The rise of the king

Disclaimer : A purely "imaginary" story with "imaginary" characters.

On one fine saturday morning, the whole of H12 was shaking.

Whoa, what was happening?

Is it an earthquake?
Did some terrorist manage to infiltrate our campus and throw a bomb?
Did Ladha fall in the bathroom again?

Many possibilities. No answer.

I quickly opened the door to investigate the reason. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect what I saw next. The whole corridor was filled with students running in a particular direction. And by students I mean both boys and girls!!!

"Whoa, so many girls in a boys hostel on a Saturday morning???"

I happened to hear a bit of conversation of 2 students who were running along with the crowd.

"Run fast lest we won't be able to get a glimpse of him"

"But where is he staying?"

"I don't know yaar, just follow the crowd. Everyone is running to see him only"

I couldn't understand what was happening. I asked this question to my neighbour, who was standing nearby.

"Yaar, what is happening".

"Don't know exactly yaar. Heard a rumour that Darkha Butta has come to the hostel"

"What!!!!Darkha Butta!!! The famous reporter from MDTV!!!!!!!!!wooooow. But why?"

"No idea re. Seems the institute has got a new academic genius. And that she has come to interview him".

"Cool"

"Also heard the genius is from 2nd year Mtech Computer Science."

"What!!!! You kidding right?"

"Well , this is what I heard. Don't know how true it is"

So some guy from my class is an academic genius and Darkha is interviewing him?
Hmm now who can that be.

Is it the deadly Borol-Sriram combo? Did Darkha madam happen to hear one of their lunch time "technical" discussions.....Na, not possible. She's still alive isn't she?

Is it our sit-through raja, the one and only CP?......Na not possible. He must be attending one of the 1000 sit through courses he has taken this semester and so he cannot be in the hostel at this moment.

Err, could it be me? Hmm a very high possibility. But then how come crowd is not running towards me? I guess people still haven't learnt to recognise a genius when they see one.

And since the genius is a guy, as unfortunately no girls stay in H12, it leaves out the network queen Chotu, the compiler rani Ambika, the mtech-convert-to-phd-convert-to-postdoc-convert-to-god-knows-what-is-left-to-take Riju and operating system "expert" Jaya.

Well it still leaves many possibilities...Rakesh, Kamle,Chander and so on.

I guess I need to find this out myself. So I dressed up and followed the crowd. I noticed that the crowd was running towards the A-wing of H12.

The whole of A-wing was jam packed. People were pushing and crushing each other. I somehow managed to make it to the front. Darkha Butta was standing a few meters away, apparently waiting for our hero to make entry.

Suddenly a back ground music started:

"He walks like a king, he talks like a king...He isssssssssssssssssss....THE KING"

And in a slow motion, our hero comes running out of his room with the song in the background. The camera moves from his toes up. As the hero comes running in slow motion, the camera shows a pair of black shiny shoes, then black shiny leather pants. The camera then moves up to reveal black jackets. Looks like this guy has been bitten by the Matrix bug. The camera then moves furthur up and finally our hero's face gets revealed....and I nearly died of shock.

Him????An academic genius??? Since when??? Am I dreaming?
I pinched myself. Whoa it is paining. Na, I am not dreaming. It is really not a dream.

The back ground music was still going on.

"He walks like a king, he talks like a king...He isssssssssssssssssss...."

This time I completed the song

".........SHEIKU?????"

Meanwhile the girls were going crazy. Sheiku was planting flying kisses to all the girls who had arrived just to see him.

"Oh he's soo handsome"

"Oh look look, he's smiling at me. Oh someone hold me or I will faint...."

I stood there mouth opened.

What was happening. Isn't this still the year 2009???

As I was wondering whether I was still living on Planet Earth, Sheiku's interview with Darkha Butta started.

Darkha : "So Mr Sheiku, how did you manage to top score in the machine learning course"

What!!! He top scored in the machine learning course??? This is definitely not the year 2009.

Sheiku : "Oh it was nothing. Just years of practice and a little use of my excellent brains".

Darkha : "But you were never even on the critics' radar before you became the course topper".

Sheiku : "Aaah critics. What do they know about machine learning".

Darkha : "A few words of advice to anyone who wants to take up machine learning courses"

Sheiku : "Well study hard party harder"

Darkha : "O is this how you top scored in this course".

Sheiku : "Yups...except for the study part".

Darkha : "So what next. Where do you go from here"

Sheiku (blushing) : "Well I guess I will go straight to the restroom. A little emergency".

Darkha : "Err I meant career wise"

Sheiku : "O sorry. Most probably I will apply for 'Machine Learning for Dummies' in MIT". You see no more machine courses left in IIT for me to take up".

Darka : "Wow MIT eh? Cool. Sheiku,a few words for your girl fans".

Sheiku : "I will always be there for them. They can ask any machine learning doubts to me anytime anywhere".

Darkha : "O your fans will be so happy to hear that".

Sheiku : "Err you asked only about the girl fans right".

Darkha : "Right. Anyway congrats once again for being chosen the academic genius. Wish you all the best in your life".

Darkha turns and faces the camera and continues

"And thus we have come to the end of your favourite program 'Even impossible things can happen'. By topping the machine learning course which only a selected few in this world has ever accomplished, Sheiku has indeed announced to the world...He is the king".

MTP stories

Disclaimer : Some parts of this blog is contributed by Ajinkya Joshi

It's project season in IITB. We need to submit our stage 1 of our MTech project
(MTP) by this month end. All the class geeks are so busy with their project reports submission that it's been ages since I have seen some of their faces, apart from the coincidental meetings in the boys' restroom.

In order to evaluate how the situation of our class is in this hectic month, let us look at how some of our folks are doing their MTP. Names have been changed to protect the identity of these people.

The first in the list is Mr CurryPurry. So how is Mr CurryPurry doing his MTP...well let's see how

One fine saturday morning

"Knock knock".

Someone knocking at my door. I open the door.
Standing outside is Mr CurryPurry.

Me : "Hello Mr CurryPurry, what can I do for you"

Curry : "Hello Mr Sree Shankar, I need your help"

Me : "Anytime Mr Curry. Go on. Tell me how can I help you"

Curry : "Please call me on my mobile"

Me : "Why Mr Curry. You are standing in front of me, then why should I call you on your mobile"

Curry : "Please Mr Shankar, do as I say, pleaseeee"

Me : "Ok Mr Curry, relax. I am calling"

I gave a call to Mr CurryPurry's phone.

"The number you have called is currently out of range"

"My Curry, I am getting an out-of-range message"

Curry : "You sure?"

Me : "Positive"

Curry on hearing this became very excited. He, who can't dance to save his own skin, now started dancing and singing!!!

I couldn't understand what was happening.

"Why are you soo excited"

Curry : "Now my guide will not be able to contact me and fix the project
meeting. Yahoooooooooooooooooooooo. Another guide-free weekend."

and Mr Curry returned to his room, dancing all the way.

What can I say. Different people different styles.

Now we will see a different character. His name is Tree_In_Kresit (As mentioned above, name changed to hide the identity of our characters). Tree_in_Kresit sits in the Circular Hall of the Kresit building.

Tree_in_Kresit has almost finished the stage 1 of his project. The smart boy that he is, this was only expected of him. As Tree was marvelling at his own work sitting in front of his computer system, a colleague of Tree's, let's call him Mr X, came up to him. Unlike Mr Tree, Mr X is an ordinary Mtech guy. Why do I say so? Well he, like many of us, is successfully screwing up his project with high precision and accuracy.

X : "Hey bhai, how's your project going"

Tree : "Yaar, ye bhi kuch puchne ki baath hei. It's almost done re. Just some brushing up to do here and there"

X (Going green with jealousy) : "Yaar gr8 man. So what is your project about"

Tree : "It's a GPS related project. See suppose I give the coordinates of a place in terms of latitudes and longitudes, the program will return the output as -

You are currently sitting in such and such place "

X (Feeling even more jealous) : "Wow yaar, kya program banaya yaar"

Tree (blushing) : "O it was nothing"

X : "Hey can you enter the coordinates of our lab into your program. Just want to see what what the output will be"

Tree : "It's output will be
You are currently sitting in the circular hall of the Kresit building"

X : "Cool dude. Just give the coordinates to the program"

Tree : "Ya sure"

Our friend Mr Tree enters the coordinates. The program starts processing
Mr Tree and Mr X both glued to the computer monitor waiting for the output.

And then with a flash, the output screen appeared.

"You are sitting in the middle of the Arabian Sea"

Silence for some seconds.

Mr Tree looked at Mr X.

"Satellite problems"

PS: Thus completes the 50th post of this author. He has thus successfully managed to bore the readers 50 times over :-).

Salsa night

One fine day, or rather night, as I was "busy" doing my MTP (theoretically MTech Project, practically Mega Time Pass) , I got a call on my mobile.

