2:59 PM |
Author: kaushik
There are some dissapointments and some surprises...
I had been to GE-JFWTC in Bangalore, spoke with some scientists there and in some corner of my mind, I had hoped to work for them (or someone like them) in the future.
Cut accross to IIT, I was actually excited about GE-JFWTC, though some of my placement committee team members, do not think of it highly. I was pretty sure, I would make it also. However, todays PPT proved to be a damp affair. They do not want to recruit for that labs that I want to work for.
Later in the evening, it was the turn for GoldmanSachs to present their PPT. Unlike the BTech/DD junta, who survive 4 years in IIT, dreaming to get absorbed in Banks/Finance profiles, I am very skeptical about them. But today, GoldmanSachs blew my mind away. Their job profile on quantitative modeling, was the same profile I was hoping for in GE-JWFTC (but on a different technology platform), and they blew the mind away of anyone atteding the PPT when they announced their package (and trying to prove to us at the same time that the package was low). But nature has its own ironies. I am pretty sure, my 'intellectual' abilities in terms of past performances do not match up to their expectations. Will give it a serious shot though!
All this gets me back to the what I intend to write about. After the PPT, I spent the evening wiht Parijat, a team member from the placement team and the HR lady from GoldmanSachs, Smitha. Chatting about everything other than placements, I was extremely happy when Smitha kept on telling, again and again, how good a college RVCE was, though, she had just recruited for the IT services profile there.
Walking back to the campus, Parijat and I got stuck up in an engaging conversation about talent in the IITs and in general.
I dont know how we came about talking about this, but somehow, the talk drifted to the 'one building colleges' all around the country, especially in Bangalore, Chennai and Andhra-Pradesh.
I have always maintained that talent is not restricted to the 3000 odd students that clear JEE (long posts in the recent pasts!!), but what IITs are able to do excellently is nurture that talent. Probably, this is because they have been around a long time, and the environment for excellence, the drive to outperform the senior batch, keeps making the whole system better and better (MoodI 2006 has to be better than MoodI 2005).
The whole system in IIT (at least here at IIT-Bombay) is just awesome. You can't be here and do nothing. It is just impossible that you are not involved in any extra-curricular activities. For the really real 'geeks', there are immense research opportunities in the institute, and also an IIT-entry card to the best of the best in the world for internships. And, for the others, there are a plethora of opportunities. Almost every freshie works for MoodIndigo and Techfest. These fests, the scale at which they operate, develop personalities. If there are totally around 60-70 top level positions in these two events, huge opportunities are there elesewhere, the E-cell, the hostel level administrative groups, the hostel fests, the department administrative groups. Any student here, would have had an experience in leading people and working with people, and trying out something that he likes, to add to the excellent education the faculty provides. This is what I mean by nurturing talent. The whole year is so jam packed with events, that a wholesome development of the personality is the latent winner for all the students
An average PG in IIT, discounting the rare case, sits in his room and plays computer games. There are complains that the PGs are not encouraged in all these activities, which is; I would call a semi truth. Respect, Encouragement etc is a give and take policy. If you do not approach the UG heads of these events, they do not have any business, begging you to participate in them ( I have a PG friend, who was given the Co-ordinator job in MI, although freshies are only given Organizer (volunteer) jobs. And technically, he was eligible to be the member of the core team this year). The PGs hardly ever participate in anything in the campus, and this reflects in their personalities.
Any organization in the world, don't just want geeks, they want well rounded geeks.
My analysis (IMO), is that, by the time these students come to IIT, the period in life where they can be 'moulded' is over; and in my opinion; this period is your engineering days.
Joining up ends, I know now, why RVCE is a good (great!) instituion. It 'nurtures' talent.
The faculty at RVCE is sad, deplorable, and atleast IMO, for a college that considers itself to be among the top 15-20 in the country, the faculty is horrible. But, the good thing is that they do not stifle the geek. And he finds a way out, summer projects at IISc or some other big research set ups in Bangalore, or for that matter, highly ambitious BTech Projects, which even the faculty does not understand, and the student pulls it off on his own.
