Can business school make you less romantic?

All kinds of people would ask you why you came to business school? First, admission officers. When you make it to school, your classmates. Few months later, your career coaches. At a later time, your recruiters. And of course all through your journey, your friends and acquaintances. I too have been asked the same question. And I dislike monotony. I find it tiring to say the same story. There have been times when I would say, “Every one else has been going to b-school, I just wanted to know what the fuss was about?”. That’s an influence of over dose of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. Phoebe once kissed Rachel to know what the fuss was about!

Of the many reasons, I had a strong and genuine one too, to come to school. In the films and popular culture, I had seen business folks are more capitalist, less emotional, not very romantic, more problem solving. Didn’t that businessman called Ambani marry his wife for securing capital to expand and establish his business? Didn’t many rulers marry the princess of other kingdoms to expand their empire? A wall street invest banker busting his ass for 11 hours a day – where will he find time to write poetry or think about his love? I wanted to be a business czar. Running an empire. Like God Father’s Michael Corleone. I really expected my heart to turn into stone by studying finance and private equity. So that 10 years later, when I am blowing a cigar and enjoying my scotch in Calvisius Caviar Lounge in Four Seasons, some hot woman would come , sit next to me, run her deep-red-nail-painted finger down my face and say, “You can’t be so cold, you must have a lot hidden in you”. That could have been perfect way to fast forward 10 years without any emotional baggage or romantic hassles in between.

Damn! That did not happen. Why do I just nod along with a class mate when he talks of sales he increased in his job at Toyota Motors before coming to business school, but my eyes brighten up and moist up out of excitement when he narrates me the time during his high school when he killed a summer in Panama or when he made money while polishing boots and landscaping gardens of neighbors? Why I imagine my classmate attending his hens in a pristine farm instead of understanding the strategy he employs in his poultry business? While attending accounting class, I still marvel at the terrific sense of humor of the professor instead of focusing on accounting ratios. Listening to Turkish professor in Finance class, I am teleported to Istanbul and I lose myself in imagining her journey from Istanbul to New York and in filming that professor in my version of Serendipity, instead of estimating the NPV of money I could make after business school, if only I had kept my senses inside the class. Why would I think of Miranda Priestly in marketing class instead of estimating net market share? So what if professor reminds me of her. Many people in the world have similarities. But so what? Why I have to extend those thoughts?

Why did have to fall in inaccessible love…… Again? Why is it so hard to fall in love with money and career and power? Or with objects like Chair or truck, that you can go ahead and buy and keep with you, till you fall out of love. Why am I writing this instead of making CAR statements and getting my suit ready for blowing away the mind of first recruiter tomorrow? Instead of using my once-upon-a-time genius brain to make it big in this land of opportunity called USA, am I turning into Nikolai Gogol, who could not be understood by anyone, and least of all – by himself? Why am I writing like Sarah Jessica Parker, with answer-less questions?

I saw this country, its people, its culture only in cinema. And in books. Now I see those characters live – all around me. Imagine someone who watched F.R.I.E.N.D.S all his life, is suddenly air-dropped in the Central Perk amidst Joe and Monica and others . Why would he not be overwhelmed! But I did not see this ever coming.. I was on my way to become Godfather, while deciding to attend business school.

I should have rather joined defense forces instead of business school to cure the broken heart and wandering mind!