It was our dear old Rishi.

"Oyee Sree, daer ho raha hei, jaldi aana"

Me : "Kaha jaane ki baath kar raha hei bhai"

Rishi : "aree bhool gaya kya...aaj Salsa ka workshop hei na"

Me : "aree ha bhool gaya mei. Nehi yaar tu ja. Mei MTP kar raha hu"

Rishi : "Kya MTP be. Ye salsa hei salsa. Har roz dekhne ko nehi milthe"

Me : "Na yaar MTP"

Rishi : "Dance seekhne ko milega"

Me (tempted, but firm) : "hmm...naaaa...MTP"

Rishi : "H11 se sabi aayenge"

(Hostel 11 [H11] is the PG ladies hostel in IITB)

Me (more tempted, but still firm): "hmmmmm....hmmmmmmm....naaaaaaa....MTP"

Rishi : "Unke saath dance bhi karne ka mauka milega"

Me : "Aisa hei kya. Sahi biduuu. MTP chale bhaad mei. Chalooooooooooo"

We were joined in our salsa quest by salsa "enthusiasts" CP, Kukri, Ajitav and Nazeem. On reaching the location, we saw that we were not alone in our quest. The entire male population in IITB seems to have taken a liking for salsa.

No chance of getting a girl partner now, not with such a screwed up gender ratio of 1 girl to every 100 boys. So what was the next best thing? Well watch the lucky ones dance. Atleast we will get to know what the entire hullabaloo about salsa is all about.

A few minutes later, we heard an announcement.

"Everyone sitting on the benches, please come down and take part in the workshop".

Me : "Looks like the guy making the announcement is blind. Can't he see that all the girls have already been taken up".

(Another announcement)

"Everyone sitting on the benches, please take the person sitting to your right as partner and join the workshop"

I turned my head to the right. I got the shock of my life. Ajitav was grinning back at me.

"Over my dead body dude. No way. Don't even think about it"

Ajitav : "Oyee c'mon yaar, what's so much fuss about it. Don't worry dude, it's me only na"

Me : "Dude, that's precisely my worry"

Ajitav : "Aree tension math le. Come let's join them"

With these "consoling" words, he dragged me to the ground. The only solace was that I was not the only person doing the same-gender-salsa. In fact it was almost an all-male salsa workshop.

The workshop started.

All the "couples" were made to stand next to each other. Ajitav stood to my left.

The instructors shouted out

"In case of same-gender couples, the person on the right will be the girl and the one on the left be the boy".

Crap. My luck sucks. I turned left.

"Oyee you come here. I can't move like a girl"

Ajitav : "Aree kuch nehi. It's all the same, whether you are a boy or a girl"

Me : "Yeah right, maybe for you"

The instructor continued

"The girl will keep her left hand on the guy's shoulder. The guy keep his right hand on the girl's hips"

Me (Looking at Ajitav) : "Don't you dare do that. That idiot will keep saying such things. After all he has a hot chick with him. That's not my case"

Ajitav : "Aree kuch nehi re. It is very easy"

And he proceeded to show me how it is to be done.

Me : "Hehehe......hehehehe"

Ajitav : "What happened. Why are you wriggling and laughing"

Me : "Abee you are tickling me"

Ajitav : Ok, let's try it again

And again we tried.

Me : "Hehehe....hehehe"

Ajitav : "abee stand still"

This went on for sometime. After 10 minutes of salsa I had enough of it. I stopped and returned to the bench. Ajitav, with his undying spirit, soon found another guy, and he continued. Thus went my first salsa experience. I hope even my enemies don't get to have such a salsa ever in their life. I would rather prefer jumping down a cliff.

Life in 3rd semester

Yikes...life cannot get more hectic than this!!! So busy that it's been ages since I wrote my last blog. Now finally managed to find some time to write some crap. In this semester each day starts agonizingly early (8:30 am!!!. Man, I really want to kick the ass of the guy who made this timetable. Making students see the inside of a classroom before the sun rises should come under IPC 302 and the person who made this timetable must be awarded capital punishment. By the way sun rises at 10 am in IITB). My daily routine goes as follows :-

Get up at 8:15 am, then dress up and start eating breakfast by 8:30 am and then reach the class at 8:50 am (for the 8:30 am class). 10 minutes goes into relaxing under the fan after the marathon you just completed to reach the class from hostel. After 10 minutes of relaxation when you are really ready to now listen to what the prof is saying, he would have already covered half the lecture. Since I don't have this bad habit of revising what was taught the previous class, whatever the prof says goes over the head. So back to relaxation till the class gets over. The 8:30 am class is a total give up.

Usually classes go till afternoon. Then I come back for lunch. Gulp food down in 10 minutes and then go back for the 2 pm class. Finally at 3:30 pm all my classes for the day will be done with. Next stop...placement office. (For those who don't know, DPN is Department Placement Nominee. There is a DPN for each department and program. DPNs are responsible for inviting the companies to the campus for recruitments. Unfortunately for the students of CSE Mtech, I am one of their DPNs. Poor students). Since IITB always strives for cultivating a sense of sharing among all the students, they thought it was best that all the DPNs share one phone to call the companies. So there I would stand in the queue, waiting for my chance to use the phone, with nothing better to do other than watching the other DPNs "thank" the company HRs for refusing to come to the campus. After half an hour of useful work done, I manage to get hold of the phone. Now the other DPNs get a chance to see me thank the company HRs.

As if the DPN work was not a handful, last week came the shocker in the form of TA duty. We use a tool called Sonata for our VHDL assignments. And I am the TA (Teaching assistant) for this course which requires the VHDL tool. The stupid tool, which was working beautifully for the last 3 years, saw it prudent to stop working when I became the TA of the course. Now what wrong have I done to this tool to deserve this? Couldn't it have waited for just 3 more months and stopped working when the next TA came over. No, it had to stop only now. Calls and mails from the prof and students jammed my inbox and phone. Aah how I miss those good old days when there were no telephones or internet to disturb your peace of mind.

The experiences in the courses that I had credited too were getting no better day after day. It was raining Andas (eggs,zeros) in the probability assignments and quizes. As for functional programming (FP), the prof and me were certainly not on the same page. But that doesn't prevent me from nodding at his lectures in class. Well I don't stand to lose anything by giving the impression to the sir that I am listening attentively to his lecture when I am actually analysing why Shahrukh Khan movies are better than Salman Khan movies. Who knows, I may actually benefit from this nodding technique...maybe end up getting some sympathy half mark or one mark from sir when I manage to Andafy (meaning getting anda) FP exam also.

Morning blues

"UUAAAAAAAA"...."UUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"

I sprang up from my bed.

"Wha wha what happened what happened...".

I looked around my room. Nothing.

"Did India just conduct it's 3rd nuclear test outside my hostel room ?????", I thought to myself.

I looked out of the window. Just a few pigeons practising their shitting skills on some poor chap's clothes below.

The nuclear test seemed to be the only possible explanation. Nothing else could sound so loud to awaken the sleeping giant. I stood still for sometime trying to hear the sound again. Silence. Hmm maybe just a bad dream I guess. I looked at the watch. It was only 8:45 in the morning. There is still a lot of time left for the first lecture. It starts only at 9:30. Who bothers about getting up now. And back to sleep I went.

"UUAAAAAAAAAAA.........UUAAAAAAAAAAAA"

"What the ****...".

I got out of my bed.

"Definitely not my dream. No one makes such stupid noise in my dreams. Not even me"

I was determined to find out what it was. I opened the door.

"UUAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"

The full blast of the sound wave, magnified 100 times, hit me squarely on my face. Things in my room started flying around, my cupboard door closing and opening at a vigorous pace and I was lifted off my feet. I was floating in the air, holding onto the handle of the door, lest I too get blown out through the window.

PS: Ok relax, nothing like this happened. I just opened the door and heard that stupid noise again.

The noise was coming from the restroom. I tip-toed up to the restroom door.

"Who knows what monster may be inside it. No humans can ever make that noise", I thought.

So, as a tool for my protection, I grabbed the broomstick that was kept near the door. I opened the door very slowly. Initially I couldn't see anything. I opened a little more.

Slowly a blue mass came into sight.

"Whoa a blue monster" ???

I opened the door a little more. More blue mass.

"Man what was this thing".

I pushed the door a little more. More of the blue mass.

"Doesn't this thing have an end" .

After some more pushes it got fully revealed.

It was one big human ass. An ass with an even bigger blue shorts put on.

The owner of this ass, a short fat guy, was doing a stunt which I would never ever wanna see even if someone offers me a free dinner. This guy was putting his hands into the throat and trying to do something which only he knows what. The only thing that was coming out was his "UUAAAAAAAAA"s. The sound was such that it can blow your ear off at a very close range.