And the extra currics scene, is not as well organized or well oiled as in IIT, but is awesome. Every enterprising student, gets an opportunity to lead, work in groups and showcase his talent. And, as I was telling Parijat, if RVCE combined all it 12-13 fests into one huge fest, MoodI can take a beating (at least the sponsorship earned will be equal/more). This wholesome 'nurturing' of talent is also reflected in the students that pass out from RVCE.
If campus recruitments is a metric to judge quality, RVCE is up there with the best. All most all top end technology comapnies in the IT/software field have in their rolls RV graduates; campus presence for other major enterants into India is increasing aswell in RVCE (and thanks to Infosys and CTS, we can boast of 1.1 jobs/student in RVCE!!!!)
Where IIT and RV differ is, the system in place for such activities. RV is totally randomized, and that is probably the reason, RV is unable to attract other major companies to its campus. But, I am sure, given some time, and some really enterprising student (alumni?) to give structure to the host of activities in RVCE, and better brand imaging of the college, can get us right up to the best.
Another loose thread in this post, is the absolute inactivity of the average PG at IIT. Connect this to my hypothesis that these students are not moulded during their engineering days. My personal interaction with many PGs and first hand reports of college practises in Andhra corrborate this hypothesis.
In most of the 'one-building' colleges, the management, inorder to improve the image of the college, stresses on just the results (or as in most Andhra colleges, compel the students to clear GATE and do MTech in IITs). Given that the faculty is not inspiring, everything boils down to 'repititive'-'hard work'. Clearly, no scope is there for personality improvement. Given that most of these colleges are in semi-urban/ rural areas; there is also no effort to improve the personal/soft skills of such students (who are not exposed to such things in school, unlike the city groomed students). Finally, what we have is students who know their curriculum inside out, but otherwise bland- one dimensional output, unlike IIT (and to a large extent) RVCE, which produces multi-dimensional graduates.
This thing shows up clearly in IIT, where I have met PG students with negative confidence ( Highly confident that they will NOT be able to do this), PG students who were toppers in the rote system they were presented in college, failing to grasp simple basics and numerical/problem solving approach taught here in IIT, and mostly PG students, who lack a well rounded personality; who can actually leave a mark in the society.
My arguments above, tend to place all the responsibility on the college ('system'), but on some scale it boils down to the individual also. You learn the most when you dream, and execute your dream. I base this judgement personal experiences as the RVCE Chemical fest co-ordinator, or placement team member at RVCE and to some extent, my job here as M.Tech Placement Nominee. Moreso, atleast you will do good to take up opportunities that are provided to you (case in point: PGs sitting in their room wasting time, where they could have easily worked for MoodI or Techfest)
My batch in RVCE, wanted to change the face of our fest; and we did it; leaving it in a better condition and raising the bar; and we faced problems from the authorities for this, but persisted. This is my interpretation of an individual taking on the responsibility of improving himself, through dedication to some short term goal he has in mind.
As my dear friend Bhatta pointed out, right now, PG education in India is GIGO (Garbage in Garbage out), most of the students who stick around for Masters in India, do not do it out of choice, and given that still, they do not seem to think that their Masters degree is going to be of any particular use to them except probably getting them 'SOME' job.
But, for ANYTHING to CHANGE, CHANGE also has to come from WITHIN
This has been a long drawn out post, but it reflects some of the things that I am really passionate about; and given an opportunity, would like to change ( or perhaps create the opportunity to changee things!)
So long then!
Adios...
4:30 PM |
Author: kaushik
Prologue:
Our gang was a large one, 4 girls, 7 boys, the eldest just finishing school, while the youngest had just stepped into class one. I was in the fifth standard then, and so were most of us, around 10-11 years old. Being kids, obviously, we did not think that boys and girls are much different apart from the fact that girls can wear shirts and pants but boys cannot keep long hair or wear a skirt. From cricket to lock and key, from football to hide and seek, from kho-kho to WWF simulation fights, we did all together as a group. And perhaps, the most valuable time spent together was around half an hour every evening on a yellow bench, sitting and chatting about all the things important to a 10 year old.
