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... &$@!@#^*!@#"

Seenu,Teenu and Tree

All characters mentioned below are fictional and any resemblance to anyone, especially to any of my classmates, is purely co-incidental.

This story pays "tribute" to a lady's noble endeavor to increase the language vocabulary of students in a particular institute. Let's call this lady Teenu. The story is about how Teenu tries to teach malayalam to her friend Seenu and how Teenu gets a little help from her classmate Tree Trunker in the process.

Tree Trunker is a first year computer science Mtech student in IIT Bombay. He is a good boy......I mean a very good boy.....I mean a fantastic boy.

(Again I have to emphasize that the characters mentioned have no resemblance whatsoever with anyone alive).

Most of the time Tree is free. So free that his email id itself is tree.is.free@gmail.com. One day, as usual, Tree was whiling away his time when suddenly he saw his classmate Seenu's status message

"Ente aniyante peru Manoj ennu aanu"
(My bro's name is Manoj)

The message was in malayalam. How did she ever learn malayalam!!!!
Tree pinged Seenu

Tree : "You the Malayalam"

Seenu : "Yeah"

Tree : "Since the When"

Seenu : "Since Yesterday"

Tree : "But the why"

Seenu : "Simply"

Tree : "By the whom"

Seenu : "Teenu"

Since Tree was a mallu too, he too decided to teach Seenu something.Tree always believed that one learns best from mistakes. And he decided to apply that concept here.

Tree : "Hey Seenu, you should thank your teacher Teenu for her great sacrifice of teaching you"

Seenu : "But how"

Tree : " Next time when you see her, just tell her 'podi kazhudhe' . In case you want to thank a guy just say 'poda kazhudhe' "

(PS : poda/podi kazhudhe means "Go away donkey")

Seenu :"Oo so what does this mean"

Tree : "It means thank you for whatever you have done"

Seenu : "Hmm podi kazhudhe....sounds so beautiful"

Tree : " Yeah I know..it's nothing. I can give you even more beautiful sentences".

Seenu : "Anyway thanks for your help. Poda kazhudhe".

Tree : "Err...yeah welcome welcome".

The scene changes to the girl's hostel. Teenu and Seenu are taking a stroll in the garden

Seenu : "Teenu, I want to thank you for what you have done for me"

Teenu : (blushing) "Sure go ahead"

Seenu : "Podi kazhuthe"

Teenu : "What!!!" (looking at Seenu mouth opened)

Seenu : "Podi kazhuthe, podi kazhuthe, podi kazhuthe".

Teenu : "Is this what I get for doing all this."

Seenu : "You like it?"

Teenu : "You have no idea girl"

Seenu : "Want more?"

Teenu : "O no no no...had more than enough for the day."

Seenu : "So when is my next class...teacher."

Teenu : "School closed for summer vacations."

Swimming and me

Ever since I came to IIT, I wanted to learn swimming. Why?Well for one, I suck at swimming, the obvious reason being I don't know how to swim. Another reason was that when it comes to water, my body defies the laws of physics. How? Well according to the laws of physics, any round object fully filled with air should float in water. But somehow my body doesn't want to follow this law making my life all the more difficult. Some body eh?

So, armed with all the above "compelling" reasons I had made this grand plan that by the time I graduate from here, Michael Phelps will beg me not to compete with him for the next Olympics. The very next day, after I entered the sacred portals of IIT, I joined the swimming club. Though it burned a Rs.100 hole in my pocket, it bothered me the least. Where else can one go to learn swimming for Rs.100 per semester. Well here ends the happy part of the story. Now starts the sad part.

As soon as I filled up the membership form, I was asked to buy a red cap, which was meant for beginners. So another 100 rupees gone. This red cap, according to the admission officer, was to make sure that the instructors can make out the beginners from the rest. The least I say about that red cap, the better. It had a stupid itching head cover, with 2 long strings from either side which goes down the either cheeks and then you need to tie a knot below the chin. Well if you didn't get the picture correct, then just imagine this : You are made to wear a 2 year old baby's scarf. It made you look like such a buffoon that after seeing yourself once in the mirror with that cap on, you never ever would want to see a mirror again in your life.

Fine whatever. Bearing the "humiliation" I started walking towards the pool, all the time making sure that I kept looking down so that no one sees me with that stupid red cap. I reached the pool. I was about to jump into the pool when someone started poking me on my back. I turned back. It was the instructor. What does he want? O maybe I need to wish him.

"Good evening", I said.

And I turned back to jump into the pool. Again he poked me. Now what.

Me : "Yes?"

Instructor : "Beginners are not allowed in the big pool initially"

Me : "Then where else do I swim"

Instructor : "There".
He pointed towards a small shallow pool of water.

Me : " You call that a swimming pool???"

Instructor : " No, we call it a baby pool"

Me : "Do I look like a baby"

Instructor : "You sure do", eyeing my red cap.

First these idiots give me a baby scarf and now a baby pool.

2 minutes later there I was standing in the baby pool, with a baby scarf, looking here and there, not knowing what to do. I looked at the instructor.

Me : "So how should I get started'

Instructor : "You can start by bringing 2oo ruppees the next class"

Me : "WHY???"

Instructor : 'That's my tuition fees"

I pay Rs.100 for getting membership, another Rs.100 for that stupid cap, bore the humiliation of wearing that stupid cap and now standing in that goddamned pool which bearly reaches till my knee and he tells me that I need to cough up another 200 ruppees to learn swimming. That's it. No more of this tamasha. I decided that I will learn it myself. No help whatsoever. After 8 months what is the end result : I should have paid up that 200 rupees ;(.