That sight was more than enough for me to lose my sleep. It was soo disgusting. If he did want to do something like this, he could well have gone and done privately inside a bathroom and that too without making such a ruckus. He managed to wake up pretty much everyone in the entire hostel wing with his "UUAAAAAAAAA"s.

But I had not seen the end of it.

He came out of the restroom, walked straight to the water cooler. He drank some water. Then he did a much more disgusting stuff. After he was done with drinking the water, he just blew his nose and put the phlegm in it. I just felt like kicking his ass.

Has this guy lost his senses or something? If he was some illiterate poor guy, he could have been forgiven. But this is a guy who was getting the highest quality education this country can provide. It just made me wonder what a waste all this education has been on him if he can't even follow the basic norms of civil manners and responsibilities.

Guys day out

Sometime around last month, some of us had gone lappie shopping. Me and Vinu had been planning to buy a lappie for sometime now. On that day we were joined by Anand, Ajitav, Nazeem and Kukri. Though he didn't come, the person who was most enthusiastic that I get a lappie was my roomie Sheiku. Not that he cared two hoots about my lappie, but he was finally going to see a day when his lappie would be free from my evil clutches. The poor guy had a tough time, for the past one year, trying to dislodge me from the front of his laptop. There were also rumors that he had tried to rent a bulldozer to kick me out, but apparently the security guys at the main gate reportedly stopped him and said he needs to get permission from the Dean of human affairs, for issues related to kicking out irritating roomies. All day long he was encouraging me to go and buy my lappie, even offering me goodies like if I do manage to get hold of my own lappie, he would sponsor a dinner for me. Heights of desperation!!!

So thus we 6 heroes, out on a critical mission to save Sheiku from the ultimate depression that comes with sharing room with roomies like me, set out to seek our goals. We went to Mulund, got into an electronics shop (Chroma), spent some time looking at the models and atlast decided that it was going to be a DELL inspiron 1545. We used Anand's credit card and paid for both our lappies. Mission accomplished.

But now the question was where next. After some squabbling in the middle of the road, we decided that the next destination was going to be CST (Chatrapati Sivaji Terminus). After a 45 minute train journey we reached CST. Outside the station, there was a beggar sitting on the roadside. He looked into my eyes with a deep emotional face. I fell for it. His looks melted my otherwise rock solid heart and he became richer by Rs.5.

The round 2 of "where next" started. Some brilliant guy suggested "Tendulkar's". It's a restaurant owned by our own Sachin Tendulkar. No one else had any other bright ideas and so the resolution was passed unanimously. We got into 2 taxis and set forth to our destination. 5 mins later we were all standing in front of the restaurant, staring blankly at the notice put up in front

"Closed for renovation"

"So anyone else has any more bright ideas???", I asked. Nazeem, who was standing next to me, raised his hand.
"I have one", he said.
"Well what is it", I asked.
He replied with a smile on the face "We can go to Deluxe".

"What the hell is that. Is it some shopping mall. Because if so I don't think my stomach will allow me to go to a mall when it had been crying 'food' 'food' for the last one hour", I replied.

With an even bigger smile, Nazeem replied "Nopes it's a good mallu restaurant".

The mention of a mallu restaurant brought a smile to all of us. The only non-mallu in the group, Ajitav, also agreed to the idea.

"Great so what are we waiting for, let's go", I said.

Nazeem (frowning a bit as if he remembered something important just now) : "Well a small problem."

Ajitav : "What is it"

Nazeem : "I forgot the exact location"

Everyone : "#$@%$#%@#$@. "

Ajitav : "Ok no problem, just tell me some landmark and I will try to find the location".

After thinking for sometime...
Nazeem : "There are lots of trees on the road side"

We looked around us. There was nothing but trees in all directions.
We looked back and glared at Nazeem.

Nazeem : "Err right, not a very good clue I suppose. Let me see whether I can remember any other landmark"

One minute....two minutes....five minutes....everyone holding their hungry tummies

"Aah I got another one", shouted Nazeem

Ajitav : "About time. Ok so what is it"

Nazeem : "There is a tar road in front of the restaurant"

Ajitav (turning red): "#$@%$#%@#$@"

"Ok how about 'The restaurant was build from bricks'".

Ajitav's face turned dark purple.

"A white Skoda car was parked outside the restaurant that day"

Smoke coming out from Ajitav's ears.

"There was a beggar sitting outside"

Ajitav starts plucking out hair from his head.

This went on for sometime. But inspite of these earth shattering clues, Ajitav was unable to locate the exact location of the restaurant.

Silence for 5 minutes. Then Nazeem opened his mouth to speak.

Nazeem : "We can do one thing. If we return to CST station, I may be able to remember the way to the restaurant from the CST station"

Me : "You sure?"

Nazeem : "Yeah"

So we all boarded the taxis and returned to CST station. 10 minutes later we were standing at the same spot where we were standing just half an hour back. Productive use of time I had say. The same beggar was sitting there. Our eyes met once again. The same emotional look. Naa it's not gonna work this time buddy.

Everyone looked at Nazeem. "Ok genius, lead the way".

Nazeem : "Right, give me 10 minutes. Let me just try to remember"

After 10 minutes , Nazeem pointed at a direction and directed all of us to walk.
After walking for sometime, Nazeem stopped.

"What happened"

Nazeem : "This is the route in which we are NOT supposed to go"

Me : "What!!!!If you knew that, then why did you take this route"

Nazeem : "So that I can make you guys understand that this is the wrong route to take."

Me : "Did anyone of us enrol for your course of finding the right path by traversing all the wrong paths????"

Nazeem : "Well I thought you guys may want to know both the wrong routes and the right routes"

By this time everyone started exercising their arms and legs. Anand was halfway through his push ups. Vinu started with his squats. Nazeem sensed danger.

Me (hunger sounds coming out from stomach and anger smoke from the ears) : "Someone's ass is in the line of fire"

Nazeem covered his ass with his hands to provide it with an extra level of defence in case Vinu and Anand decided to act.

Nazeem : "Ok I am sorry, I still can't remember it exactly. Give me another chance. I will make sure you guys reach safely at Deluxe"

Again Nazeem led the way. Every now and then he looked back to see whether the others are making any concrete moves to launch missile attacks on to his ass. Tension was written all over his face. He knew he faced definite extinction if he didn't lead these hungry cannibals to some source of food.

After around half an hour of roaming around, finally he did take us to the correct place. Only then did he start breathing properly. I guess never ever would he volunteer to lead an "expedition". He had enough for one day.

A curious thing that I noticed on reaching the Deluxe was that, on the entrance it was written "Partial A/c". Now no one understood what was meant by partial A/c. Or atleast they didn't understand it till they got to experience it. It meant a "A/c which doesn't work".

A homework half done is a homework not done

For the last one week, I had been attending a 6-day course of Art of Living (AOL). Not that I have any hope that I am going to be any better than what I was before the course. Let's just say it is this small curiosity to know what actually these guys teach. But I must say I am pretty impressed by what I have been experiencing throughout the course and, I feel, if practiced daily, will certainly be beneficial. But being the lazy guy that I am, that's just going to remain a pipe dream.

The course is being conducted by a person called Salil. He is one of the many AOL teachers. This guy has a tremendous sense of humor (and I must say, after meeting some other AOL teachers, this strait seems to be a common one among all of them). He explains things in such a lucid and funny way that whatever he says, will get registered in our heads (including my dumb one) for a very long time. At the end of each day, each of us is given a homework to complete. One such homework that was given was

"Do 5 random acts of kindness".

We were given a time of one day for this task.

The next day, as usual, everyone gathered in the hall. Salil bhai came in. After a few introductory words, he asked,

"So how many of you did your homework yesterday".

Many hands rose into the air. As you may have guessed, I didn't raise. Salil then asked one of the persons, who raised his hand, to stand up. His name was Ramesh (name changed to protect the identity of this person. Another insignificant reason is I don't know his actual name).

Salil : "So you did your homework right"

Ramesh : "Yes sir, I did 4 acts of kindness"

Salil : "O you did 4 acts of kindness!!!"

Ramesh (with a very happy face) : "Yes sir"

Salil : "Well, what was the homework"

Ramesh : "Do 5 random acts of kindness"

Salil : "So how many did you do"

Ramesh : "4 sir"

Salil : "So did you do your homework"

Ramesh : "Yes sir...partially"

Salil : "O you did your homework partially...hmmm..."
(After 2 seconds of silence)

Salil : "are you pregnant"

Ramesh (with his mouth wide opened and shocked) : "What!!!"

Salil : "Are you pregnant"

The poor guy looks down. Did the belly give it away?

Ramesh : "Definitely no sir"

Salil : "You sure?"

Ramesh : "100 percent"

Salil : "Not even partially pregnant?"