Things, however, were drastically different from our parents viewpoints. Call it generation gap, conditioning of the mind, upholdment of Indian values, whatever, boys and girls were as different as chalk and cheese for them. Yes, they thought the 'modern thought'; did the 'correct things'; but still they could not fathom friendship between 'grown-up' girls and 'grown-up' boys.
Most girls 'grow-up' more quickly than most boys, and our group was not the 'exception' that proves the rule. However, from the 'predujiced' lenses of our parents, it was blasphemy. Quite words with the daughters (who given the changes they were growing through, unquestioningly followed their mothers), a stiff warning to the boys, broke the spine of the gang. The elder boys understood the deal and gave us half cooked stories to our queries like -'You know, she thinks we are all stupid fools since she came first in her class', 'blah-blah'. But then, none of us were convinced.
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So it was, leading to the Durga puja of 1996. The joint games played by the gang had turned into a more 'rough' boys only games, while the girls played whatever it was that they played with dolls and mini kitchen sets.
It was the second Durga puja being celebrated in the apartments, and each of us had our pockets full of excitement, eager to be present everywhere all the time, eager to show off new clothes, roam the neighborhood. Also, for the first time we were given more 'responsibilities' during the pooja. Decorate the pandal, the stage, make announcements, serve the prasad etc. All in all, we were geared up for an exciting 4 days of Durga puja.
Also, by then, if not sworn enimity , there was some spite between the 'boys-group' and the 'girls-group', for the then foggy reasons, whatever that was, to us.
The girls had decided that they will come down to participate in the festivities at 9AM, but we boys, lazy as ever, decided 11 AM, just before the 'pushpanjali', was an earthly time to go down. However, amma, unaware of the separate plans, made us both (my sister and me), go down by 9:30AM. So, there I was, in a awkward position, so to say, but I had been friends, not long ago with these girls, and so thinking quite objectively (and unemotionally), and it being Durga puja, I pulled up a chair and joined the 'girls-circle', and started chatting with them.
Over the years, as we grow up, we develop 'layers' of 'shell' around us, impermeable to certain feelings. Though, they are not unbreakable, they are good defence mechanisms to protect our feelings, emotions etc...
However, to a small 10 year old kid, her greatest strength and her biggest weaknes is her innocence, the shell is yet to be made.
By the evening, I had become quite comfortable with the 'girls-group' again. Probably, realizing that they have not turned into blood-sucking devils, and more so, given everything, we had been good friends just 6 months back, I spent more time seated on 'my' chair in the 'girls-circle', rather than on 'my' chair on the 'boys-circle'. Early into the evening, I refused a trip, gallivanting into the bylanes of the neighborhood, 'pandal' hopping, with the 'boys-group', deciding to spend that time with the girls-group.
All boys gangs make serious rules, especially about prioritizing 'girls' before group events. My punishment, was that 'my' chair from the boys-cirlce will be removed.
New friends or not, I was eager to return to my flock (Also, I was getting a 'trifle' bored with the antakshari). As soon as the boys returnded, I took 'my' chair to join the 'boys-circle', but I was refuese my place. Confused, I stood there for a minute extra, trying to understand the 'joke', when one of the boys quipped -'Hey, you cannot sit here anymore- you are a girl'.
Thus began a particular half hour in my life, forever fresh in my memories.
Shocked, shattered, desperately trying to hold my tears in public, I tugged amma's sari, demanding to go home. As soon as I entered, I started crying uncontrollably. When I finished unfolding the story of my day to amma, she stormed down to confront the 'boys-group', to make them apologise to me.
As the boys came up, my sister also came up, followed by the girls. It was a short time before the mothers of all the kids were also in our drawing room.
