The DoD files I

   People like to think and feel that things are getting worse for other people. SuperFreakonomics  talks of "Unbelievable Stories of Apathy and Altruism" but I think fatalism constitutes the core of a human being. Remove the many different layers and emotions and you would find that the Second law of Entropy forms the basis of one's psyche. The jar of milk will fall and smash to pieces. The eggs, no, the crate of eggs will break and splatter. 200 people will die of dengue. That little nuclear coolant problem in Jap land will result in Apocalypse. I have got no less than fifteen odd text forwards describing the radiation threat as an EOW symptom. Stop wallowing in self pity, imagining the last few calls you make to parents and other loved ones... Boring... 

   Whoa! That was some heavy stuff. Thought the reader would brood and look deep and forget about why I haven't written in a long while. An explanation is deserved and an explanation will be given. I was writing an article for Cactus Flower, the annual magazine of BITS, Pilani. Hopeless excuse, isn't it? Not if you consider the number of tests and quizzes and the Raag practice which has been going in the past few weeks. Sangamam'11 was presented successfully on the 6th of March and since then I have been diverting evenings to ahem, studies...

   Two important discoveries in the recent past. One, the library. Hitherto used only for nerding away in peace, away from the confines of my room and the distractions offered by my bed, I also discovered that it has things known as 'books'. Not just the "The Physics of Particles and Waves" and "Soil Mechanics" type but also the Rowling, Ludlum and  the Asimov types. The little snag in the above statement is that whenever I manage to locate a book using the lib's computerized system(A veritable treasure hunt), the book is usually in such a dilapidated condition that it kills the joy of reading. ..

   The second is the fact there is a profound mindset change among freshers as they enter their second semester in campus. They know the ways and means of the world and most importantly can use institutions like The All Night Canteen(ANC) without any fear of being trounced upon by seniors. I also started ANCing. My senior has a nice way of putting it. I could've been eating for free. The mess bill involved was an impersonal equation my father had with the insti and my wallet was not involved. And Et voila!  My ANC bill was a bloated 1200 bucks before I knew it. And the worst part was I couldn't stop myself... Egg rice and Cheese Burger... Holy Shit!

   And guys, the situation genuinely seems to be getting worse... Pray for Japan...

Ivy League LSD

   A lot of people, mostly freshers run their case by knowing or pretending to know all about PG degrees in the US of A. Highly amusing are the encounters with guys who cannot complete a sentence without garnishing it with "Harvard" and "Princeton" or "UIUC" in a normal conversation about say, heavy metal. How they crept up is an entirely different question. Do they think it makes them cool by talking about it? No idea. This can be explained as a runoff from those JEE coaching days when a person, who cannot get above 60 percentile in the All India Test Series harps about how his dad or mom or uncle or Grandfather's brother's son's wife's half brother's son was an IITian ot BITSian and how much pressure he is under (the writer can also relate to that, very well, in fact... However, he did nothing to concentrate more on his studies...).

   Anyway, the above para was completely random, aimed at nobody. The chemistry lecture went quite decently.  "It doesn't matter how you pronounce it, "Jetcheff" or "Jetcheff". The Germans and Russians can handle it", rang the voice of the lecturer as students sat in rapt attention and my eyes drooped worse than a koala bear. For those who are not chemistry geeks, there is a Russian bloke called Saytzeff who was beautifully mispronounced as "Zaitsev" by the Germans. My professor being an Indian, pronounced both the same way. He is a brilliant prof though, nice teacher...

   You know you are in the second sem of the academic year when suddenly people start talking a lot about acads and projects. Friend Judee(Remember the guy with the Android phone?) is living proof. He is an Msc. Chemistry student and wants to major in an engineering degree too. So when asked (by mistake) what his interests were, he ranted almost immediately, "Semiconductors, Automobile Engineering, Nanotech, Robotics, a bit of Computer science too..." Hmm... he is still confused about what he is going to take and so am I. I don't know anything about any engineering discipline and was planning to choose what he was taking, damn...

   The Founder's day celebration was a grand success as everyone cheered(?) us on as we danced(?). We were appreciated, more for the fact that we had the guts to not only stand but dance before a gafffe hungry crowd, jeering and laughing all the way through. The IC dinner was excellent as usual and the post dance euphoria added to the taste..

