Achilles’ last stands

Sidekicks have been an integral part of so many legends. The Sundance Kid to Butch Cassidy, Circuit to Munnabhai, Sambha and Kaalia to Gabbar come to mind. The hero’s potency even without them notwithstanding, a consummate sidekick, to use a terribly cloying cliché, completes the hero. It’s hard to imagine a “Kitne aadmi the?” without an answer, even if the question “Holi kab hai? Kab hai holi?” could be considered rhetorical.

This blog, after a sudden change of mind a long time ago, and a quick return to normalcy, has missed a subtitle. The present outstandingly lame title had an even more outstandingly lamer adjutant, giving a sneak preview to the (you guessed it right) outstandingly lame pieces of writing that appeared under its banner. Although I can’t seem to remember it in its entirety, I vaguely recollect mentioning emetics and aggravating suicidal tendencies. Considering my vile idleness at present, I’ve been thinking about filling the void below that title. Redundancies, banalities, blatant rip-offs and sacrileges of the sacred number are all that I’ve been able to come up with. “In search of the Ultimate Question” seems like a most poignant peg, but doesn’t fit the round bore (pun intended).

(If you haven’t been a regular reader, now you comprehend the outstandingly lame sense of humour I possess.)

Just before Pick Withers does a round trip of the drums in front of him, as John Illsley lets his fingers loose at his bass guitar, and the Knopfler brothers avow together “We are the Sultans of Swing”, something feels just right. No lines filling the aforementioned gap have given me that feeling so far. Ergo, the gap remains.

Wandering and wondering, what place to rest the search...

The Bisibele Baath Diaries

Another brief tryst with the Garden City’s most wondrous weather had come to an end and with that, my three-week-long sabbatical from the World Wide Web. Gmail was to greet me back with a little under hundred unread e-mails, and perusing through them clearly wasn’t on my priority list as I hugged Big B, wishing him on his 23^rd birthday. Ma had carefully chosen and helped decorate the cake- a delicious-looking chocolate delight- and a short visit with her to Big B’s treat at Cafe Coffee Day revealed there was one more cake waiting to be devoured, thanks to TV Didi and Rachel. And, like bad luck, good fortune tends to stream in continuously- it was another chocolate cake, with both being from two of the three best chocolate pastry-making bakeries in town! My teeth’s health and their monthly check-up by Big B could take a backseat- it’d been exactly a score days since I’d had good food, and I was not going to let up. A Chocó-latte, too, was gulped down greedily in the meantime. I’d ordered that for a reason...

After a squalidly dry first week, the in-plant training kicked in to work mode, with regular morning presentations and afternoons spent reading about or configuring devices. I was ordered to buy another phone by Ma and Pa, and I reluctantly bought a threadbare Nokia- the one with the Hindi SMSing and the flashlight. And Snake. I quickly rediscovered my touch and started racking up mammoth scores. That, and the free local and national SMSing kept me busy enough till dinner, a task I somehow got through every night at the paying guest accommodation where I’d put up. The mornings at the office were to get better, too. On our second day into the second week, a routine conversation with our on-site guide revealed the coffee machine was open to us as well. More significantly- for free. We strutted in awkwardly the first time, looking to see if other employees weren’t giving us curious glares- they didn’t seem like they’d be bothered unless we were big white ghouls with a sickle in one hand and a hook for another. The overwhelming aroma of coffee beans had me hooked in a trifle. The first button I pressed was espresso, to clear my perennial confusion over which of that and cappuccino was black coffee. After quickly throwing that cup of espresso- it being black coffee- I pressed the cappuccino button, and even though I messed up on the amount of sugar I needed, Cafe Coffee Day’s impeccable mix even through a programmed machine left me begging for more. From then on, we needn’t an excuse for heading off to the pantry room, where rested that amazing little contraption. Cappuccino, elaichi tea, ginger tea, masala tea and classic tea were all duly tried and tested. Although cappuccino won a few battles, the war was decisively taken by the latte- the delectable mixture of milk and chocolate, with the almost-ubiquitous tinge of coffee, all served neatly in a cup only a few inches high, with a carefully measured spoon of sugar- just perfect.