I was sitting on the sofa crying. As the boy, who actually made the remark, came up to me to apologise, he also burst into tears, explaining how I had angered everyone else, by spending the whole day with the girls, who had not as much as bothered to tell the boys a 'hi' during the past six months. Girls are never the ones to be left out, especially when it comes to a contest of tears. My sister, always cries whenever I cry, but her tears, bought along tears of the other girls, unknowingly sorry for the past six months. The other boys, being boysm did not cry, but were uncharacteristically quiet,
Among all the innocent tears, all the mothers also realized the folly of essentially separating a bunch of innocent friends. Moist eyed, they knew that they had been prejudiced, parochial, narrow minded, ambigious to the problem, not forthright with their answers.
All's well that ends well. A new set of rules (avoid contact sports), formulated then and there, withour as much as a word being spoken, restored the 'gang' again.
We happily trotted out of the house, myself redeemed again as a member of the male gender, the girls and the boys mingling with eachother again. Yet, we were still unaware of the actual reasons for the drama that unfolded. Ensconsed in our innocence, we returned back to the pandal. But back in the house, elders learnt a lesson from innocent children.
Within no time, in a bigger circle of chairs, another game of antakshari started, only this time, it was boys v/s girls...
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Epilogue
'To kill a mocking bird' is my favorite novel, because it beautifully captures the magic of innocence and highlights the heavy price of years of prejudice has to pay.
Today, as I sit watching 'Puja-pandals' on TV, my mind drifts to the gang. People have changed, enimities have been made, but still from among the 11 of us, 5-6 are still as good friends as ever.
2:56 PM |
Author: kaushik
Updates: Nothing special happening in my life, nothing to write home about. Have been really busy coordinating the Placement activities in IIT-Bombay. All my interesting stories are from the placement cell, but I do not want to bore myself in the future when I read this blog:-D
There 'WAS' a creative writing competition in the insti today. I was really lazy to miss the deadline, but then the competition's loss is my blog's gain. The topic was what the blog topic reads.
I tried to dabble at some fiction in trying to write something that fits the topic. Everything that is under the heading 'A' is the half truth, things the world views in my hero's life, and all that is under 'B' is the other half, hidden from the world.
If you think the story/situtation/lines are Plaigaraised, then don't call it so, because I have Internalized...
Hope you enjoy it...Criticism invited
A
"Well Mr.Sen, we have a prodigy. There is no other word with which to describe your son", said Mr Agarwal, to Rohit's father. It was the annual Parents-Teachers meeting at DAV school, and as was expected, Rohit had not only topped his class, but exceled in extra curricular activities also, by winning the inter-school singing competition...
B
"Give me two 'English reader for 4th standard' please", asked Mrs Sen to the shop owner at Peoples book store. This has been the way the Sen's have been operating for the past few years. While little Rohit goes to school, Mrs Sen reads her copy of the books, and makes notes and question answers to drill it into Rohit's head when he
comes back from school. The Sen's are paranoid about Rohit topping the class. TV, Cartoons, Games is controlled as strictly as the Chinese control the media. The only allowance, if it can be said so, is the music lessons he is allowed once a week...
A
The whole family went to the airport. It was perhaps the biggest moment for the Sen's. Rohit had been selected from among hundreds of students in India, to attend the young scientist's meeting in Munich. Grinning always, Mr Sen never forgot to
mention that at 14, Rohit was the youngest in the international conference. Rohit was enjoying every moment. He had worked hard, but science and math came naturally to him. When he submitted his model fuel cell for the competition, he started
learning a little german...
B
Mrs Sen was hysterical. Mr Sen had a stern look. Rohit knew the lecture coming. "It's for your own good, son", "Sometime, in the future, when you are a succesful engineer or doctor, you will appreciate our decision"...
But still, he asked his parents, with the hope that if not this year, the next year, he may be allowed to participate in the musical, organized by the renowed dramatics group'-'Faces'. Renu, the 'artistic brain', director of several award winning plays
had spotted Rohit performing in a school play a year ago, and since then has been trying to convince the Sens to allow Rohit to perform with them...
A
"Statistics is my forte", Rohit asserted, as the interviewer nodded appreciatively. He knew, he had the right person, although Rohit had no prior experience. He knew, that Rohit was winner throughout. An academic topper, a leader in college activites, a drive to succeed, young and energetic, Rohit fitted the requirements to the 'T'...