Ramesh : "No sir"

Salil : "So you can either be only not pregnant or pregnant right. There is nothing like partial pregnancy right"

Ramesh : "Yes sir"

Salil : "So you did your homework"

Ramesh : "Sir...but...4...I did...only one left.."

Salil : "You pregnant?"

Ramesh : "Ok ok I didn't do the homework"

Salil : "Aaah there you are, now you may sit down"

Needless to say, when Salil repeated the question
"Now who all have done the homework",
not a single hand went up into the air. Well, I am not alone in the laziness department.

Fun with GD

Note : Thanks to Akshat and Ladha for the data to write this blog :-)

This week we had a workshop on GD (Group Discussion) conducted by a reputed institute. As a part of this workshop, the students were asked to divide among themselves into groups of 8. There were around 4-5 topics that were taken up during the GD session. I would like to mention some of the interesting points that junta came up during the GD discussions.

One of the topics that were given for discussion was

"MF Hussein had painted Hitler in nude. He claimed Hitler deserved it. Then he painted Indian goddesses in nude. So does MF Hussein deserve to be welcome back to our country"

Before the GD started, the moderator had a few things to say

"In a GD, we should be shameless. That is, we should not hesitate to say what we want. Do not think what others will think of you, just say it."

And then the GD started.

The GD started well. Junta started discussing points for and against the topic. A few minutes passed. Suddenly one guy opened his mouth and went ballistic

"We should kick MF Hussein in his ass. How dare he draw nude pictures of Hitler. What does he think of himself. He is an insult to the nation. He should be given a taste of his own medicine. I know what to do with him. We should draw a nude picture of him and then sent it to him by post."

Hmm really makes me wonder whether M F Hussein drew this guy's nude picture, going by how much this guy "loves" M F Hussein.

Another guy came up with a very "genuine" doubt.

"I think this topic is utterly false. How can M F Hussein draw the nude picture of Hitler"

Moderator : "Why"

"M F Hussein was not even born then na"

Well thus went the first GD topic.

The next topic up for discussion was

"Whom does your vote go to : Mukesh Ambani or Ratan Tata"

This too started fine. Somehow most of the junta's votes were going to Tata. And they had pretty strong reasons too. Checkout the reason given by one guy :-

"My vote goes to Ratan Tata because Mukesh Ambani didn't make his empire, he only inherited it"

Moderator : "Even Tata inherited Tata group. He did not make it"

"But Ratan Tata is a good man na. So it is fine."

The poor moderator had no answer to that.

But Mr Ambani too had supporters in the group. Try this

"Tata doesn't care about the employees"

Moderator : "Why do you say so"

"Well how can a person, who doesn't take care of himself, take care of his employees"

Moderator : "And why do you say he doesn't take care of himself"

"Because he is still unmarried na. So you see, if you don't marry how will you know how your wife feels. And if you don't know how your wife feels, how will you know how your employees' wives feel. And if you don't know how your employees' wives feel, how will you know how the employees feel."

The moderator by now had a "What-the-hell-am-I-doing-here" look on his face.

One guy came out with a "Nano" support to Tata

"Tata built a Nano car for the poor. So I vote for him"

Prompt came the opposition

"You call that a car? And what a stupid name : "Nano". It should have been "Maaro" [Hindi for beating]. Does it even look like a car. Looks more like a doghouse. The metal used is so thin. Tyres are so small. Seat comfort goes for a toss. A cycle's handle turns better than it's steering wheel...."

On and on went this guy. Looked like, for him, Mukesh Ambani was not even in the picture. As far as he was concerned the vote is between Tata and "Maaro".

Atlast this discussion also ended.

The next topic was

"India's GDP in terms of Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) is 4th in the world, but in terms of HDI, we are ranked 132nd"

In this discussion everyone was given a chance to speak for one whole minute.

Discussion started. It was speaker number one's chance to speak.

But what happened was that most of the guys had no clue at all about GDP, HDI, PPP etc. Everyone started looking at each other.

After looking helplessly at everyone for a few seconds speaker number one started speaking

"Hmm GDP...no idea...And then HDI...absolutely no idea.....but I guess since this GDP thing is growing, it should be a good thing. Let it keep growing. Then HDI...hopefully it won't fall down more"

He must have taken around 20 seconds to say so much, as supposed to one minute that he is to talk. The remaining time he just kept looking at everyone else. Silence prevailed.

One minute up.
Second speaker's chance to speak. Well he was no better.

"I total agree with my friend here."

Needless to say it was silence for the remaining 55 seconds.

When my chance came, I managed to talk some crap to fill in my one minute. In between I said the following in the context of corruption in India

"As Rajiv Gandhi said, out of every 100 paise spent on various schemes, only one paisa reaches the needy. Rest of the money goes into the pockets of the babus"

When my time was up, the guy sitting next to me started talking.

"I agree with my friend here. I also agree with Rajiv Gandhi...and his one paisa...and his 100 paise."

The moderator was at his wits end trying to make out what this guy was saying. I guess this maybe the last time he may ever attend a GD session in our college.

The real happiness

A typical placement scenario in a highly reputed institute.

"Hey Ramesh what happened dude, why you looking so sad"

(in a sad tone) "Na nothing yaar, just didn't get the company I wanted"

"But I thought they offered you 6 lac per annum. That is a good salary buddy."

"Yeah that's right...but 6 lac per annum is too low. All others got better salaries than me"

Scene shifts to a nearby slum

"Hey Muthu you look so happy"

Muthu replies in a very ecstatic manner, " O yes I am so happy today...a kind man gave me a packet of biscuits to eat....whew they are soo tasty...especially after being hungry for last two days. Here you too take some."

How many of us can say that a packet of biscuit can brighten up our day. I don't think many among us. But for Muthu, it was a gift straight from heaven. If a packet of biscuit can bring a smile to Muthu, why does having a 6 lac per annum not make Ramesh happy. Why is that we have forgotten to smile? We are so busy running after making more and more money and other material comforts that we have forgotten to enjoy this beautiful creation of nature called life.

Have we ever realized how lucky we are? Well to know that, all we need to do is go for an evening stroll on the beach. You will find atleast 10 children, barely aged around 8 or 9, walking around selling balloons or some food items. Did we do anything even remotely close to this when we were around this age? No. Our parents took us to the beach to enjoy the sunset...not to sell balloons. Then why is that these children have to toil the whole day to barely have 2 square meals a day while we had the luxury to go to school and enjoy a good upbringing?

Has anyone ever tried calculating the probability of a child being born into a family which can barely sustain itself? Well, don't. It will scare the shit out of you. You will realize just how high your chances were to have been another one of those kids selling balloons. But yet here we are having 3 meals a day, enjoying a tension free sleep in our own house, living a life free from all worries such as how to feed the family the next day, what to do when the rain washes off the mud house, how to get some clothes to protect us from the harsh winter and so on.

Why is that inspite of all these luxuries we enjoy, we are still not happy?

Why are we not happy that we got a decent job instead of worrying over the salary. There are millions out there without a job.

Why are we not happy that we live in a rented home rather than keep worrying about owning a bungalow. There are millions out there who doesn't have a roof above their heads.

Why are we not happy for the fact that we are able to afford 3 meals a day rather than worrying over ways to live a King's life. There are millions out there who rarely gets one proper meal a day.

It's because we never had to endure how it feels to be without these luxuries. It's just like an old saying

"You never realise the value of your eyes until you have lost them"

This is not to say that dreaming of a better job, or a better lifestyle is a bad thing. Just that it is not worth sacrificing one's happiness to achieve those dreams. Chase those dreams by all means, just make sure you don't lose your happiness on the way.

To me, real happiness does not lie in trying to worry about how to make more than what we really need, but it lies in bringing a smile to those who are not fortunate enough to lead a life like ours. It need not be spending millions of dollars on charity work. A small act of giving your old clothes to a child, who can ill afford to buy one, is more than enough. The smile this brings on to that face is worth much more than all the money in the world put together. That, for me, is the true meaning of life. Like someone said

"With great power comes great responsibilities"

If we have the power to change something, then let it be to bring a smile to those who never had a reason to smile.

Comedy of errors

Disclaimer : Conversations below are mostly imaginary though the incident is real

It's been one week since I have been lazing around in Trivandrum with nothing much to do other than eat, sleep, sleep, eat...not that it was much different when I was in campus, but somehow the eating factor has increased exponentially high, ever since I came home, and still going strong without showing any signs of stabilization. Maybe the thought that after one more week I have to face the hostel mess again, must be acting as a catalyst(and a very strong one) to gulp down whatever good stuffs are available at home. Once I return, it's back to the mess torture once again for the next 6 months.

2 days back my uncle Hari mama had paid me a visit. During the casual talk that we were having, he told me about a funny incident that happened to Kannan, his son and my cousin, recently. Kannan is a first year engineering student.

