Peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep IN

English, for sure, is a funny language. Here if you want to guess the word meanings your old friend ‘intuition’ might not be able to help you always. Here are few words that would highlight the funny aspect of VOCABULARY in English.

PERCHANCE has nothing to do with chance, it means perhaps.

Though PERCOLATE is to move gradually through a surface with small holes or spaces in it, PERCOLATOR simply means a pot for making coffee.

A PRODIGY is a young person who is unusually intelligent or skilful for his age, while PROTÉGÉ is a young person who is helped in his career and personal development by a more experienced person.

PROPRIETY means correct behaviour, strangely PROPRIETOR is the owner of a business, a hotel etc.
Keep watching this space to master vocabulary the fun and more interesting way

A Few things you should know about Google...Part 1

Being in awe of this new age creature called Google, I thought I should share the few things about Google with you all...

Apart from being the Search King of the world, there are a lot of other things that Google brought to this world. Sample this:

Google Docs- a sure competitor to Microsoft Office Suite, though there is still some long way to go. But check out the sharing features in Google Spreadsheets, and you will never have to use email attachments. Take this one-minute Survey that I created in the other window even as I was writing this blog piece. To participate, just click on this link:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=p1noMdNLLVAUKuMzMMAxLHQ&email=true

I hope you didn't miss the comments left by other people in the poll. And that's real time!

I find this truly exciting because it gives common men and women the power to communicate, and get opinions from others. I have seriously thinking about using this to get student feedback. Do you think it would work? I will try and capture your answer to this question in a separate form :)

I will try to keep you updated about the other exciting stuff (and there is a lot of it, believe me!)

DI....

Refer to the caselet below and answer the questions.
In the new version, Sholay 2006, Amitabh, Dharmendra, Manmohan, Jhonny Lever, Manoj Vajpayee, and Rahul Bose play the roles of Surma Bhopali, Samba, Thakur, Gabbar Singh, Veeru and Jay, though not respectively. All will wear different coloured dresses, i.e. black, blue, green grey, khaki and white.Johnny Lever and Rahul Bose will not play the role of Thakur and Samba. Gabbar Singh will wear khaki but his role will not be played by Manoj Vajpayee or Dharmendra. Amitabh and Manmohan will play the role of Samba and Jay though not respectively. The green-dressed actor and Manoj Vajpayee will play the role of Veeru and Thakur though not respectively. The role of white-dressed Jay and black-dressed Surma Bhopali will not be played by green-dressed Dharmendra and grey-dressed Manoj Vajpayee. Rahul Bose and Manmohan will wear neither black nor white dress.

1. Dharmendra plays the role of
a) Thakur b) Samba c) Veeru d) Data inadequate

2. Who wears the khaki dress?

a) Rahul Bose b) Johnny Lever c) Manmohan d) Data inadequate

3. The role of Surma Bhopali will be played by

a) Johnny Lever b) Rahul Bose c) Manmohan d) Data inadequate

4. Who plays the role of Gabbar Singh?

a) Johnny Lever b) Rahul Bose c) Dharmendra d) Can't be determined

solve it....

An archaelogist was excavating a site in France where he comes upon 4 lettered english word, he made an entry in his notebook and found that word is of french origin.
Further he noticed that if u replace letters with its alphabetical position( a=1, b=2 and so on)
Sum of all digits ends up to 20. Again he found that addition of any three digits is always devisible by fourth digit.

Find the word?

Check your aptitude

Check your aptitude by solving following 10 Questions in 20 minutes.
1 An orange glass has orange juice and white glass has apple juice both of equal volumes. 50 ml of the orange juice is taken and poured into the apple juice. 50 ml from the white glass is poured into the orange glass. Of the two quantities, the amount of apple juice in the orange glass and the amount of orange juice in the white glass, which one is greater and by how much?

2 A family X went for a vacation. Unfortunately it rained for 13 days when they were there. But whenever it rained in the mornings, they had clear afternoons and vice versa. In all they enjoyed 11 mornings and 12 afternoons. How many days did they stay there totally?

3 There is one lily in the pond on 1st june. There are two in the pond on 2nd june . There are four on 3rd june and so on. The pond is full with lilies by the end of the june.(i) On which date the pond is half full?

4 A lorry starts from Banglore to Mysore at 6.00 A.M, 7.00 A.M, 8.00 am.....10 pm. Similarly one another starts from Mysore to Banglore at 6.00 am,7.00 am, 8.00 am.....10.00pm. A lorry takes 9 hours to travel from Banglore to Mysore and vice versa.(i) A lorry which has started at 6.00 am will cross how many lorries.

5 A theif steals half the total no of loaves of bread plus 1/2 loaf from a backery. A second theif steals half the remaining no of loaves plus 1/2 loaf and so on. After the 5th thief has stolen there are no more loaves left in the backery. What was the total no of loaves did the backery have at the beginning.

6 The Old car of Mary requires tyres to be changed after each 24000 km. If she wants to go for 42000 km journey then how many minimum number of tyres she will need.

7 Alice and Liu had some berries. The total of Alice's berries and square of number of berries with Liu is 62. The total of Liu's berries and square of number of berries with Alice is 176. How many berries does each of them have?


8 A begger collects cigarette stubs and makes one full cigarette with every 7 stubs. Once he gets 49 stubs. How many cigarettes can he smoke totally?

9 Person spending out 1/3 for cloths, 1/5 of the remaining for food and 1/4 of the remaining for travels. He is left with Rs 100/-. How he had in the beginning

10 A can build a wall in 30 days; B can demolish the wall in 40 days. If A and B working on alternate days when will be the first time wall will be completely build.
Note: For analyzing your aptitude reply these questions.

Why Should You Worry About GD/PI now?

Its just the beginning (or maybe the middle, depending on when you started!) of the CAT prep season for the 2008 year. And you are probably concentrating on the Big Daddy of all subjects...Math/ Quant. For some strange and unknown reason, most of us tend to take English as the Small Cuddly Bear that "We will tackle anyways".

So, the point is: Is this really any time to think about the GD/PIs? I have been interacting with students since 1999 when I joined from the K campus. And, invariably, I found the one quality lacking in most students at all places (and I have seen students in Delhi, Lucknow, Bangalore and now, Pune)- Public Speaking Confidence. And I am not referring to a stage fright here! Its plain and simple "Standing in front of the class and saying a few words..."!

I must say this one time...Wake Up! Get Ready for the next phase NOW! Assuming your best dreams coming true, you will get about 2 months' time to get ready for a GD and PI call. At that time, if you are at the current communication levels of not knowing what to say about yourself, or where to get that economic "current" data from, I can promise you that it will a really uphill task.

I have a concise bulleted list to help you start:

1. "Think in English"- If you are in the habit of first thinking in Hindi/ Marathi etc. and then translating into English, you are wasting time. And more importantly, you are not "feeling" the language.
2. Reading Practice- I know I am violating the golden rule of RC by asking you to read aloud. But you need to read aloud in front of a mirror, though the RC reading still has to "mann mein"!
3. Read the Editorial of a newspaper from the first to last word- Its really hard, but its inevitable. And do this practice also for one business magazine. Slowly, you will start understanding it too:)
4. Understand both sides of the coin- Try and understand all aspects of a statement. The quality of your participation in a GD is guaged by the way you respond to other people's viewpoints. Can you think of points going against the conventional standpoints? For instance, think of points in favour of Dowry, Child Marriage or Reservations. Once you understand the other person's views, you can present better counter-arguments!

There is a lot of work to do, and the time is not too much, considering you have grown up doing things the easier way. The good news is...there is enough time to make amends :)

All the best!