    Math test just got over now. Did decently... Will watch the movie "A Beautiful Mind" (again), a story about a man who goes to Princeton... Uh oh, did I just give myself away?

Welcoming the summer(?)

Yesterday's list:
          1. Plan proposal to a girl I like in Chennai on Valentine's. (Am a despo. Period.)
          2. Plan the studying part for upcoming tests. (Aiming for 8+ CGPA)
          3. Organize books and model exam papers and do chem assignment.
          4. Wake up at 6:30 AM everyday the next week.
          5. Wash undies.

Today's List:
          1. Plan the studying part for upcoming tests. (Aiming for 9+ CGPA)
          2. Organize books and model exam papers and do chem assignment
          3. Wake up at 7:30 AM everyday next week.
          4. Plan proposal for BITSian sister. (Am still a despo. Period.)

(Hmm, the proposal for Chennai girl was half-hearted anyway, and was quashed by my best friend Ashwin. The undies were washed.)

   This weekend went quite well. Well is relative, as usual. Nothing wrong happened. I managed to set my room right and that's saying something with all the cobwebs and dust and books lying around. Raag sessions are also going decently, though I cannot say the same for Founder's day... (Read Previous post.)
   The weather is getting more and more pleasant by the day. I apologize. I don't know if it's the BITSian in me which keeps wanting to harp about the weather at the drop of pigeon shit or the south Indian which frankly, hasn't seen life below 25 and above 40 degrees. The seniors say that it is the calm before the storm, the deep breath before the plunge into scorching heat. Yuck. Freezing cold can be handled. I hate summers.          
   The hostel has turned into a CounterStrike 1.6 gaming den 'cos the freshers got laptops (No, I got a Netbook). So it's not a big surprise to hear "Abey Saale, get to their base armed with sniper as soon as "freeze time" runs out and don't forget to turn off Friendly Fire" or just "Nooooooooo...". Sad. There was this article I read the other day about the incresing number of suicides in IITK; Around 8 in the past five years... It accounted students holing up in their dens and facebooking and LAN games and general solitary confinement as a major factor. My dad told me that in his days, even if students drank or smoked (up?), they did so together and it was always fun with people around...
   Hey, the answer key to my chem test came out. I would like to focus on two emotions here. The first one is happiness; When you have done a test well; When you don't have any classes left for the day; When nothing can go wrong; When you just want to snuggle into your bed without going on a guilt trip like your school days, when a moment not spent on mugging formulae is a moment wasted; When you're in love with life;
  That's how I felt immediately after the test got over...
  The second is the sense of crushing defeat, of impending doom, of dreaded fear, when everything can go wrong at the very start, where I might be forced to take the Chemical Dual(No offense meant for chemicalites... Do remember that I wanted chemical) and will live to regret not working hard enough...
  Well, you know when I felt that way now...(Let's wait and hope I've done well...)
   And  like every Seven  Habits has an Eighth Habit, I would like to tell you about another awesome feeling. My mom sent me two HUGE parcels. One had two great books in it and the other had savories and snacks which might just help me last through this sem without any qualms about the pathetic food here. Yay! Thanks mom! Mental note to send a greeting card for everyone's birthday made...
   The management fest "Interface'11" is happening right now. Everyone's excited, as the culinary delights(?) of Domino's Pizzas(Oh no, not again!) and Momos have set up stalls. It's just another excuse for tasting a bit of civilization before we become our usual cynical, class bunking selves again. My friend Nadeem texted me the other day:
    Nadeem: Ssup?
            Me: Nothing much here man, just tests here.. you temme..
    Nadeem: What else?
            Me: Had my chem test the other day. Went ok, I guess. Otherwise, life is fine...
    Nadeem: Hmm... Ssup?

        Me: Dude, I'm in a bloody village in the middle of nowhere where post offices and banks close at 2 PM itself and civilization is 200 kms away. What do you expect?

    Nadeem: Kk, Am so sorry, man.. Will talk later?
           