Hari mama is the district magistrate in a place called Attingal. Being a magistrate, he gets calls from all important people like politicians, bureaucrats, police officers etc. The call he got 2 days back was just another such call. Or so he thought.

Caller : "Hello"

Hari Mama : "Hello, who is this"

Caller : "Good morning sir, this is sub inspector Prasad"

Hari Mama : "O hi Prasad, how are you"

Prasad : "I am fine sir"

Hari Mama : "And how is your daughter"

Prasad : "She is also fine. She is now doing her first year engineering"
.
.
.
.
.
.
After talking for sometime

Hari Mama : "So is this your mobile number"

Prasad : "Yeah"

Hari Mama : "O great, just hold on a second".

Then shouting to Kannan,

" Kanna, bring your mobile, I need to note a number down".

Kannan bought his mobile.

Hari Mama : "Aah yes Prasad tell me the number"

Hari mama typed in the number into Kannan's mobile and pressed "OK". In his hurry to save the number he didn't read the message for which he pressed "OK". The message was

"There is already a name called Prasad. Do you want to overwrite"

As luck would have it, Prasad, whose number got overwritten by our inspector Prasad's number, was Kannan's good friend.

After sometime Kannan messaged his "friend" Prasad in typical college student lingo.

[in malayalam] "Enthonada chette ravile pani. Choriyum kuthi irupano"
(Wassup idiot? As usual nothing to do other than scratch your back?)

But today, he didn't get any reply

[in malayalam] "Ninte naavu enthada erangi poya pullae. Marupadi ayakkan enthada ninakoru madi"
(Bloody rascal, has someone plucked out your toungue that you can't sent any replies)

Still no reply.
[in malayalam] "Ninte appante cash kondu ala nan ente phone bill adakunne. Ente paisa kalayathe reply cheyada parikki"

(Your dad doesn't pay my phone bill. So stop wasting my money and sent a reply good for nothing country fellow)

Well now we all know, the golden rule in indian democracy is come what may, but never ever insult a police officer's father. Needless to say, Kannan got a call on his mobile the very next instant. Kannan looked at his mobile.

"Aha Prasad calling"

Kannan (Picking up the phone) : "Enthada potta reply cheythudei"
[Can't you sent a reply you dumbass]

Prasad : "aara ithu"
(who is this)

Kannan : "Ninte thantha. Sound maatiyal enikku manasilakulla ennu karuthiyo. Manda"
(Your father. You think you can fool me if you talk to me in a different voice. Foolish fellow)

Now this was more than what an average kerala police officer could take in. He opened up the floodgates of the police dictionary filled with police vocabulary.

Hari mama was sitting nearby reading a newspaper. As he looked at Kannan, he could see a lot of emotions passing through Kannan's face...

It had started with a smile when the mobile rang....2 seconds into the call the smile vanished....then eyes widened....jaws dropped....sweat started dripping down the neck....big gulps of saliva...

Hari Mama looked at Kannan curiously. Kannan was looking scared, with his mobile on his left ear and one finger inside his right ear, as if he didn't want to hear what the guy at the other end was saying. Poor Kannan was repeatedly blabbering some phrases.

"Sheri Sir" [Yes Sir]
...
...
...
"Maapakanam Sir" [Forgive me Sir]
...
...
"Ini avarthikila Sir" [Won't repeat it sir]
...
...

Hari Mama went to Kannan and took his mobile and brought it to his left ear. But the intensity of the vocabulary from the other end was so high that even the hard core magistrate had to remove the mobile from his ear and then clean his ear just after 5 seconds of "knowledge transfer".

Finally Hari Mama talked to Prasad and later on the full cause of miscommunication came to light. Only after Mama told Kannan that everything has been cleared up, did our hero start breathing properly again.

Skit wits

Disclaimer : High dose of imagination added to real life incidents

We had our dept valfi (ie, validaetory function) for the passing out Mtech and Btech students a couple of weeks back. As a part of valfi, some of us :- Neha, Akash, Akshat, Krishna, Aaditya, Ladha and me, had decided to perform a short skit. The skit's theme was

"What would have been the first day in IIT for some of our seniors".

We had handpicked some seniors, on whom we could make a skit on. Now the director of our skit was Neha. She's one tough director I must say. One growling look from her is enough to get everyone's attention. She had the prepared script in her hand and was telling each of our actors what they have to do.

Neha (to Akash) : "Your character is a music loving guy and has been in IITB for one year now. So when he enters the class, he sees many new students and starts singing 'Aao naye panchiyo' "

Akash : "Magar panchi kaha hei"

Neha : "Oye bhudhu in musical sense, students are equated to birds..uff...am I the only intellect here"

Akash : "Yeah right"

Neha : "Start cameraaaaaaa...action"

Akash walks in singing "aao naye panchiyo"

Neha : "Cut cut cut"

Akash : "Kya hua"

Neha : "Ye kya tha"

Akash : "Naye panchiya"

Neha : "Woh tho teek hei....Magar scene mei entry karthe waqt amul ad ki ladkiyom jaise kamar hilake kyu aa raha hei...seedhe aana"

Akash : "Maine socha thoda sa improvise karoonga"

Neha : "tu improvise math kar re, tu sirf acting kar"

Take 2
Akash walks in singing "aao naye panchiyo"

Neha : "Cut cut cut"

Akash : "Ab kya hua"

Neha : "Robot ki tarah expressionless kyu hei"

Akash : "Aree dono tu hi bol rehi hei. Pehele bolti hei expression zyada ho gaya. Ab bolti hei expression nehi hei. Tu abhi decide kar, tuche amul chahiye ya robot chahiye"

Neha : "In dono ke beech mei kuch nehi milega kya?"

Akash : "Tho improvise karna padega"

Neha : "Tu kuch bhi karle mere baap...bas teek se kar"

Akash improvised. Neha happy. Everyone relieved.

Next was Krishna's entry.

Neha : "Krishna, u have to look at Akash and then tell the dialogue 'Hi, I am Yogi Yogasan'...teek hei?"

Krishna is a Telugu guy, and his hindi is sometimes hard to understand

Krishna : "Bas, itna hi...fikar mathao karao, mei hei nei"

Neha : "Kya"

Krishna : "Bola na mei hei nei"

Neha (looking at others) : "Ye kya bol raha hei"

Sheiku, my roomie, and also a telugu guy, who was standing there watching our practise, clarified "He means 'main hoon na' "

Neha : "Ok good good. Now let's get started. Start cameraaaaa....action"

Take 1
Krishna walks in, takes his seat,looks at Akash

"Hi, I am Yoga Yogasan"

Neha : "Cut cut cut...oye Yoga Yogasan nehi, Yogi Yogasan"

Krishna : "Acha teek hei...mei hei nei, don't worry"

Take 2
Krishna walks in, takes his seat,looks at Akash

"Hi, I am Yogi Yogiasan"

Neha (cheeks turning red) : "Yogi Yogasaaaaaaaaan"

Krishna : "mei hei nei...mei hei nei"

Take 3
Krishna walks in, takes his seat,looks at Akash

"Hi, I am Asan Yogasan"

Neha could take it no more. She starts pulling out Krishna's hair

Neha : "Saale teek se dialogue bol, teek se dialogue bollllllll"

Krishna : "AAAAAAHHHHHHH Yoga Yogasan....no no...sorry.....Asan Yogasan..AAAHHHHHH...no no sorry sorry..AAAAAHHHHHH...Yogi Yogiasan...aree woh bhi nehi...AAAAHHHHHHHH.....Rogi Rogasan...AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH"

Poor guy started losing his hair count exponentially, till he got the name right. By the time he did perfect his dialogue, he was looking almost bald.

He thought, "Why in the heaven's name did I go to the barber shop yesterday for the hair cut. I got one for free today"

Krishna (to Akshat, making sure Neha is out of earshot) : "Ye ladki hei ya kuch aur hei. Kaise kundhal kundhalke maara re mereko"

Next was Ladha's entry.
Neha : "Ladha, after you make your entry and take your seat, you will ask Aaditya a doubt in data mining. He will tell a jumbo mumbo answer. So when you hear that, your face should show an expression which tells the audience that you are not understanding Aaditya's answer. Got it?"

Ladha : "Fine, no probs."

Neha : "Start cameraaaaaa.....action"

Ladha walks in, sits on his chair and asks his doubt. Aadi starts giving the answer. Neha closely watching Ladha's face.

Neha : "Ladha expressionnnnn"

Ladha narrows his eyes

Neha : "More expression"

Ladha raises his eyebrows also

Neha : "more more"

Ladha now holds his breath. His cheeks turn red.

Neha : "moreeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"

Ladha's widens his eyes as much as possible.

Neha : "MOREEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"

Ladha's cheeks were getting more and more red. Tears falling down his cheeks. Eyes almost popping out. Steam flowing out from both his ears.

Neha : "MOREEEEEEEEEEEEEEE MOREEEEEEEEEEEEEE"

Ladha looked as if he will burst any moment.

