A Bizarre Construct of Life

Growing up within a consulting firm which is known for its risk management practices, I have come to know myself as a risk-averse person. I mean I do enjoy the returns, but I also like to limit the risks that come along with them. Perhaps that’s why risk management as a concept seems like an obvious extrapolation of my own outlook. So I did surprise myself when I said yes to going for a two-week safari trip to Africa. What could possibly go wrong (besides being mauled by a lion or falling in a lake full of hippos or contracting a life threatening disease)? They say in order to escape a lion, all you need to do is to not be the slowest runner in the group. So as part of my risk mitigation measure, I picked a group of four (three of whom were from Oliver Wyman, by the way) in which I was one of the faster runners. And that is how I agreed to this trip to Kenya. Our group in Kenya We covered a lot of ground in those 2 weeks – started off with a few days in Samburu National Rese...

Once in a while, I like to get out of the civilization and go for a retreat to the Himalayas. So, with five other friends, I decided to go for another long trek (my second in recent past) to the Himalayas. Amongst the various options available for a 9-day trek, we picked Rupin Pass, which at an altitude of 15,250 ft (or 4.7 km), snow clad mountains and ever changing scenery, seemed to offer the right adventure. We joined a trekking group which took care of all our logistics, food, sleeping bags and offered reliable guides for the entire journey. While it was a long journey to get to our base camp itself (a flight to Delhi, an overnight train and an entire day on road), the first sight of our base camp was enough to fill us with excitement of what lay ahead. Our base camp was located in the middle of nowhere, at the bank of Rupin river and had greenery all around. This gave us a good preview of what amazing views awaiting us during the trek. Our base camp at Dhaula at 5,100 ft ...