B
He had given up trying to convince his parents. The rebel in him was not rebelious enough. He knew, he owed a lot to his parents who have sacrificed a lot to get him to this postion. Anyways, his plays are not good enough. There are better actors, and I love Statistics...
A
Rohit's growth in the company surprised many pundits. It took him just 10 years to reach the upper management of the company. He immersed himself in work, lived out of his suitcase, globe trotting half the year.
As he exited of the CST airport, he could see two little kids jumping, trying to catch a glimpse of their father coming out of the terminal, happiness and expectation (of lots of gifts) in their eyes. He waved back, a trifle nonchalantly, to his wife, a budding laywer, who had retired really early from her practise to take care of the kids. He knew, the sacrifice she had made, so that he could devote more time for his overseas appointments...
B
As much as he hated it, his work was his only escape. Only escape from everything that seemed to go wrong in his life. Sometimes, he wondered, why was he so gifted in mathematics, why could he not be a duffer, who could just act brilliantly.
Guilt ate him. He knew that he had to appreciate Pooja's efforts at trying to make the marriage work. If only he could love her as much as she loved him. Instead he knew, he was running away from all truth, flying away on overseas assignments, because he could avoid Ashwini, his 'ex', his parents, who could not stop admiring him, Pooja, who kept making him feel guilty.
A silent smile automatically came, as he thought, 'I wanted to act in a play and live life, but now I am acting life and living plays', watching a play in London...
A
Pooja was shattered, and wept bitterly. But she acknowledged that probably 'divorce' was the best thing. Rohit had agreed to a generous alimony and she had the children. Even though, she waived off the thought, she was happy for Rohit. He was going to
marry Ashwini finally. She knew that the marriage was on the rocks, but was happy for Rohit, happy that he will walk into a happier life after the divorce.
'Finally, somethings going my way in life', thought Rohit...
B
'The honeymoon is over, now I wish I had never split' muttered Rohit, after yet another fight with Ashwini. It was hardly three months to their marriage, and they acknowledge the mistake that it was. 'College was so different, if only I knew that you were such a pain to live with', shouted Ashwini back.
As he tried to catch some sleep, his only thought was 'not another divorce', will pooja accept me back or probably I am doomed'
A
'The car inexplicably went out of control' read the report. The post-mortem report showed no drugs, alcohol in Rohit's blood. The Sen's were inconsolable. Pratik and Priya, were shocked, reality had not sunk in. Pooja was repentent, 'I could have done
things differently...'
B
A thousand thoughts floated in Rohit's mind. "My parents, my kids,..., I can still do things differently. Hope is never to be lost", but even as the thoughts floated, Rohits mind was clear, as he pushed the accelerator, took the hands of the wheel and closed his eyes...
3:02 PM |
Author: kaushik
Lots of thanks to Vinay for this amazing conversation.
We (Vinay and I) were sitting in the Night canteen, discussing about Campus placements at IIT-Bombay. Of particular interest was the amazingly large number of companies that had agreed to come to IIT-B, but recruit only B.Tech or Dual Degree students and not the M.Tech students. The underlying answer to this mystery was that the B.Tech/DD students have cleared a particularly tough exam called the Joint Enterence Exam, which the M.Tech's had not.
Question> Is the IIT-JEE, the be all and end all of all examinations? Should all that is there to classify a young 17 year old as intelligent and hard-working be judged by the one exam?
Point in case, for this was that IIT'ans on an average recieve 6.5to 7 lac pay packages, while in other engineering colleges (which by the way, is again ranked based on some Common Enterence test), the pay package is 3-3.5 lac. My arguement is that Talent cannot be demarked on the basis of one examination. Vinay, argued, and argued correctly, if I may add, that for companies that look for placements, JEE is a easy metric. They find good people in IIT, they dont have to look elsewhere. The companies that have to look elsewhere, create another hierarchy in the remaining collegest in India. It's easy and cost-effective for them. JEE (and the host of other enternce exame) does the screening for them.
