My tryst with Investment Banking

I was absolutely certain that I wanted to be a Fashion Designer like Manish Malhotra. Nothing was going to change my mind. My family disapproved. My grandfather, a fabulously rich Septuagenarian, was an Accountant. He ran his own firm along with my dad, a lawyer, and wanted the next generation to continue in his footsteps. He frowned incessantly whenever I mentioned my childhood dream. Then my nerdy cousin brother, whom I idolized (then, not now), became a CA. That did it. I followed suit. Firstly because I wanted to follow my brother's footsteps and secondly because I did not want to be the odd one out in my family. I also figured I would be more ambitious if I worked hard enough at buying my own private aircraft instead of flying someone else's. A few months into the job, I was miserable. I realized post-mortem examination on numbers was the last thing I wanted to do. That's when I saw Wall Street. A wild film on an ambitious young trader in the eighties in New York. Boy, I loved that movie.

 'Greed is good' is what Michael Douglas inculcated in me. I saw the swank apartment Charlie Sheen lived in with his perfect woman and I thought, that's the life I want. Forget the family footsteps. I decided. I needed to do what I was passionate about now. I got in touch with a senior schoolmate and asked him to help me get a job as an investment banker. After a dozen interviews, where I had close encounters with the inflated egos of other investment bankers, I managed to get myself a job. I think my success at landing the job lay solely in my ability to look most interested as the guys interviewing me spoke blatantly about their lives and the deals they clinched.

 My new life had begun in boutique investment bank.