While the first weekend was positively squandered doing nothing, the next was spent with an old monk, Rapu, in Bengaluru’s most famous mall. Although the fairer gender left us squarely disappointed, Hugh Jackman as Wolverine didn’t, even when the entire movie was made to rest on his shoulders alone. Lunch at a beautifully designed North Indian restaurant, and (yet another) coffee at CCD, and I was off to the city’s outskirts again in those breezy air-conditioned buses that glide through the city roads. Although there was a television at the PG, it was shared and that meant I was only to hum random Kannada songs, when not chatting with the two interns from DCE who were also staying there.

Back home, the first thing that caught my eye on the TV’s programme list was the return of The Championships, and I found myself ooh-ing and aah-ing at the sight of the lush green tennis courts at SW19, London. The state-of-the-art retractable roof notwithstanding, the air of tradition wafted all the way through to my couch, as I gazed like an eight-year-old, in amazement. Alan Wilkins and Vijay Amritraj’s voices were a relief after the drab Rolland Garros coverage, but despite this beautiful sojourn through the various courts at Wimbledon, just one thing seemed missing- the one thing that those most wonderful articles in The Hindu had described assiduously. The next evening was to see that culminating at Centre Court- His Royal Highness Roger Federer, prancing like a freed gazelle. Now, some who may have watched tennis with me may think I’m not a Federer fan and am thus, now being a hypocrite. The only reason I supported Nadal through the Australian Open and other tournaments, is that I felt he was the one who could bring the latent best- yes, even more- from the champion, that He needed a thorn in the flesh to bloom further, a loss’ bitter pill to make that one elusive victory that much sweeter. The French Open triumph has brought back the FedEx, who almost effortlessly, almost carelessly brushed aside the competition to equal Bjorn Borg’s once-impossible record at the greatest stage of ‘em all. Watching Him thwack forehands wide, snuff those once-pristine backhands, and grimace in agony at those double-faults was painful, and to see Him recover from that, and come back to play the divine tennis that we worship Him for, is precisely what sport is all about.

I bow to The King.

P.S. - A little fiasco involving a long-overdue recommendation letter had me bunking office for two days. I got to complete my intern only because of Pa, Musit and Tiwari ji. A big thank-you to you all.

P.P.S. - By the bye, the prettiest lady I encountered during the entire duration turned out to be in the office all along. Although one of my comrades flirted openly with her, leaving us staring open-mouthed one time and throwing punches another, the idiots that we were, she was the only company employee whose card we didn’t take. Sigh.

A midsummer night’s drag

The only on-off affairs you have are with the television. You use the adjectives “tender”, “gentle” and the like only with food- the kind that you aren’t getting. You start the sentence “I love...” and end it with Christopher Nolan, Sheldon Cooper or the guy in that stupid dance video . You know you’re having a mineral water overdose when you think Sprite “tastes funny”. You’ve spent your entire weekend switching between sleeping and lying down with the laptop on your lap. You’ve been disconnected from the Internet since the past week (you care to keep count in hours and minutes) but still know that you haven’t posted on your blog in June- a fact that keeps hurting you in your sleep. You’re sitting at work in a 110-country, 115,000-employing MNC reading “The Restaurant at the End of the Universe” while people around you try and protect substations.

 

It’s clear that you’ve been reading only Douglas Adams in the recent past when even the phrase “at sixes and sevens” seems to have a connection to 42, to you. It’s also not surprising that the aforementioned phrase applies to you perfectly. Murphy’s Law has been at its, well, veritable best, to be most etymologically correct. You take hours of explaining in your most heavily accented Hindi that you want a mobile connection without residence proof in four shops and when you finally catch hold of that elusive SIM card, your handset gives up on you. Your one connection to friends and family is gone.

 

The best pastime I’ve had over the days I’ve spent here in a place which excuses itself by adding “Bangalore” at the end of its address, apart from marvelling at the wonderful weather here, is precisely what I’m doing right now- not whining, but typing. The “First Intern” folder in my documents has a document named “Work Log” which is more of a daily bloopers collection. There’s another named “Weekend Log” which doesn’t have much because, as mentioned earlier, I don’t do anything worth writing home about. There are also a few score drafts I’ve typed but haven’t saved because they’re either too morose or too romanticist or clearly show that I’ve been watching a lot of The Big Bang Theory episodes repeatedly. My best friend is my keyboard, and the screen gives me angry glares as I keep typing. There’s no phone to talk to Ma and feel better. There’s no room nearby to drop by to chat and feel better. There’s no Internet to find others to talk to and feel better. And, just when you need it the most, there’s not even a thought to make you feel better. At best, you try and recite Betty Botter and the story of her butter and how she felt better, but her feeling better makes you bitter that you aren’t feeling any better. Bugger.