Neha : "Cutttttt. Cool Ladha, that was great acting. It looked so natural"

Ladha (after catching his breath) : "O it was nothing. Err I will come back in a moment"

As Ladha was going out, Krishna asked him "How did you do so naturally"

Ladha : "Well, don't tell her. It looked natural because it was natural. Can't hold it any longer. Need to visit the loo."

And the poor guy just ran off.

PS: Though most of the dialogues and actions mentioned above are imaginary, we guys had a blast making the skit. The main credit for making skit a wonderful success goes to Neha. Though she has been demonised in this post, she's actually a very sweet girl. But then sweet girls seldom make for good blog posts, thus the character assasination . Sorry neha ji :). I would like to dedicate this blog to all the guys/gals involved in the skit. Thx one and all, u guys rock

My quest for food

Most of our lives we keep running after money. But sometimes experience shows us that money can't buy everything. There will be occasions when it won't be worth the paper it is printed on. Well I had once such experience today.

The summer vacations are on in IITB. All the students have returned home for two and a half months vacations. Well almost all. The Mtech guys have no such good fortune. Apart from some 10-15 days, we have to continue to stay in the campus and "work" on our Mtech project. O hell yeah work we certainly do. We work on "LOST", we work on "FRIENDS" and most importantly we work on our thesis "How to sleep beyond 12 hours". Since most of the students are not in campus, almost all the hostel messes have been closed for vacation. Out of the very few open hostel messes, I have my food at H12 mess. There we can take a 15 day card for Rs 825.

As usual I got up today morning at 9 am. I then washed my face, brushed my teeth, put on a shirt and was about to go to H12 when I remembered

"O crap, my food card had expired yesterday"

Luckily I had the required amount in my wallet to make another card. So, making my pocket heavier with Rs 825 cash, I made my way to H12 mess. Somehow my stomach was grumbling more than usual (Well usually it grumbles like anything). The smell of the food just made the grumbling worse. I had to look down to my stomach and give it a reassuring look

"Dude hold on for a few more moments, food is on it's way"

I went to the counter, took out the money and stretched it out to the counter guy (CG). The counter guy looked at me and said "What"

Me : "Card"

CG : "Come at 12-12:30"

Me : "Why not now"

CG : "Time is up"

O great.

Me : "Fine atleast give me a Rs 20 coupon for the breakfast"

CG : "Time is up"

Me : "What!!! I am asking for coupon, and not card"

CG : "Time is up"

Man what a horrible way to start the day. Stomach grumbles even more. Fine, I guess I have to go to H7 mess. On reaching H7 mess, I eagerly looked into the food containers.

EMPTY!!!.

I guess I have to do with just tea today. I walked to the tea vessel and opened the tap at the bottom

FIZZZZZZZZZ.....just air comes out

O damn it.

I decide to buy something from H7 canteen

(PS: Canteen is different from mess)

I walk to the H7 canteen.

LOCKED!!!

Man, why aren't shops open when people need food the most. I stood their pondering over my options.

Fruit juice shop....naa low probability of opening.
CCD.....naa too far away.
H6 Canteen....nopes, will open only at 2 pm.
How about skipping the breakfast....GRRRR...the grumble from below reaches a crescendo.

So there I was standing, with around around 800 rupees in my pocket, and yet unable to get something to eat. By this time sounds started coming out, literally, from my stomach and passers-by looking at me suspiciously trying to see from where the sounds were coming. I made my way back to my room. Well I guess it was a good learning experience, though some grunting noise from below tells me that not all parts of my body agree with me.

The great CSE debate

CAUTION : There may be many grammer mistakes in the hindi conversations below.

Many of my friends in my batch are specializing in different fields of computer science namely databases, networks, operating systems etc. Now let's imagine a situation where these guys are talking about their area of specialization. Let's see what happens. The scene is the DMC lab. As usual Adil, Guruji(Akshat), Chotu(Prashima), Riju are some of the many DMCers in the lab.
Suddenly...

Adil : "Aree yaar, databases nehi hota tho ye zindagi bhi kya zindagi hota"
[Dude, what is this life without databases]

Guruji : "Networks kya kuch kam hei...tu internet ke bina jee sakthe ho kya?"
[Whoa as if networks is not good enough...can u imagine a life without internet?]

Adil : "Magar internet ka data store karne ke liye databases chahiye na..."
[But then you need a database to store the internet's right]

Guruji : "Internet hi nehi hei tho tu database ka kya ukaat leega be"
[But what worth is your database if there is no internet at all]

Adil : "Database ke bina tu internet se kya karega...gillii dhanda khelega?"
[But what use is the internet if you don't have a database to save data]

Guruji : "Chal Chotu se pooch lethe hei . Oye Chotu, tu hi samchade isko ki networks bahut badi cheez hoti hei"
[Ok let's ask Chotu about this. Hey Chotu, make this guy understand that networks is a big thing]

Chotu : "Ha"
[Yes]

Adil : "Database bhi phodu cheez hei"
[Databases are also damn great]

Chotu : "Ha"
[Yes]

Guruji : "But networks is more important than databases right"

Chotu : "Ha"
[Yes]

Adil : "Databases is the backbone of any application"

Chotu : "Ha"
[Yes]

Guruji : "Yeh kya ha ha hi bolti jaa rehi hei. Kabhie tho na bhi bol"
[What is this yes yes all the time. Atleast say no once in a while]

Chotu : "Ha"
[Yes]

Guruji : $%#$^%^*$#@#%$

Guruji : "Oyee Somil, tu Adil ko samchao ki networks ko koi hara nehi saktha"
[Hey Somil, make Adil understand that no one can defeat networks]

Somil : "Kuch bhi ho Buchi is the best"
[Whatever is the case, Buchi is the best]

(PS: Buchi is a term used in theoretical computer science)

Guruji : "Burji? Kya burji? Egg burji? Burji kaha se aagaya yaha pe"
[Burji? What burji? Egg burji? What is egg burji doing here?]

Somil : "Abee saale, burji nehi buchi...buchi automata...kya sahi concept hei yaar"
[Idiot, not burji...it's buchi....buchi automata...what a sexy concept dude]

Guruji : "Koi isko yaha se leke jaa. Yaha mei networks aur database ke baare mei pooch raha hu aur ye bol raha hei burji aur bhajji ke baare mei".
[Someone please take this guy from here. Here I asking about networks and databases and this guy wants to talk about burjis and bhajjis]

Adil : "Chal Anand se hi pooch lethe hei. "
[Let's ask Anand about this....]

Adil : "Hey Anand, which do you think is more important...database or networks"

Anand : "Statistically speaking database is important, but probabilistically speaking networks is important too"

Adil : "Err and that means...?"

Anand : "Statistically speaking database is....."

Adil : "Yeah we heard that. Just tell us in plain english what it means"

Anand : "Err sorry I don't know plain english. I know only plain data mining and plain machine learning".

Just then our ex-CR Aaditya walked into the lab.

Guruji : "Hey Aadi, which, in your opinion is more important, databases or networks"

Aaditya : "He looked into the mirror. He saw his reflection. It was looking back at him. Mirrors are like life. It reflects what we actually are"

Guruji : Hey bhagwaan ek aur blog!!!....Maine tere kya bigaada hei be...ek chotta sa sawal hi tho maine poocha tha...oske liye itna bada dhand?
[Oh no not ur blog again!!!..Have I ever wronged you in anyway...all I asked you was a question...and for that so big a punishment???]

Adil (shouting) : "Vinu Vinu..come here"

Vinu : "Yeah?"

Adil : "Dude, we have a problem here. We are having a debate as to which is more important, networks or database. We need an answer to that. What do you think"

Vinu : "I too don't know the answer, but I will ask Alex and get back to you"

Adil : "Alex? Which Alex? Ooo Alex the Phd guy ????"

Vinu : "Naa Alex the ManU guy...as in Alex Ferguson, the Manchester United's manager. There is nothing in the world that he doesn't know. Will mail him today itself"

Adil (looking at Guruji) : "Abhi tuk sirf suna tha ki football logom ko pagal banathe hei...abhi dekh raha hu"
[Till now I have only heard that football can make people go crazy...well now I got to see it in real]

Just then Vishal comes in. This guy has been watching the FRIENDS series for the last 2 weeks, the effect of which is that only english words flow out when he opens his mouth.

Adil : "Hey Vishal, tu batha, kaun sa technology better hei, Networks or Database?"
[Hey Vishal, you tell us which technology is better. Networks or Database]

Vishal : "You asking me which is batter?"