                

The Shitty one

 To be the mud, the bog, the mire,
 To soak the bones in February-
 Eons from the autumn shower-
 Even from a summer berry!
                                           - February Rain, 72.21.81.63


     Oh, what is it? I can hear it. The steady clatter which makes one believe that the Tzar's horse carriage itself is arriving. Its in the air, I can smell it! Its on the ground. I can see it. Its on my head too. Well, what is it? Its PIGEON SHIT! 
    Life in Pilani can be a bitch sometimes... Like, that blue moon dhobi and that little curfew for girls. Well, right in front of my hostel is a patch of white road known as the Milky Way. This dilapidated, seldom walked upon if not ran across and completely yuck stretch has got its infamous nickname because, believe me, Pigeons from all across the campus sit on a tree in the sidewalk and choose to let loose. Its true, they ALL chose to suffer from explosive diarrhea at the milky way! It rains shit!
    Well, pot jamming or ghatam practice is on full swing, accosted by some "founder's day" celebration dance and learning a bit of photography training. I also managed to nerd a bit in the library today and therefore granted myself a guilt free pass to blog away. I also borrowed "Macroeconomics deMystified" from the lib... Kinda figured that engineering may not be so interesting after all so why not major properly in economics? It is a good field..
   My friend Hariharasudhan(smartly shortened to Judee, there's a history behind that) has got this kickass android xperia phone, and it is well...........................................kickass! Its got everything, man. The apps are nice, if not squeaky clean like apple, if you know what I mean. It can read docs and spreadsheets and apps like the Bar code reader and Talking Tom are amazing. A nice app is the urban dictionary...  
   You may already know this, but for the old chops, here goes... The word 'shit' is a very versatile term. So Wrong context and/or emphasis on specific words may give the sentence a whole new meaning. Adding a "the" before 'shit' and stressing on it actually means the shit is cool. Removing the "the" completely messes it up. So, please do me a favor and say Li'l Wayne and t-Pain are shit, not the... 
       My room is a mess, I got a lot of laundry to wash, there's a lot of ghatam practice and I need to pickup my grades! Ugh, I need to get my act together, pull my pants up, literally and figuratively too(Friends will get it. Go Low Waist!). I made this small timetable, describing short term plans(which include studying hard for the t1 and waking up by 7) and long term plans(writing a book and washing my clothes). I like writing stuff. 
   Yawn, time's almost one. I am all out of stray thoughts... G'nite then...

7 Ganton Maaf

    Am blogging, completely spent of all energy to do anything else, of the will to do anything to do with acads and of the compulsion to go to anc to munch something. Two important developments... One, I attended all SEVEN hours of class, including every foul lecture and draconian tut. That's saying something, 'cos I never had a 7 hour day in my previous sem and even then, I had not attended all classes of any day. Who ever said the path to renaissance, order and decorum from chaos and laziness starts with baby steps? I would like to see the reader attend a seven hour day...
   Maybe I went overboard with my use of (googled) words. Well, the second piece of trivia about yours truly is that I am going to be dancing for the Pilani Tamil Mandram to a peppy number on The Founder's Day celebrations in the auditorium in front of all the students. Holy crap, that's embarrassment! I hark back to the days of old when I came up with amazing excuses to skip the kiddish Sports Day dance at school. Revenge, huh?
   Meanwhile, the institute, in keeping with its ambitions and dreams of Vision 2020, is finally thinking ahead and has installed these small, cute(?) and irritating speed breakers at every turn of the campus. Well, I guess students in super bikes by 2020 wouldn't be so off the mark, would you say? On a serious note, I seriously appreciate the insti's effort. They could try and increase the number of dustbins too... I love my college, man. I want it to give some serious competition to the IITs...
   My mom can sleep peacefully at home knowing that I simply cannot game on my netbook. Why? I tried to install Counter strike 1.6 on my comp and et voila! It was slower than my '98 comp when I tried to play Liberty City on it... Poor devil, It put up such a brave fight! Anyway, I didn't want to see it suffer anymore and uninstalled it... I'm using it for lec slides and blogging only now...
   I'm putting the cycle(Baby, I call it) to full and awesome use these days. I am so happy. It eliminates all these lousy 'transition' time intervals which were such a big waste... Give you an example... If the time is 11:00 AM and I got a class at 12 and I had to buy stuff at C'not, without a cycle I won't go 'cos the job might take me more than an hour. Well, with a cycle, thinking about travel time intervals is simplified and can be neglected, if you get what I mean...
   Meanwhile, our bhawan also acquired the much coveted "Visited by the Chief Warden" status symbol. No idea what we did, though. We did have a few birthday 'celebrations' in the first few days. Guess they were loud enough.
   On the subject of metal, I think only folk metal is worth listening to these days. They are mostly clean, they quench that li'l classical thirst inside me and most importantly, the music is damn good. Special reference to Inis Mona by Eluveitie and Windrider by Ensiferum.