 

Loneliness isn’t a good feeling. Solitude- yes. Loneliness- no.

(Published on June 14, 2009 at 10:57 p.m.)

P.S.- Thankfully, this was just the end of the first week.

Season Two Finale

I wake up in an air-conditioned bedroom with the curtains keeping the sunlight from breaking my tired reverie. It’s my screechy SMS reminder that’s the culprit, with Vodafone dutifully informing me of the latest Telugu ringtones and caller-tunes I can get for fifteen rupees a month. My stomach is still full from last night’s sumptuous dinner- nothing special, but filling all the same. Big B’s off to college, Pa’s not yet back from yet another field trip while Mumma’s long taken her ninety-minute commute to the hospital. It’s just my aunt and her chatter as I stretch out on the sofa with a bowl of idly-sambhar resting on the pillow on my lap, simultaneously renewing my on-off affair with the TV. A now-habitual check of the e-mail takes me to check my grades on the batch’s Google group, and after exchanging a few wall posts with a friend, I vow to break all connections with R for the rest of the day. Needless to say, I was unsuccessful.

This trip home couldn’t have come at a better time. Yes, this academic year saw the indescribable Nihilanth trip to Bombay, a busy yet enjoyable Thomso, four of the best issues of Kshitij that I’ve been a part of, memorable first trips to Gnosiomania in Allahabad and the IIT-Delhi Parliamentary Debate, a fun trip to Rishikesh with the third-years and a path-breaking Cognizance. The fact that I may have missed out on mentioning a few more brilliant memories simply means that there’ve been so many things that could’ve made this year unforgettable. This year, though, has been quite forgettable- academically and personally. The former, for obvious reasons, and an increasing sense of disillusionment regarding my future leaves me in an uncomfortable haze. As for the latter, all the phone manners I’d perfected over years of making and answering calls were thrown out of the window last week in a 21-second call I’ll never forget. I can’t seem to recall what the margin of victory was in our first-ever win in the Delhi debates, but I sure do remember the infinitely long night that followed after this call was made. That, as a relatively insignificant consequence, had robbed me of an entire paragraph in the long year-end post I’d planned earlier. Combine it with the grades that followed later in the week, and the whole post was dead.

***

The last few hours in R were spent at Moh’s. The last hours I’d spend with Lefty, Rapu and Moh in the insti. It wasn’t a glitzy night spent recollecting some of the best moments we’ve spent together, or what we’ll miss. We watched a few episodes of South Park, discussed the IPL and cricket’s pretty boys over dinner in Ganga canteen and rounded off the night with a few episodes of The Big Bang Theory. It was... arbit. Now that I come to think of it, I wouldn’t have it any other way. Maybe a last game of Scrabble would’ve been fun. Even more arbit! The final goodbyes were pretty arbit, too. We did both a lame cool guy handshake and an awkward hug.

And, as I was about to hug Lefty one last time, I whispered into his ear- I guess when it comes to the insti, after tonight, I’ll remain loveless for good.

P.S.- If it means that I’ll have to endure another round of really sentimental farewells, I don’t want to be grand old man in Roorkee, masters! Plus, I guess I’ll have to pay, too. Nooo!

P.P.S.- Pity I missed paying my regards to the rest of the fourth-years. I wouldn’t have hugged NamJham, though- the baster said he isn’t taking a bath till his BTP’s done! Not SriPri, either, of course.

P.P.P.S.- Lefty, I meant every single word of it.

Much ado about nothing

R-land throws up all kinds of characters. There are those who seem they were born to write algorithms that’ll run the planet, the kind who can see all seventeen primary and auxiliary views of an imaginary object in their head, those who may have been playing with diodes and transistors instead of Lego bricks when they were still sucking their thumbs (if and when they were free).

 

There are those who may not be as brilliant as the aforementioned, but manage things just fine. They may not know why the aperture for *random-lens-name-here* has to be greater than five millimetres, but know that such a thing exists and might as well be on the answer sheet in front.

