Back in college...

It has been such a long time since I wrote my last post, I had almost forgotten my blog address. Much has transpired in my life since then.

April was more or less spent in mugging up all that the professors had fed us during the entire semester. I had my US visa interview right in the middle of my endsems and, as a consequence, had to do a bit of running around (What happened to that visa finally will come up later in this post :D). After bearing the shocking sight of my graded endsem answer sheets, I returned home and started waiting for my visa, which had been delayed due to "administrative processing".

I had to come to Kanpur during the vacations as well and compressed some 60-70 metal samples but that is not pertinent to this post. Well, nothing about this post is really pertinent to anybody now. It's just a look back on the past few months which are, well, exactly that... past.

To cut a long story short. My visa arrived by the first week of June. By the my professor in the US Univ had other plans and ... program cancel. I spent the next 1 and a half month at home too. It was incredibly cool and fun. More so, due to the 5 day trip to Rajasthan - Jaipur, Udaipur, Mount Abu. Some sites in these places are amazing and worth watching once in a lifetime.

I also played my guitar a lot during the vacations and it has accompanied me to Kanpur as well. Another semester is about to begin... this being the penultimate one in my undergraduate study. I just wish it goes off well!

Amen!

If you can't beat them, Po'em

Aloha! My friends, I guess it's time,

I always knew I had a knack to rhyme.

Naive, one may say, my verses are,

Give me time I say, I shall raise the bar.


Humor, love - I know my theme not,

A penchant for words is all I've got.

People, places, I'll let my wit jog,

And here goes the first post in my poetry blog!

Galaxy Winner Hall 3... yeahhhhh!!

What an awesome week this has been. I mention this because I was reminded of this by a friend yesterday. A few days before Galaxy began, I was pretty skeptical about the utility of such a festival in an already jam-packed cultural calendar. I was of the opinion that it would nothing to improve the cultural scene here, neither would it be an "enjoyable" affair. I couldn't have been more wrong!

Galaxy not just rekindled the spirit of competition among the people in the institute, it also helps develop a yet unseen level of camaraderie among people of your hall. Throughout the week, we had loads of competitions and due to certain delays, almost every day stretched to 3-4 am. By the last day, we had tallied an almost invincible lead. I really don't want to crib about this. But the shock results of the structure competition (where a canopy of bamboos won over a magnificiently constructed ship) reduced what would have otherwise been a landslide margin (It still was around 120 with the runners-up fetching 700 something). For all those who saw it, the faux pas was pretty obvious. Here, I would like to concede that there might have been instances where the results might have been skewed in our favour but well all this evened out totally).

Leaving aside all this, the ecstatic moment when we were declared winner will truly remain etched in my memory (and for that matter the memory of every Hall-3ite). The roaring mob, the colour-smeared faces, students dancing like mad-men and chanting at the top of their voices. Not a sight that is witnessed every day. Every person in your team, whether he knew you personally or not, not just shook your hand but went out of the way to indulge in a ecstatically warm embrace. The happiness of having achieved what we had dreamt of was palpable.

Any amount of words would not do justice to the electrifying atmosphere that was, so I'll stop writing albeit with a few points.

First and foremost, congos to everyone who worked hard towards this victory... we need to keep this trend going so gear up!

Secondly, people who are making baseless accusations should rather spend their time improving the pool of talent they have. This is not the last time this is happening (unless you really make efforts to ensure that :P). So just take it in your stride and work hard!

Thirdly, amidst all the viciousness in the hearts of the teams which didn't win, there were certain people who bore the risk of coming out when the mob reached their place and congratulated us with a smile. Kudos to your spirit... we need more of your kind!!

Adios...

Galaxy monologues... Day 1

Seven years is a long time, but the way “Galaxy” began, it was worth the wait. I am not really into the Hall ‘funda’, which is such a rage here at IIT Kanpur. However, when one sees hordes of the usually sincere and studious students transforming into frenzied mobs, one’s enthusiasm is bound to rocket. My case was similar. I was asked by certain friends to join the Opening parade and I joined albeit a bit unwillingly. However, the moment I reached Hall 3, the electric atmosphere totally bedazzled me and suddenly I was part of the excited crowd. I got my face painted in the colours of our team and we began preparing for the parade. By now, I was so taken by the enthusiasm that I joined in the people who were playing tin cans in the front. With titillating beats and sky-renting slogans, we marched on the roads. It was an amazing moment, something words cannot describe.

We won the parade competition which set the tone for the rest of the events. However, soon we were reminded of the roller coaster ride that was in store with the shocking loss of our “declamation team”. In the night, we were supposed to take part in an antakshari which, though scheduled at 10 pm, started at 1 am. With the pride of the Hall at stake, our inability to answer in the first few rounds made us fear the consequences of losing the first major event. But then came a unique and rather weird song-memorizing round. We used some logic and it somehow got coupled with total dumbness on part of the other teams. In one round, we shot from being last to sitting comfortably first. The journey after that was pretty smooth with Tanmay (one of my teammates) cracking some good questions. We had some totally hilarious moments with Abhishek aka ‘Chomu’ (the other teammate) making certain other teams the butt of his wisecracks.