   Stop pulling at your hair, my blog ain't that bad...
PS:  Did I tell you that the trailer of 7 Khoon Maaf looks kickass? Looks like Priyanka Chopra and Vishal Bharadwaj are cooking up a real kicker this time. Wishing Akshay kumar more luck this year...
    

Musings

Here I am, blogging my brains out...
    I am not gonna be sleeping today. No one has been handed a laptop, net connection and DC++ on the same day. Its too much power. I want to spend myself this weekend so that I can concentrate on studies the rest of the sem. And the file which had the honor of being the first to be downloaded was 'Sheila ki Jawani'... Haha..
     I am also slightly happier than usual, today because of a totally dumbass reason. The girl I liked in 11th and 12th grade had her 18th birthday today and she is in Chennai and she replied back to my 'Happy B'day' message! I mean, she usually does reply and conversations are quite formal and friendly. But us despos celebrate at the drop of a hat and I had everyone guessing what I was so cheery about. I should try convincing pappuji to change one of his shakes' names to ''The Kesh Shake"... Pretty cool, huh?
    Anyway, I haven't taken a bath for the past five days. Uh, the horror! I used to be a daily bather when the weather was ok. All I can console myself with is that the temperature has been touching 1-2 degrees every bloody night since new year and the sun peeps out of the clouds once a day. All birthday celebrations are rescheduled to 10:00 pm the previous day as its simply too cold at twelve. I guess every BITSian cries at least 5 times a day why GD Birla, god bless him, had to be born here. I mean, come on, this village has its advantages, but still I would put the high incidences of smoking and drinking among students here to the extreme climate and the lack of well, anything outside campus.
   The coriander and onion pastes which mom got me to mix with rice and eat are working out quite well, thank you mom. These and the absence of an ID card have ensured a near zero anc bill till now. I did promise myself(maybe in vain, as seniors tell me) that I would be damn stingy this sem 'cos the mess extras in the previous one simply went through the roof.
   I have just downloaded the entire collection of lecture slides of all the courses, prepared by all the profs for the entire second sem.This lovable wonder, this incredible software, this god given blessing called DC++ also turns out to be a veritable monstrosity. I also have downloaded a few discographies and movies. Till now, the 'distractions' have been  kept at bay...

Back in Pilani

      Yep, I am blogging from my dear college again, but this time from my own net book with frosted, multicolored and numb fingers; the temperature must have hit 4 degrees out there. The whole campus is empty except for a few early birds like me and friends, and it looks BEAUTIFUL… Will probably hate myself for saying so later as registration and time table making will begin day after tomorrow. Meanwhile, I got more pressing things at hand which will help me weather the weather extremum. Having been told enough by Preethi (Raagan) to get a quilt and to quit being this lazy, tomorrow is the day for buying that and other essential commodities like soap, shaving blades and cream and a LAN cord. Now, let me bother the kind reader about my new lappy.

     It’s a HP mini whatever model with an atom processor. It looks great, is compact and can be carried around in a ‘sleeve’ and is very portable. It’s a net book and supposedly can’t play games. Not that I’m gonna try and install any. Mom and dad have placed so much trust on me even though I had screwed up my first semester big time and I will use it only for lecture slides and other stuff.  Of course, blogging isn’t a big distraction! It’s only for biggies like Sidin Vadukut who make it, well, big in the blogosphere and have a reputation to keep up. I am also excited ‘cos it looks kinda like the one Zuckerberg uses while inventing FaceSmash in The Social Network. Yep, I almost feel a billion dollars coming my way, thank you…

    I enjoyed the train journey from Chennai to Delhi by the recently introduced Duronto trains. The discomfort due to the disgusting CD flush system notwithstanding, it’s very encouraging to see the Indian Railways take some good steps to reduce the load on the world’s largest toilet. For those who didn’t understand, the new drains in some of these new trains do not lead to the tracks… Collects the shit instead. The food served was pathetic as usual, with the guy having the balls to collect tips. There was a water shortage problem too, going down into the complaint register from a very irritable (and slightly smelly) lady. Well, I beat the crowd before the panic rush started.  The air conditioning kept us well insulated from the freezing cold but the intense fog prevented the poor driver from arriving on time by more than five hours… Sad.