Question>Still is it not cruel? What about students who are good, but are unlucky to miss out on JEE. After all, JEE selects around 5000 students out of 3 lacs, and you can't expect only 5000 to be really talented. ( I expand this question a little bit more: Ranking of other engineering college also takes place based on toppers in some Common enterence test... RVCE was good because rank1-100 selected it, and so on!)
Once this question is identified, all the statistics that I have learned came to me. There is always this blue shaped Gaussian curve, symbolic of so many things in this world. Couple more. Most JEE'ians are in the talented Gaussian curve, while there are non-JEE'ians also on a Not-So-Talented curve. There are the outliers to the curve. We went for a flatter profile for the JEE and a more narrow one for the non-JEE ones.
To some extent, I do justify myself. I have seen, both the IIT students, and the one in RVCE (where I did my UG) and some other 'TOP' bangalore colleges (where I put the students right on the edge of the non-JEE curve) and some more students from other colleges, who fit in the middle of the Not-So-Talented curve. Here, by talent, I not only mean IQ/ intelligence, but also other extra curricular activities, organizational skills, soft skills etc. Based on my (and Vinay's) assesment of JEE like Talented student outside IIT, we pretty much seemed to agree on the profile.
Question> It is the outliers on the Non-JEE ones who seem to lose out. They are Good, but are clubbed in the wrong graph? A talented student, good enough to be an JEE-ian, misses out on the goodies of being a JEE'ian? That particular set of students will feel depraved, feel that they are not getting what they deserve, because they are not in IIT. To refresh, we are talking about the huge array of opportunities that a JEE'ian gets compared to the others. What seems to be the solution??
We got really philosophical at this stage. What has to be agreed is that Life is cruel, everyone tries to optimize, get the maximum without as much as moving a finger. Given this background, the outliers of the Non-JEE have to lose out. Tough luck.
Question> (Here comes the business end of this post! and Coming a little closer to IIT placements)Consider a hypothetical situation, one of the non-JEE outlier's are in IIT-B (i.e. A M.Tech student). A big consulting firm is here to hire. They say we look only at B.Tech/DD students. What can she do (apart from feeling frustrated)?
The option being explored now is requesting the company to open for all M.Tech's. Ideal from a M.Tech student point of view. For the company, 500 more applications to screen. Yes, they may get a good M.Tech student, but then the B.Tech/DD pool is not dry that they need to look elsewhere. So, they say No to M.Techs. Our poor student is still there, feeling frustrated.
Taking a larger picture, there will be lots of such frustrated students (probably a little less than the IIT-PG student).
Question> Is JEE (or CAT) the right Metric to judge? Are these exams still relevant in differentiating the Best from the Rest?
It probably WAS! This craze about JEE, Undergraduate degree from IIT, has caught attention probably from late 80's/early 90's. Till then, we agreed, yes, JEE was a good metric. In the 90's, there came an additional concept of dropping a year, preparing for JEE, there mushroomed coaching classes whic dissected the JEE, stripped it to it's bones. Students were being 'coached' to crack the JEE. From what it set out, how well students have learnt and applied their 11th and 12th standard science, the JEE was made to stand out. Preparation for boards are different, preparation for JEE different.
Now, in the present scenario, JEE is not a good screening agent. It allows some rotten eggs to pass through it, while rejecting some good ones.
The same with CAT.
GATE, now probably, is still pretty good, but it is also on the decline, and in another 5-6 years, we will see commercialization of GATE as well.
All these exams, were created with a purpose, they served the purpose as well, but as with anything in the nature, it has to evolve. It has to capture the times that we are living in. Past does not gel with the present anywhere in this universe.
Presently, awareness, the number of students doing Engineering in India, competition is ever increasing. Considering the sheer numbers, IIT's are too exclusive to capture all the talent in India. The corporate world as well as the academicia, must adapt to a new metric to judge talent in India, rather than the now existing one dimensional hierarchy, IIT-JEE>NIT>Top private colleges (top rankers choice in state level enternce exam)>Middle level colleges>Absolute dregs...