 

And, then, there are those exceptions who seem to prove one Mr. Murphy right all the time. It’s nice and simple- they just can’t do a thing correctly. Even if they manage to get all the chemicals right, mix them in the right proportions, and by freaks of nature they might call miracles even stir and heat them just right, they will drop the beaker.

 

No prizes for guessing- yours truly belongs to the last category.

 

This semester’s been quite peculiar. The attempts to get back over the wall shaped like the number eight were lost in soporific stupors- the recently installed air-conditioners in the lecture rooms, too, serving dear old Morpheus. The courses have all seemed pretty easy but those marks remain elusive. One might have thought practical exams for three subjects might help bridge the increasing gap between us hapless souls and the unbelievable nerds lying at the top. But, as said earlier, some people just can’t get it right, no matter what.

 

Exhibit A: The first practical exam is Electrical Machines. The preparation’s been half-decent, but I stride into the lab confident that I’ll forget all circuit diagrams as soon as I get my experiment. Thankfully, that doesn’t happen and I find my bed and get started on doing random tests on a transformer. The writing part is duly completed as neatly as possible, and the connections are made arduously over an hour. I get them checked and am given the green signal. I can’t believe everything is going so smoothly. I push up my collar in pride, and give the switch a pompous hit. The circuit is turned on and all but one of my meters reads zero. I almost felt satisfied I was proved right, but one hour of effort for just one of three tests going futile wasn’t a comforting fact. I called the lab assistant for assistance, and was informed I was working in the wrong lab all the while. Oh, yes! I knew my circuit was alright! I entered the other lab to be promptly questioned how I was strutting in an hour late. The lab assistant there couldn’t believe someone could possibly have worked in the wrong lab for an hour, but let me in all the same. Things went on uneventfully, afterwards, until the viva-voce came along.

 

I can talk- a lot. For hours at a stretch, to any random person, at any place, on anything and everything. But, somehow, despite this superhuman loquaciousness, viva-voce sessions aren’t exactly my cup of tea. I’ve only ever given them in two ways- one in which I sit around for a long time saying “Erm... Uhh... Hmmm... Dum tada dum dum”, and the other in which I very straightforwardly say “Honestly, sir- I have no idea.” This one was the former, and I even managed to screw up questions I had a semblance of an answer for.

 

Digital Electronics was up next. The viva was pretty early into the practical, and frustrated with the professor’s slow drooping voice, I resorted to answering questions in a snap, something which seemed to have perturbed the old man and I was sent off in less than five minutes. The LEDs meanwhile, decided to run my counter from 0-3 only, and some jugad later, I was out of the lab after another bad practical. The worst part was that the worst part was to follow.

 

Power Electronics is my M. Tech specialisation. The first course on it has been a nightmare. With the professor’s incorrigible hissing going un-understood and the promise of no attendance, this course has been quietly ignored all the while. The coordinator decides to make amends and conduct a practical exam. Bad idea- no one, including the professors themselves, has taken them seriously and from the first batch, it’s inferred a diagram with some seven transistors, three different ICs, a brand-new clock-timer (?) and some thirty-one resistors and capacitors is to be learnt by heart. No wonder it was called a firing circuit. I was lucky I got to work with only eleven resistors and capacitors and two ICs, but the other components duly made their mind not to help me. The viva-voce was good fun. I answered the first six questions admirably, and to the next three I said “I haven’t a clue, sir.” The nice guy that he was, the professor asked me to make an educated guess. “I don’t really think random guessing is going to help me in any way, sir. You need to know something to guess, don’t you?”, I snapped.

I don’t know why but I think he was impressed.

 

The end-semester theory exams follow, and I ironically feel relieved I only have to communicate by writing on an innumerable number of sheets. Of course, if I can.

 

P.S. - Old Monks this year has been great fun. While Lefty had one full of allusions, Moh meant business with his last quiz. Bang Bang and Chaukanna had a hilarious last one, and Dude's special was most memorable. Only he could've pulled it off!

 

P.P.S. – You’ve got to stick to your principles.