We ended the day at 3 am. No wonder, the next day began at 10 am with bunks in two classes. (You see, this still matters to me...  ). Some more events today... let’s see what happens as the day unfolds!

Turmoil everywhere!!

The past few weeks have been full of ups and downs... one might say that some of the things that happened were made out to be more than they actually were. Nevertheless, they figured as major points of contention in my life.

Not that the rest of the world is free from similar waves of unrest. Economic recession has been sweeping every little corner of this earth. Our neighbour Pakistan seems like a sinking ship, something that does not augur well for India. On the other side of the border, election manipulations are the order of the day. Disappointing names have been spelt out as potential PMs. Basically, waat lagi hui hai poori duniya ki hi!! :D

But sometimes it is great to see the problems with a whole new perspective. This is something my mom advises me to do frequently. Analyze what is the worst that can happen if things do not correct themselves. At times, you realize that the consequences do not merit all the fretting and worrying you have been indulging in.
And suddenly, the problem remains a problem no more...

There is so much to life. Something or the other is always going wrong. Perhaps all we can do is count our blessings..!

(NO) food for thought !!

As usual, a long hiatus and then comes this post...

All my entries till date have been rather sombre and lack the comic element which is so evident in my day to day life. Of course, most of the jokes we people share lie outside the public domain and my writing about them here would, perhaps, be deemed “blasphemous”. But I realise that I am 20 years old now and free to express what comes to my mind, especially if it sounds interesting.

By the way, the above justification is there for the perusal of my two elder sisters who form a major chunk of my readership, which also says a lot about the popularity of this blog.

Well, moving to the point. Recently, a very amusing piece of research was brought to my attention by one of my friends. A group of Japanese researchers studied certain subjects and found that people who skipped breakfast were likely to lose their virginity early.

Now, that sounds ridiculous. Of course, the researchers tried their best to give some plausible explanations. However, having the sort of wildly imaginative mind that my friends say I have, I came up with my take on this. I made hypothetical inferences and wondered about the change this could bring in the status quo.

Imagine this scenario:
Guy (using one of his favourite pick-up lines): Boy, I am starving, didn’t have any breakfast today.
Girl: Oh my god!! That is so turning me on... maybe you can have me for lunch today... ;)

Weird... Moreover, companies like Kellogg and those that make breakfast bars would be thrown out of business. “HUNGRY” would be the new “COOL”.

All this is amusing but I have my reasons to totally despise this theory. I am frightfully regular at having my breakfast and I am currently not in a position to totally disprove this theory either. Neither have my friends, who haven’t seen the face of breakfast for months together, done anything which would corroborate the study. So basically I would hate to see any truth in here. I have propounded some cause-effect misjudgement explanations to console myself but that, is for another day!!!

Ciaos! Sleep well, Eat well (or don’t, suit yourself :D)

Pondering over 26/11 ...

Ok... I know this might be coming a bit too late for its content. Moreover, the timing for my last post and this one is highly skewed because, being at home, I tend to write stuff whenever I feel like doing it and am too lazy to post it on the blog. I feel it is time I voiced my feelings regarding the recent terror attacks and the lessons to be learnt from it. It might sound naive but I was reminded of the effect they had on our lives when one of my friends called up in the morning. He, along with his entire department, had gone for a trip to Nainital and he, in his words, had a really good time. Now, my department was supposed to go to Jamshedpur and we might have ended up having a great time too but the awful lot of terrorists decided to wreck havoc in everybody’s lives with the dastardly act they did.

I know I sound mean and silly. The consequences of the attack were far more horrific and disturbing than the cancellation of a trip. On a graver note, I pray for the souls of the people who lost their lives in this outrageous assault. I mean, seriously, these attacks are an insult. It’s like somebody smacks you in the face and your helplessness hits you in a way it never did. There is a lot of talk about beefing up security measures at all places. Great idea! But think of the vast expanse of land that this country has. Yes, there were security lapses and intelligence failures that shouldn’t have happened. But, howsoever strong your security system is, these trouble makers will end up finding a loop hole and cause bloodshed again. A long term solution to this problem is required. I understand it won’t be easy but somehow these terror outfits have to be wiped off (or made to change their ways and line of thought). Beefing up of security is a necessity but it might not be a solution.

I don’t think anybody reading this blog is stupid enough not to understand this. But think of the progress we can make without the fear of such violence. It has often been said that if India and Pakistan work together, the subcontinent will be a massive superpower. It is hard to imagine what these countries and their people have lost in the last 60 years, just because a small chunk of the people just couldn’t think straight. I pray that peace be bestowed upon our country and the entire world and all those people who are full of any kind of hatred which leads them to do such despicable acts realize that they can do so much better by channelizing their energies and resources to some more constructive causes.