But then as Vinay pointed out, India is now ensconsed in this system. It is too much work, time, money to come up with a comprehensive overhaul to this system.
Till such time, to all outliers in the non-JEE curve, keep trying harder and harder. It is upto you to see opportunities and sieze it. JEE curve students will be luckier, but then if you are as good and doubly hard working, the gap can be reduced!
2:58 PM |
Author: kaushik
this character is quite regular on my blog... my friend shriram!
so he finally got his call to sail on friday in the most weird circumstances.
Feeling toatlly bored that he was not getting a call for his first sail for a couple of months now, he calls up the company to remind them that he is on their list. the company reprsentative inturn asks him "when are you ready to join". Shriram, in order to impress upon the restlessness with which he is waiting for the call, replies "Anytime you say, infact, i am ready to come tomorrow even". The company representative however, takes the figure of speech quite literally, and calls him to join the next day.
So the poor fellow, packs in a hurry, gets himself a air ticket to mumbai in the last minute, and leaves home without getting enough time to say goodbye to family and friends.
On friday he finds out that he has to fly to Dalian, a port in china to join his ship.
Travelling abroad is quite frightening, even if you are well prepared mentally, have a good idea of the country you will be visiting. I am a case of "nearly there". I was supposed to be on a flight to new york, sometime this time last year, but opted out for a masters at IIT. I sure felt the jitters of planning a trip so far from home, because finally, home is after all home.
Last year, i went to the airport to see of a friend, who was going to washington for his PhD. At the airport, I just glanced at the faces of the people travelling. It was not a tough task to point out the faces that was going out of india for the first time, a delicate mixture of eagerness, excitement, anticipation of the new place, with a fear, sadness of leaving home was clearly visible. But even among the seasoned visitors abroa, according to my face reading abilities, i could sense a little fear and a sense of holding back. Infact, to me the whole atmosphere at the international departures terminal was a mixture of fear and sadness. I did not glimpse a single face that was extremely happy, nor a send off group that was laughing and merrying.
Anyways, coming back to my friend, this was his first trip abroad. After collecting his tickets, we changed whatever money he had to USD and started for the airport. This is where, my trusted bag, that which has travelled with me to home and back weekends,to matheran , to madras and tirupati, to hyderabad and bangalore got lucky and flew to Dalian, China. Shriram in his hurry had forgotten to get a smaller cabin luggage bag to keep important documents and toileteries and a change shirt or two!
The whole day was fun and happy mood for me. But, in the evening on the way back home in the local train, parry called up to give news that shattered all the happy mood that i was in in the evening.
He called up to say that a batchmate of ours from RVCE, a fellow hostellite, AP, passed away in the evening, crushed by a bus as he slipped from his bike.
Initially, as dozens of calls started coming to me, informing me of the news, I hardly could not feel a thing.
A hostel is like a big joint family, close friends are your brothers and sister, and then you have a gang of friends, like your first cousins, and then there are fellow hostelites, people you exchange a pleasant hi-bye with, people you hug in joy when they/ you get good results/goof jobs etc, the equivalent of distant cousins, related yet not close. To me AP was in the last category, and thus a certain ambivalence in my feeligs. A part of me felt sad, but another part wanted to remain happy, wanted my brain to file the whole day of fun that i had!
But later in the night, as i tried to sleep, the whole enormity of the unfortunate incident stuck me. AP, had been a part of my life.
For two weeks, in our second week on engineering, we had to stay in our first year hostels as the second year hostel was still being renovated. AP, was my room mate for those 15-20 days. He was our team captain for our night cricket team in my final year, and we were "FEst-Hos" team-mates in our second year cricket team.
As such short burst of closeness that we spent circulated in my memory, i really started to feel that I am going to miss this person in my life, so what if we had not really spoken since we graduated from college. Tears did not come, but the heart became heavy...
It is at times like this the one comes to question faith, relegion and GOD et al.
