klein » basketball

Rolling Stone

amit — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 20:40:22 +0000

Things have been pretty hectic lately, I’ve had 18 flights in the last 2 months and I’m still not done. Next week I’m going for my last set of MBA interviews at ISB in Hyderbad. I think it’s safe to say after the 800 interviews we’ve done in the last 6 weeks, I can now accurately gauge the level of talent of the top students in India. These dudes (and chicks) are all ridiculously smart academically, in order to get into the IIM’s (the top B schools), you need to literally be in the 99.9th percentile. What’s amazing though is how little they know outside of their immediate studies. It seems like so much emphasis is placed on studying for the exams, that they have no time (or desire) to learn what’s going on the industry. One of the major difference between the students here and in the U.S. – there’s no concept of being well-rounded. So few people had an understanding of topics not covered in their curriculum (but essential to our business) like internet advertising, emerging trends on the web, and traffic monetization – out of 800 we only gave a handful of offers,

Outside of work I agreed to volunteer at an elementary school for slum kids. One of the things that’s really tough about living here is seeing extreme poverty everywhere. Kids/women/old people living on the streets, coming up, asking for handouts. It’s hard to say no, but I’ve heard a lot of stories and how you never know where that money is going (a la the intentionally blinded kid in Slumdog). I try to hand out food whenever I have it, but my goal was to do something a little more meaningful to give back while I’m here. I planned to go in this past Saturday and give my first basketball lesson. On Friday I get a call, “we’re really excited that you’re coming in tomorrow, just wanted you to know, there’s no balls and no hoops.” Hmm, makes my job a bit tough. I was pretty nervous about the whole thing, but it ended up being a lot of fun and way easier then I expected. There was an Aussie guy teaching english, I just helped him out a bit, reading and talking to the kids. They were all really attentive and excited:

Afterwords, I had brought two basketballs, and just did some basic passing games and dribbling races:

The kids loved it and were all asking me, when I was coming back next. One of the things that took me by surprise was that the school is segregated between Muslims and Hindus. They don’t have classes together and the kids (from the little I saw), don’t really interact. They said they are planning on integrating the school, but it was still unexpected, especially since Hindus and Muslims seem to be in such close contact and proximity everywhere else. All in all though, it was a really good experience and I hope I can keep at it.

Tomorrow is Holi – I’ll be going to a friend’s apartment with some super soakers full of colors. Will post some pics tomorrow (assuming my camera makes it out alive…)

3 Month Recap

amit — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 19:00:36 +0000

So I’ve been in Mumbai for about 3 months now. They say it takes that long to acclimate to a new job, I think the same can be said about getting used to a new place. Surprisingly, I’ve started to feel at home here. A lot of things that bothered me when I first moved here (pollution, heat, vegetarian food), I’ve pretty much gotten used to (alright I still sweat a lot a crave bacon).

Generally my life is pretty awesome. I work my ass off (today was my 19th consecutive work day), but I like my job so it’s been cool. I’ve been doing a lot of recruitment flying around the country visiting the top business schools. It’s great talking to the top students here, but grueling. We’ve done about 400 interviews in the last 2 weeks and have about 300 more in the next week. Intense. Sometime soon I’m gonna write a post on things not to do in an interview (like repeatedly emphasize your dance skills, or force your interviewer to read 3 of your poems – true story).

I’ve met a lot of really good people, and go out whenever I can. I’ve started pluggin’ into the Yahoo and Facebook Bombay expat groups though I haven’t attended any events yet. Not sure how I feel about that whole scene (seems kinda weird to come all the way to India to hang out with other “westerners”).

Sometimes I feel like a minor celebrity. I went unannounced to the bank last week, introduced myself to the branch manager, his response, “yes I know who you are.” Kinda creepy, though in my ‘hood there aren’t too many non-Indians around.

Anyone knows me knows my favorite thing is eating, followed closely by playing basketball. I’ve been playing ball a few times a week and finally made the official Andheri West YMCA team! We played in a tournament last week, where we won two games but lost in the quarter finals. My first game we won easily against the Mumbai police (though as my dad warned: “beating the police team may have it’s own dangers”). We then proceeded to get smoked by the Maharashtra Railway. Apparently these guys “work” in the sports department, are recruited to the company cause of their athletic skills and get to play ball 8 hours a day (note to self: get a job at the railway). We had a crowd of 100 or so people which was the biggest crowd I’ve played in front of. I also got heckled a bit which is awesome (I’ve always wanted to be heckled).

Though I haven’t been studying as much as I should, my hindi is getting better. I can at least pick out words in conversations and say really basic sentences (Hahm kab party jayenge? When are we going to the party?) It’s almost time for another poem… Any time I try to say anything in Hindi people get a huge kick out of it (probably cause I make at least 3 mistakes). My goal is to be able to tell a good joke and not only have people understand what I’m saying but also laugh, so far I’ve been wildly unsuccessful.

Finally I’ve decided to give back to the community and get involved in some sort of volunteer work. I met with a group Atma, and in our conversation they randomly mentioned they want to start an after school basketball program close to where I live. Perfect! I can do that. I’m meeting with some people next week to get it going.

I’ve been super busy but I think my time will free up soon. I will continue to try and write weekly. In case you don’t hear from me, you can always follow my alternate persona “the chef” at the other blog and twitter.

Till next time… main snanalay mein gatha hoon (I sing in the bathroom).

why im moving to india

amit — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 05:27:54 +0000

a few months ago i was feeling stuck. i started plateauing at my job, my social life was fun but unfulfilling and my only hobbies were ballin’, readin’ and drinkin’. i was restless. i traveled a lot growing up and always wanted to live abroad. on a whim i started researching agile software companies, interactive agencies and fast growing companies in india. i emailed the ceo’s directly letting them know i was motivated, charismatic and relentless. i setup a few interviews and bought a plane ticket. i was there for two weeks, had 7 interviews and accepted an offer in mumbai.

my short trip to india reinforced my desire to go there. sure it was dirty, crowded and i almost died every time i crossed the street, but there is a huge amount of energy and excitement. sometimes when you get to a place it just feels right – i felt an immediate connection to mumbai and the people i met there. also the ability to travel in the region (i have friends in vietnam and thailand) was particularly appealing.

why india? as india continues to play a more important role in the global economy i figured the experience gained working there and the connections id be able to make, will one day prove invaluvable. culturally i’ve always been fascinated by india and out of the worlds largest emerging economies (BRIC), it’s the only one where language isn’t really a barrier. obtaining a work visa (with a u.s. passport) is also easy. finally there’s an amateur basketball scene, a prerequisite for any place i would consider living.