     The Chennai Thyagaraja Aradhna Programme conducted by students of BITS-Pilani turned out well, with a small help from my enthusiastic parents’. There was an explosion of talent as classes right from 1988(like the guy who started it) to 2010(like me) participated… I played the ghatam, which also was a HUGE learning experience for me… Remember the super perspective vortex which Beeblebrox was put through? There was this 1992 pass-out who played the mridangam. Holy crap, he was an expert and I didn’t know shit! I could have tried dancing instead…

PS: I also found my cycle back! It was in the abandoned cycles dump near the insti… Could be a sign of good things to come, very soon… 

The Hol Blog 2

     I'm shit bored here, man. The first week of holidays was spent in eating. Like. Hell. I also met a lot of friends and finally delivered the Mridangam to a senior's mom for repair and maintenance. Now I am spending time with the cat, which sleeps all the time and reading The Fall of Giants. The book, as I said is amazing.
     Now blasting Ensiferum(Exotic tastes, people, exotic tastes, read The Hol blog 1...) in my room. A beautiful thing about Indians is that thy neighbor is never troubled, at least he acts as if he's not, by the decibel level of thy music, 'cos
    1. He's too lazy to stand up for his rights as an Indian, preferring to curse and whine and gripe about you rather than knock at your door.
    2. He had been doing the same thing to you a few days back and is resigned himself to the fate that he's paying for his sins...
    The music is just a metaphor for those little, but not so little things which your neighbor does to upset you, like keeping a dog which is a barking alarm at two in the night, dumping his garbage in front of your gate, buying non veg from the road sellers(This, coming from a non vegan, but it attracts flies and stinks and the hawker putting his hand inside the fish's mouth.. ew!), having an AC which has a leaky nose and a liking for your head...
     The worst neighbor is the Cheapass neighbor. The neighbor who washes clothes in the terrace because he doesn't want to waste his own water, uses the common plug point to run all his electrical appliances. That's worse than having a friend who eats at your mess and increases your food bill. Am I touching some nerve here?
     I checked my mail and saw that there was this mail thread linked to ideas for Sangamam 2k11. Thats the classical dance show of Raag for the second semester, usually based on a story or a theme. Holy shit, some of the ideas were wonderful. Professional. A little twinge of guilt here, having not offered any ideas myself. Ajay(The prez) is going to kill me...
    I also want to talk about the wonder woman and lobbyist Niira Radia. Not about the scams she's involved in. That's already going on full blast(Or, is it? Newspapers aren't willing to lose ad revenue from our dear Ambanis, are they?) in the media. All I want to do is offer a 21 gun salute to the daring nerve this woman has had in putting up our democracy and India as a republic up for sale, right from selecting portfolios to ministers, cozying up to the biggest names of corporate India to bloody deciding what newspapers should publish. Yep, that's the parliament and the Freedom of Press taken care of. Anyone for telling me what else democracy means?
   Mom's getting me a lappy for the next sem! Will use it only for slides...
  

The Hol Blog

Back after a hiatus!

    Well, Im not in the IPC right now. The semester ended on the 14th of December, reaching(and ending) a crescendo of end sem preparations, as I lived in the library and struggled to convert whatever mid-sem 'D's and 'E's to justifiable 'C's and respectable 'B's.. I just might manage a B in thermodynamics, in fact... Whoa!