Adil : "Abee batter nehi be, the word is better"
[Dude, the word is to be pronounced as "better", and not as "batter"]

Vishal :"Oo is it then I batter pronounce the word as batter and not batter"

Adil : "Abee better bol"
[Dude pronounce it as "better"]

Vishal :"Yeah right batter"

Adil : "BETTERRRRRRRRRRRRR"

Vishal : "Exactly...Batter"

Adil : "@$#$@!%^&#$#........woh chod, answer bol"
[Getting frustrated...Ok leave that, tell the answer]

Vishal : "Answer...hmm..I batter don't know"

Adil : "Saale bhag yaha se"
[Idiot, GET OUT!!!]

Vishal : "Yeah I batter go"

Suddenly a loud laugh was heard.."HEHEHEHEHHE...."
As usual it was Riju...

Guruji : "Dekh humare PhD bandi. Osko tho patha hona hi chahiye. Osse hi pooch lete hei"
[Look it's our PhD girl. She should be knowing the answer. Let's ask her]

Guruji goes to Riju

Guruji : "Riju ji I have a question to ask. Do you think....."

Even before Guruji could finish asking the question, Riju started laughing again.
Riju : "HEHEHEHE..."

Poor Guruji thought she was laughing at him. He looks down to make sure his zip was closed. Hmm no problem there. Then he looks at Adil

Guruji (whispering) : "Psst Adil...mere pant ke peeche check kar...koi hole tho nehi na"
[Hey Adil, just check the back of my pant and see whether it's torn]

Adil checks and replies in negative. Guruji looked relieved. Then he looks at Riju

Guruji : "Itne bhi hasne ki kya baath hei"
[What's there to laugh so much?]

Riju (Very innocently): "Patha nehi...hehehhehehehe"
[(in an innocent tone) I don't know...starts laughing again]

Guruji : "Hasne ke alawa kuch karthi bhi ho aap"
[Do you do anything else other than laughing???]

Riju : "Patha nehi...hehhehehehe"
[(in an innocent tone) I don't know...starts laughing again]

Guruji : "Yeh patha nehi patha nehi kya hei"
[What do you mean "I don't know"]

Riju : "Patha nehi....hehehehehehe"
[I don't know....again starts laughing]

Guruji (to Adil) : "Aaj H11 ke breakfast laughing gas tha kya???"
[Was laughing gas served for breakfast in H11 today???]

(PS : H11 is the girls' hostel)

Thus the great CSE debate rages on...

Wireless troubles

Disclaimer: As usual, a highly exaggerated version of some true incidents

"Abee darwaza khol"
[Open the door]

No use. It takes more than that to awaken the sleeping giant (me).

"Kamine dharwaza khol nehi tho thod daloonga"
[Open the door else I will break it open]

The bang on the door just kept growing louder and louder till I knew the resistance level of my door was about to be breached after which my room would have got the dubious distinction of being the only room in the hostel with natural ventilation (ie, no door). Now I wouldn't want such a situation would I?

Me (in my sleepy condition) : "Abee bhen**** mere darwaaza ko chod. Mei aa raha hu"
[ Leave my door alone. I am coming]

On opening the door, I find Vishal standing outside, grinning at me.

Me : "Kya be, mere darwaaze se kuch panga hei kya tuche?"
[You have any problems with my door?]

Vishal : "Wire hei kya tere paas"
[You have any wires?]

Though Vishal and me were conversing in hindi, I was still in my sleep state. In my sleepy condition, I thought we were talking in my native language malayalam...and "wire" in malayalam also means stomach.

For a second I looked confused, then looked down to make sure my "wire" was still there and then looked back at him, looking more confused.

Me : "Ha abhi tuk tho hei"
[It's there till now]

Vishal : "Tho de"
[Then give]

Me : "Kya!!!Tuche mere wire chahiye??? Pagal hua hei kya"
[What!!!You want my wire?Have you gone mad?]

Vishal : "Abe dena yaar"
[Give it dude]

Me : "Saale, tere wire ko kya problem hei ki tuche mere wire chahiye"
[What's the problem with your wire that you want my wire]

Vishal : "Mera kaafi nehi hei"
[Mine is not enough]

Me : "Ha woh tho mei dekh saktha hu. Mere jaise thoda bahut khaana khale, tuche bhi mera wire mil jayega"
[Ya I can see that. Eat more food, like me, and you too will get a good wire like me]

Now the poor chap looked confused. That is when I looked at his hands. He was holding lots of wires, as in cable wires. That is when it occured to me what he was asking for.

Vishal : "Abee project kar raha hu...tere paas koi wire hei tho dede...project ke liye chahiye. Mere paas jitna hei, woh kaafi nehi hei"
[Dude, we are doing a project. We need some wires for it. If you have some then give it. We need more wires than what we have now.]

Me : "Andar jaake jitna chahiye lele"
[Go inside and take what you want]

Vishal (shouting) : "Oyee Manan, yaha ka wires mil gaya, tu oss room se leke aa...oyee Ganesh tu woh room cover kar"
[Manan, I got the wires from here. Now you try to get some wires from this room and Ganesh, you get it from that room]

I could see that these 3 guys were pulling out wires from all the rooms in my wing.

Me : "Kaun sa project kar raha hei be"
[Which project are you doing]

Vishal : "Wireless networks"

Me : "Kya!!!wireLESS networks????wiresONLY networks bol"
[What!!!wireLESS networks????you are joking right? You must mean wiresONLY networks right]

Vishal : "Abee tu nehi samchoge. Tu jaa"
[Leave it, u won't understand]

Well he did have a point. Networks were never my cup of tea. But then a natural question that arises is shouldn't a wireless project be done without wires???


After getting my morning sleep screwed up by big guys doing some wireless project using wires, I thought I may as well go to the lab. I took a bath, had my breakfast and started going to the lab. As I left my room, I could hear Vishal shouting to some guy on the 3rd floor :-
"ABEE WIRE NEECHE DAAL"
[Drop the wire down]

As usual the DMC lab was full. This week was going to be a tight week for all the first year Mtech guys since everyone had some project or assignment submission deadline coming up soon. Adil, Chander, Riju, Ajinkya, Ramesh, Vaibhao, Rakesh, Chotu, Saurab were some of the people who were already in the lab. Everyone was busy doing big things on the computers/laptops, looking damn serious. Suddenly there was a cry.

"Yipeee we received the packets, we received the packets"

When I turned to look at the source of the cry, I saw Riju dancing (looked like bharatanatyam to me, but in all possibilities she may have actually attempted to do break-dance which ended up looking like bharatanatyam). But the first picture that suddenly came to me, on seeing Riju, was that of Riju thumping her chest, like Tarzan, and screaming "OOOOOOOO........"

But her partner, Ajinkya, was looking at her, confused. "But I didn't sent any packets. Then how did we receive it"

Riju (Shocked) : "You didn't sent???"

Ajinkya : "Nopes"

I looked at Riju. "You too Wireless", I asked. She nodded. O great, one more wireless project. Well, atleast their project didn't have wires.

Meanwhile in the other corner of the lab, a few minutes back :

Ramesh : "Abee Vaibhao, where did our packets go. You sent them right?"

Vaibhao : "Yups"

Ramesh : "Then where is it"

Vaibhao : "How do I know"

That is when the explosion, in the form of Riju's shouting, was heard throughout the lab.

Ramesh : "Hmm I think I know, where our packets went".

The situation continued for a long time, Ramesh's team senting the packets and Riju's team gobbling them up. As I sat down in front of my computer to do my work, I could visualise packets with names Ramesh and Vaibhao on them, flying around the DMC lab, trying their best to get back to their masters' laptops, but unable to do so since a blackhole called Riju was busy eating them up.

To believe or not to believe

"Do you believe in God or not, Yes or No", Naveen wanted to know.

"I don't believe in the concept of a person sitting above us and presiding over us", said Vinu. He was not the one to give up easily.

"I am not asking whether you believe in God as a person or the different forms of God that exists today. All I am asking is do you believe in the concept of a power that science is unable to explain", Naveen asked, trying to coax a definite answer from Vinu.

"I believe that Love is God", Vinu said.

"So u believe in God"

"Love is God"

"So it's a Yes"

"Love is God"

"So it is a yes right?"

"Love is God"

"Da poda", Naveen said irritated. "Ok, lemme put it this way, have you ever gone to a temple".

"Of course", said Vinu

"Aha there you are", Naveen said, excited. "May I know why"

"To watch girls",prompt came the answer from Vinu

"Yups, I have to agree...nothing can beat girls praying in a temple...", I chiped in, nodding my head, as if we both agreed on the same philosophical thought.

Flashback:
One fine morning last week, I found a forwarded message from Naveen. It was some high funda philosophy from Manusmriti, an ancient Indian book. The essence of the mail was women should never be the head of a house, ie, house should be run by hubbies, and not hi-fi wi-fies (meaning wives). The champion of womanhood, our hero Vinu, on reading this mail, opposed it tooth and nail. So replies and counter replies were exchanged between those two, with some fools like me,
acting as mute spectators, sitting and wasting our time, reading it, with nothing better to do. Even after several mails were exchanged, no compromise was in sight. So in the end, the third umpires were called for :- the smart third umpires me, Kukri,CP(Sriraj),Anand, who then took a decision to sort this out over dinner (Which meant no mess food. Great escape!!!!!!!!!!!). Over dinner, though conversation started with Manus and Smritis, it drifted and reached God.