Of memories, milieus and minutiae

The scorching midday sun was all guns blazing in the little lawn behind my room when we decided to celebrate our but temporary emancipation from the clutches of the mid-semester tests. A few sublime goals from the Sexy Sleepy Soccer-lover (SSS), the Electrical Kholu, the Scuttling Shuttler (SS) and other mates were interspersed with some brilliant assists of my own, albeit them being for the opposition! I also scored the maximum number of own goals (three, on my last count), but even an Inter-IIT regular like SSS scored one. By the time we got tired and the others sat down to watch Terrance and Phillip fart their way to ignominy in the South Park movie as I prepared orange juice for them, it was overcast and it wasn’t too long before it started to drizzle. The sleepless nights of the weekend, and the exhaustion after the game caught up with me, though, and I dozed off.

 

The Popular Geek (PG) and Technology Expert (TE) were in my room three hours later, to wake me up after they’d taken pictures of the vestiges of the Bhawan day (described here). It had rained sporadically for the past few hours, and the petrichor was heavy in the cool breeze. Oh, I could go on and on for another rain post! It is one of those things about nature that piques you in so many ways. Rain, to me, is a harbinger of optimism, a reminder of beauty, a messenger of relief, but above all, an excuse to head off for coffee and pakodas! Sipping the hot elixir slowly, when not digging into succulent pakodas, while the rain beats down on the window panes, and the wind hisses into your ears, is an experience beyond my expressive capabilities.

 

Mumma was worried I’d be draining myself in the heat, but it isn’t the same weather as Visakhapatnam here. It isn’t raining in Bhuj in western Gujarat, either, where Papa is in the midst of making sure he visits every corner of the country. It is overcast in Delhi, I hear, but the wind blowing merrily isn’t a pretty situation in a city as dusty as the capital. If you are in R-land as you read this, I’d rather you walk out to feel what I’m trying to say here. If you aren’t, try catching one of those Tata Tea rain advertisements, which, I feel are one of the best depictions of this feeling. A similar one is an old Maruti Alto ad, but that was because of Shubha Mudgal’s enchanting voice singing “Boondon mein jaane kya nasha hai...”

***

It’s a Monday morning, and it’s an exam day. SS and I are on our way to the hall, with both of us having slept little, prepared even lesser and frantically looking for someone who knew more micro-economics than each other. But, unfortunately, we were a little late to leave, too, leaving the two of us praying for our souls. We completed the turn around the hostel gate, to emerge behind the seventh wing, between an exhibit of modern art on Ravindra Canteen’s back-wall (whose popular name has something to do with a horse) and fellow classmates jumping the fence, hurrying to catch vantage seats to make up for their preparation (or the lack of it). As we look at some of them get caught very uncomfortably in those pointed steel spears, our attention is caught by that big tree which just a month or so ago, was all empty-canopied. It now wore a most delightful coat of light violet, and so did the ground beneath it. The contrast compared to the dull yellow of the walls and the brown-tinged green of the other trees around was a sight to behold- if only we weren’t running late already. For the rest of our way, we speculated which tree it may be. Lavender is the option we sat upon at the end, but I have a good feeling it’s not that. This was precisely what I was thinking about after seeing that I had little or no clue on how to calculate the average variable cost of production for a company. Ah, the irony of (ou)R lives!

***

Thursday is a busy day this semester. Classes till one followed by practicals sixty minutes later, and a long, taxing day is rounded off by a tutorial. The only positive is that the practical gets wrapped up in less than three-quarters of an hour, and the research scholar taking the tutorial is accommodating enough (and our batch goony enough) to let us out in less than twenty minutes. The gap between the two usually ranges from thirty to forty-five minutes, spent on some days lazing around on the wooden benches of Alpahar Canteen, sipping fruit juice and eating fruit chaat at the numerous fruit-stalls near UG club on some, or in the pursuit of Frappyness at Nescafe on others.

The last choice is the most chosen one as I get to spend my wait alone on most occasions. On one such Thursday, I picked up a Frappe with the last notes in my wallet, and proceeded to pick a booth looking out to the road, as well as the other booths. It’d been an especially tiring day, and I sought to relax, pulling my legs up onto the bench in front as I searched for my headphones. A couple of middle-aged men, made their way to my booth, making me switch my legs’ position. As I turned, I could see a couple in the diagonally opposite booth coochie-cooing as they gently fed each other their patties. Two deaf-mutes were having an animated conversation, even in sign language, in the booth right in front of me. A graduate student I recognised from the Azad mess was all hurried and harried on his way to the PNB ATM just outside the Nescafe entrance. A bunch of fellow sophomores waved Hi on their way in, while on the other side of the road the Scuttling Shuttler chirped away along with the Scary Godmother. My wait was futile, but blissful nevertheless, as while this scene of humanity played before my eyes, Mark Knopfler was singing melodiously into my ears “...Everybody’s looking for somebody’s arms to fall into; That’s what it is... That’s what it is now...”