He was most certainly like any other 20 yr old, chasing his dreams, first in an engineering college and later in a software firm, living his life, working hard, studying hard, partying hard...there was no reason that he should not live his bright future, have his share of the pie...
in some cases, he was little unlike many of us. His job meant a lot not only for him, but for his family too. The money he sent back home, was used to pay back some loans that his parents had incurred.
And afterall, he was young, with his whole life ahead...
I spent a small time, in the shoes of his mother. What trauma must she be going through...
Why GOD why??????????????
I have a stock dialogue for unfortunate events, "Whatever happens, happens for the good"...and two days ago, all I had was nothing!
4:18 AM |
Author: kaushik
it has been such a long time since i posted!!!
though i was busy for maybe about 1week of the three week hiatus, a certian jinx were in the way of me and a post!!!
whats the jinx?
mumbai rains hates me!!
last year, first day in bombay had to be 26/7, and by the time i returned to my room in the evening, the room was under water...my mattress and suitcases were happily floating in the water.
this year, the first day of the rains, a lightning strikes somewhere in the vicinity of my hostel, and blows up some parts of the computer of some rooms in the hostel, maybe due to excess surge of current. My computer had to be one!
and finally, two weeks ago, i shifted to a newer-better hostel, and whats the problem...rains have seeped into the switch/router (some thing like that) and thus in some rooms internet will not be working. My super new room just happened to be one of them.
When finally, net starts working on my comp, i had to get busy with my M.Tech report submissions, and when i finally finish that, the govt had to ban blogger.
Last few days were not good for me to blog :-(
anyways, right now, i am in no mood to write, will just put up some pictures of vihar lake, right behind IIT, where we had gone for a walk on monday! the pictures are taken from my mobile, hence the not so good quality!
quite unbelievable that such scenic beauty is there inside bombay!!!
and ya!
couple of weeks ago, amma had to go to chennai, and that left me in the home incharge of the kitchen to try and cook!!!!
day 1: i tried to make aloo sabji and bhindi sambhar. the sabji was fine but instead of bhindi sambhar, i ended up with bhindi rasam.
day 2: teamed up with my cousin to make 'Khichidi" and "pakoda". came out pretty well.
day3: teamed up with appa and cousin, to make 'avial'.....was as good as when amma makes it!!
day4: made khichdi again....have perfected the art of making khichdi now. made baingan bhaja to go with it!!!!!!
3:53 PM |
Author: kaushik
A mail I recieved today.
Dear Terrorist,
Even if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and again you
tried to disturb us and disrupt our life - killing innocent civilians by
planting
bombs in trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring death and
destruction, cause panic and fear and create communal disharmony but
everytime you were disgustingly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass
our life in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single rupee? If
you
wanted to give us a shock then we are sorry to say that you failed
miserably in your ulterior motives. Better look elsewhere, not here.
We are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujrati’s and Marathi’s or Punjabis and
Bengali’s. Nor do we distinguish ourselves as owners or workers, govt.
employees or private employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you
like). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. On the last
few occasions when you struck (including the 7 deadly blasts in a single
day killing over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to work
next day in full strength. This time we cleared everything within a few
hours and were back to normal - the vendors placing their next order,
businessmen finalizing the next deals and the office workers rushing to
catch the
next train. (Yes the same train you targeted)
Fathom this: Within 3 hours of the blasts, long queues of blood
donating volunteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of the
injured were admitted. By 12 midnight, the hospital had to issue a
notification
that blood banks were full and they didn't require any more blood. The
next day, attendance at schools and office was close to 100%, trains & buses
were packed to the brim, the crowds were back.
The city has simply dusted itself off and moved one - perhaps with
greater vigour.
We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in times like this. So, do
not dare to threaten us with your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very
strong and can not be harmed.
Please forward this to others. U never know, by chance it may come to
hands of a terrorist in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Iraq and he can then read
this message which is specially meant for him!!!
With Love,
From the people of Mumbai (Bombay)
PS: Really busy now. will come up with a post next week probably!!