Back to present:
Kukri suddenly looked at Naveen and asked "What makes you sure there is God"

"Aha look who's talking. Then how come you are not eating chicken today on account of being Easter today, if you didn't believe in God", Naveen asked pointedly.

Kukri didn't know what to say."I..hmm...err..So Anand, as I was telling you, Goa is a very nice place........."

As this great conversation was continuing, the waiter came to CP.

Waiter : "Kya mei aapka order le saktha hu sir"
[Can I take ur order sir]

CP: "Entho"
["What" in malayalam]

Waiter : "Kya mei aapka order le saktha hu sir"
[Can I take ur order sir]

CP : "Mei tu hei...tu mei hu?"
[Applying all of Anand's Data Mining and Machine Learning knowledge, it seems that CP was trying to tell the waiter that he didn't understand Hindi]

Waiter : "Kya"
[What!!!]

CP: "Hindi hu hei hi"
[CP still trying to convince the waiter]

Waiter was looking as if he will faint any moment, seeing how well CP was succesful in killing his language.

CP : "Oye guys, how will I tell 'I don't know hindi' in hindi"

Vinu : " 'Know' in hindi is 'maloom'. But don't know the hindi of 'don't know'".

CP : "Yeah that will do, rest I will take care".

Then he looked at the waiter.

CP : "Hindi maloom". Then he started shaking head from left to right and then right to left. "Hindi maloom" head shake..."Hindi maloom" head shake. This continued for a few seconds.

The poor guy took a minute or so to really understand what CP was trying to say. But in the end CP's brain power did work. No wonder he's the class topper.

Meanwhile the God conversation went nowhere.

Love letter

First the big news...I stood third in the love letter writing competition for PG Fest 2009, which concluded this week.

Possible Reasons:

1) Only 3 entries were there to be judged from.

2) Some other guy named Sree Shankar is present in the campus who must have actually written a good love letter.

3) It might have actually been a "How not to write a love letter" competition.

Actually this was the first time I have ever written a love letter. And where does it end up? In some GUY's inbox. Why? We had to mail our entries to a guy who is supposedly one of the judges. I must be the first STRAIGHT guy in this world to have written my first love letter to a guy. Hope no one else get to have such rotten luck.

Given below is the "love letter" I wrote. Read it at your own risk. Don't say I didn't warn you. Anyone with a weak heart, your journey ends right here. Others, all the best in case you have decided to read it. Since this is my first love letter, I dedicate it to the unlucky girl, destined to bear me for the rest of her life (By the way search is still on...any girl willing to take a risk can apply)

"Why does each day, bring a spring of happiness to my heart. Is it that smile of yours that makes my knees go weak or is it that celestial face that glows like a thousand suns or is it just the thought of getting to be near you,I know not. The harshness of the cold winter or the cruel summer heat is nothing compared to the pain of the heart,those moments of your absence cause. Your very thought makes my heart go heavy with numbness when you are away and as light as a feather when you are near me. Just looking into your eyes gives me a warmth so great that no cold or sorrow can penetrate. Even Mother Nature seems to know how special you are to me. She showers you with snow in winter, flowers in autumn and rain in the monsoons as if she wants you to know how much you mean to me. The winds bring your presence to me from the farthest of the lands. Your beauty is the ray of light that brings warmth into my soul just like the warmth and light the rising sun brings into the world drowned in darkness. The blossoming of a flower dims in comparison to the the blushing on your cheeks. The lovely time that I spend with you are moments that are embedded deep in my heart, never to be forgotten. Would you, my love, give me an opportunity to bestow you with all the happiness in this world. All I ask is the chance to keep holding your hands for ever and ever, this life, every life."

If anyone managed to reach here and is still alive, then congrats

The X scare

In our first semester we had an assignment based on a tool (let's call it X) . The stupid thing was soo confusing that most of us had to spent some sleepless nights breaking our heads over this. When we realized that we were going to go nowhere this way, we decided to split the tasks among ourselves and each person would try to solve one task each instead of everyone trying to do the same thing. Thus when someone somehow finds out how to do a particular task, he shares his method with everyone else.

In this way we somehow managed to submit the assignment before the deadline. This was just before the Diwali holidays. Soon afterwards the Diwali holidays started and most of us went home, had a great "break" from studies and returned afresh (Some poor guys like me had to stay back due to the long time it will take to reach our hometowns).

A few days after the classes resumed, some of us were having our lunch in the hostel mess. Suddenly Akshat said

"Hey did you hear that there are 24 copy cases that were caught for the assignment on X"

"Whoa whoa when did you hear that. How come no one else heard it"

"Aree looks like one of the TAs had told someone that such a thing happened"

(TAs are Teaching Assistants who do most of the assignment corrections on behalf of the professor)

"But we did not copy right? We only had some "healthy" discussions and shared "tips" on how to do the damn shit"

"Yeah right tell that to the TAs."

"Also how can those guys find out about it. It's almost impossible to just look and tell since doing a manual comparisons of all the files in an X application is almost impossible due to the very large number of files in X."

"Looks like they have used some high funda software for doing it"

"These guys have softwares for catching copy cases????? Man that sucks"

After this, all the guys started speculating on who these unfortunate 24 people were.

I looked at Adil

"Tu tho gaya beta".
[You are busted dude]

Adil : "Oyee maine kab copy kiya be"
[Oyee, When did I copy]

Me : "Haha tu nehi kiya tho kya hua, mere code mei tera code bhi hei na"
[So what if you didn't copy. My code contains ur code also]

Saurab : "Muhahahahahaha....muhahahahaha....."

Me : "Oyee tu kyu hass raha hei be saale...tera code bhi hei mere code ke andar"
[Why are you laughing idiot. My code contains your code also]

Saurab : "Saale haram khor, khuthe,lafange....."
[Calling foul words]

Rohit : "Bechare log...chu chu chuu"
[Poor people]

Me : "Rohit bhai, maaf karna, tera bhi code liya hei maine."
(Rohit my brother, forgive me .I have your code also)

Rohit : "Saale tu kissi ko bhi choda nehi hei kya."
(Idiot, haven't u spared anyone?)

Me : "Aree mei kya karu. I spent 3 whole days on this dumb thing. It was soo confusing and irritating. I coded two or three things and then I borrowed the rest. I really don't think any human being created X.. Must be the evil work of aliens from other planets. They must have made this grand plan to give each human being a X assignment to do as homework and in the process of doing the assignment, the human race will become extinct. Inorder to prevent such a mass extinction I thought maybe atleast I should try not putting too much of stress on myself. I need to save the world you see."

Rohit : $#@$^$*^%^$#@

Nothing much anyone could do other than wait for the demonstration day when we had to demonstrate our X application to the TAs. Well atlast the D-day came. Everyone sitting in the lab, tensed, waiting for the TAs to arrive. Rumours flying thick and fast as to who were the 24 genius guys. Everyone came up with their own list of 24.

The TAs came. Everyone was looking at their hands.
It was empty.
Hmm guess the list is in their pockets. Wonder when they are going to take it out.
Each person started demonstrating their X masterpieces.

Suddenly one of the TAs started moving his hand towards his pocket.
Oh no, this is it!!!!
The TA's hand reaches the pocket...goes inside...some shaking inside the pocket...more vigorous shaking......then the shaking stopped...Oh no Oh no....looks like the hand found what it wanted....the TA's hand got into reverse gear...it's coming out..slowly...really slowly...and then..it came out...and we saw it open mouthed...
a dirty handkerchief!!!

O man some people are really gonna have to deal with some serious heart attacks before the TAs leave the lab.

Ohoo...there it's happening again...his hand...it has started it's forward motion again...and this time it's going towards his back pocket....Oh great the TAs must have kept the list in their back pockets owing to the "security" concerns following intelligence reports that some guys from our batch may try to destroy the list...the hand reaches his back pocket..and then into it...and..and...is moving up and down????...now why would he be doing that...wait a minute....Aah...the poor guy was just scratching his ass...boy another scare.

After some hair raising moments, when each time the hands goes anywhere close to the pockets our hearts almost came into our mouth, the TAs completed their evaluation and left.
Everyone was looking at each other.

"Aree then what about the list ???"

"Lagtha hei kissine ullu bana diya re"
[Looks like someone has made a fool of us]

"You mean some asshole made up this story and gave me countless sleepless nights!!!
If ever get my hands on that egg head moron who came up with this story of copy cases, I will...I will... &$@!@#^*!@#"