***

 

P.S.- Research Scholars (RS) are PG students, aren’t they? Not all of them are blobs, though! J

P.P.S.- The lavender incident was uncannily similar to what the female protagonist of ‘Daze of Our Lives’ in the last issue of Kshitij goes through.

P.P.P.S.- You sit and wait, think it’s futile, and move on. Then, out of the blue, your wait is ended in the blink of an eye, but the sight somehow remains with you for a long, long time! All hail persistence of vision! By the way, try giving “Turn! Turn! Turn!” by The Byrds a hear.

The tradition lives on...

Another set of mid-semester examinations is upon us, meaning it’s been another week full of coffee, gossip, joblessness and, of course, frantic attempts to make some good out of those tests. Speaking of joblessness, R-land has been unbelievably active on Facebook, and not to mention, the preferred activity being those random quizzes that have invaded our Home pages. The conversations in the midnight rendezvous at the canteen earlier used to be the usual “Are these the subjects I really want to study?”, “I should’ve gone to Delhi or Bombay...” or the omnipresent “I want to get committed!”. Thanks to the aforementioned recent developments, these bakar sessions now sound a little different. “What should be your real job?”. “Which city are you/ should you be living in?”. “What is the first letter of the person you will fall in love with?”. For goodness’ sake, even “Which street animal are you?” (I am supposed to be a mangy cur). Facebook was nice and addictive when I first picked it up, but it was the social networking part which made it fun. Poking friends, commenting on their albums, following their status messages- you got to know these people so much better. These quizzes claim to add to the same, but do they? Who’s bothered if I’m a gamma function or an exponential function, or if you’re a stiletto or a pair of sneakers. You can lie your way to becoming a nice bovine creature on the city roads, or boast about an emotional quotient of 138, or claim you’re a real-life equivalent of Charlie Brown’s cousin, and get a handful of guesses as to who your love’s going to be when his/her name begins with an M (which, by the way, every second person seems to be getting). But is that what I really want to know about people? If you say you’re involved in them as just another activity to bide time, I’m OK with it. If you think it helps you connect with people better, I seriously begin to wonder ‘How?’. As insignificant as it may be here, I’d like to ask Mr. Zuckerberg to ponder over this and the suggestion of reverting to the old Home page.

 

Meanwhile, blogging is now officially a fad on campus. So much so that Kondy’s April Fools’ prank involved one, and was quite a rage, might I add! First posts now gather comments I can’t dream of, and cheap publicity is the norm. The new monthly newspaper, YouthZilla, in their coverage of this phenomenon, asked some chips from the old block why they blogged, and what keeps them going. I got that e-mail, too. Pity I couldn’t reply in time. Do read that article for Sushi’s awesome reply. As I surfed through my chat list and found links to at least half a dozen blogs as status messages, I was reminded of my humble beginnings in the blogosphere.

 

My blog began as my vent for all that I couldn’t speak thanks to lack of time/ space/ cooperative audience. But, as the sands of time flowed down, I realised it was much more. It was an endoscope into those great recesses of my mind, a vent- not for arbitrary chatter- but for anything that’s stimulated me , and, of course, a chance to keep writing regardless of my work (or the lack of it) for the magazine. I realised today, that sometime in November 2012, when I’d be a dapper 22-year-old with a mortarboard for headgear and a scroll in hand, there’d be one place I’d look to recount all those little things that made life in the insti as special as it was, and this page would be it- unblemished by time, untampered by opinions, unhampered by incidents to follow- pure as that first drop of rain. After all, as AP so poignantly says, beauty lies in the minutiae.

 

P.S.- All the very best to Dela and Prondu for the Tata Crucible National Finals. I wish the Grandmaster’s legacy passes on to you.

P.P.S.- For all those who're reading this before Sunday, best of luck for the tests. You seem to need it.