     What a semester it has been! An overwhelming experience, joining college, learning freedom, right from registering to making your timetable and having a room for yourself(The latter might have figured in my poor grades, but take lite...), 'interacting' with seniors, BITSian bdays, DoPy, Raag, ARBITS... Awesome... 
    Cant speak the same for my acads though... I realized yesterday that I'm the only six pointer among my 12th grade classmates, who are 8 and above... Kinda sickening... Blame it on my college, where an average is given a 6 instead of a 7 or an 8...Will study like hell next sem, damn...
    I also want to make an interesting point on my blue blooded insti's blue blooded character. The temperature touched a non thermodynamic zero two weeks back in Pilani and the next day I see some profs still wearing their immaculate starched shirts and t-shirts and jeans, nothing more, nothing less! This is the limit of institutionalization! Just because you live in a place that has a temperature range of 55K doesn't mean your blood stops regulating body temperature... You can't be that cold! (Anymore sentences with implicit meanings or metaphors and I just might be thrown out...)
    The train journey home was as beautiful as ever. I would live in a train, given the chance. My favorite sophomore Venkatramanan's status describes it nicely, "the steady clickety-clack of steel wheels on polished rails...", ah, music to the ears... I love the way tracks 'merge' and divide as though they were composed of silk threads...  The way, the world's largest institution seamlessly functions as a unit, right from laying the concrete slabs to the fish plates to the catering...Did you know that the Indian railways also caters to the Parliament? No wonder our babus are so bloated up... Till now I thought it was the moneybags.. Also makes you wonder about the people who sit on the railway tracks or the A-holes who blow them up in protest for some mundane cause... Anyone for running trains over them? 

           Heavy stuff apart, me and my friends went to Barbecue Nation yesterday and ate the waiter's(Yes, the waiter's) heart out, so much so that the poor devil begged us to try the main course also instead of sticking just to the starters... I don't think I'm gonna be eating out for weeks... Amazing food.. We all felt guilty and also generously tipped them too...
      In my college, A person's cool quotient(supposedly) increases greatly if he or she has exotic tastes in books, movies and music.
   Tanmoy: Hey, have you heard of Eluveitie?
          Me: Nope, what is it?
   Tanmoy: They are a band from Europe..
          Me: Genre?
   Tanmoy: Folk, Celtic metal...
          (Hmm.. Celtic refers to the six Celtic nations of Brittany (Breizh), Cornwall (Kernow), Ireland (Éire), the Isle of Man (Mannin), Scotland (Alba), and Wales (Cymru). Yep, thank you Wiki...)
              Me: Nice, how are they?

   Tanmoy: Awesome shit, yo... I listened to them two days back and I didn't sleep yesterday 'cos I was       high on them... 

          Me: Nice, will try listening to them...


   There you go... Tanmoy is a nice friend of mine, but sometimes, I can't even recognize the author or the director of some of the books or movies he mentions. Well, he isn't in Matrix(The book and movie review club) for no reason... Keeping up with the peer pressure, I decided to read Ken Follett's "Fall of Giants". The book is going good, about World War I or something...  
    Anyway, I have to deliver a mridangam to a senior in Cathedral road, about 6.5km of bad roads, traffic snarls and teeth munching away from my house...
     Will keep the reader posted...
PS: Eluveitie is from Switzerland. Love you Wiki..

Diwali Blues

   Diwali is round the corner and I'm watching Chodu CID on my cell. Well, the wing is quite empty and my best friend Achyuth has left for his beloved homeland Hyd. Hopefully, he'll bring some good sweets from PullaReddy's when he comes back. Most of us are clinging on to our friends here in the mutual hope that they bring a bit of civilization (Thank you for the McD burger, Shravan sir) whenever they come back from wherever they went. It would be chaos otherwise, like an Alice Cooper concert.

   All the buildings have been decked up with colorful decorative lights and the clock tower looks magnificent. Ive bunked all the classes for the past two days, not that they taught anything worthwhile anyway, so megalite... (Megalite is a nice piece of pilani jargon which can be used pretty much like the f word - noun, adjective, verb, you name it...) Also, am jamming with raag again for an instrumental concert. Full fledged practice might begin tomorrow. Hurray.

   I've also noticed that my vocabulary, grammatical accuracy and general command over the English language has been on free fall since I have no idea when... I've already said that I write crappy blogs with a dictionary and google for help. I was usually known for my language skills at least till 8th grade, where my teacher asked the class to give me a big hand for an essay or something. So it comes as a big shock to me when I didnt know the meaning of "aficionado" (Yes, I had to google the spelling, don't rub it in). Blame it on all the mind numbing, brain killing, creativity sucking IIT coaching for the past two years. All I can remember are formulas, and more formulae... Back to the drawing board.

  Have I bored the reader enough? Wishing him/her ("it" if its Zaphod Beeblebrox) a very happy and flollopy Diwali... Have fun...