30. a Murphy addendum

I was of the impression that Murphy’s laws were actually written by a guy named Murphy. It’s only a lot later did I know that it was a flexible set of laws to which anyone could add their own, provided they’re weird enough and agreeable with a large section of the ppl. This made me think for a while and I realized, that I have a couple of my own laws/experiences which cud be appended to the already huge Murphy set. So here goes ….

If you’re going to the lectures, surely there’s not gonna be any surprise quiz(es) that day!

It’s only from your batch that the question paper pattern changes for each exam!

You happen to teach one girl, for one hour, one day before an exam and your peers make sure that that one mistake haunts you for the rest of your life!!

It’s invariably on the exam day that you wont find a single dependable pen, a trip to the stationery store is a must !

It’s only when you’re in the loo (two hours before the exam) and have just started downloading that you get these STD and ISD calls from long lost friends!

It’s only when you don’t have the change to buy a bus ticket that even the conductor appears not to have the change.

It’s only when you spit phlegm out through a window of a moving bus that the phlegm manages to land on a bald guy’s forehead. (the rest is history)

A friend, of the female kind (the one mentioned earlier) calls you on your landline (asking about ur exam) only when the whole family is sitting on the couch next to it watching a soap opera, with ears wide open!

During a cricket match (enjoying the post-exam relief time), when your side is batting, it is only when your turn comes to pad up to go bat (invariably at the end, the last wicket more often than not), that the ‘guard’ is not to be found! Too scared to go and face the music without ‘the shield’, but cant keep searching for long, otherwise will be timed out !

(Once you get timed out, u remember that watching a movie is on the agenda) Every movie whose tickets u’ve bought in ‘black’ turns out to be an utter flop ! (Dhoom 2 being the latest, your girl is stunned that you could not manage to buy balcony tickets, doesn’t speak to u throughout the movie!)

The stranger next to u in a public place (the movie hall), invariably knows the vernacular (in this case, Tamil) that you are using to swear at him/her !(the rest, again is history….get kicked out of the theater, ur girl accepts a lift offered by another handsome hunk, u return home with bruises, only to find a huge family gathering, all gleefully waiting for ur arrival)

The porno CD collection that’s been in a safe and secure place for eons, somehow falls out during this family gathering, into the hands of your 8 year old cousins!(the rest again, is history !)

Your cell’s Sim card loses its validity on the very day(the next day) that you are expecting the break-up call from ur girl !

Your battery loses its charge when you’re mid-way through a call, trying to make up the break-up that happened during the last call before your validity had expired :P ( lets hope the rest is not history :P)

29. How emotionally mature are you ?

You Are 55% Grown Up, 45% Kid

You've grown up a good bit, but you still have a way to go before you're emotionally mature. You have the skills to control your emotions, you just have to use them.

How Emotionally Mature Are You?

28. Hair-ism and the human

There’s this perception world-over that every human on the whole (a conglomeration of all the organs/tissues blah blah) is an individual independent entity. But as far as I see it, there are 2 entities which combine to make a human. One of those entities is HAIR and the other is the person himself/herself (minus the hair). Can’t u see what’s happening. They (the hair people) are all over us. Have a look at yourself in the mirror, they’re ALL OVER !! And we cant do anything about it. They decide when they have to change colour (depending on the current fashion trends in their race, some turn pinkish yellow too), where they want to stay on the human surface, when they want to leave the human (especially the head region) for a long sabbatical. There’s no question of having talks with them and coming to a consensus. Every time a hair falls in front of my question paper, every time a dandruff flake gives me that wretched look while dangling on the collar of my shirt, every time I look in the mirror praying that the tragic disappearance of the lushness of my hair doesn’t become a reality……….. It would be so good if I could talk the hair on my head into a bargain, a settlement, sign a treaty with it. Life would be so much easier.

“Treaty to maintain sanctity of hair-zones” (2006) : LoH (Leader of the Hair people) versus AK (Abhay Krishna)

AK : So, what would it take for you to give me a guarantee that you or any of your people wont leave me in the lurch till I cross the age of 30.

LoH : You see, we are very reasonable people who have very reasonable demands. If you can fulfill our requests, we will be happy to sign this treaty.

AK : (What kind of requests can these people have…. they’re so long, thin, fragile, hope they don’t ask me something which I cant offer) I am eager to strike a bargain with you. Some of your people have already left my constituencies without prior information, which is totally un-democratic, but putting these stray incidents aside, we want to arrive at a common consensus. Let me put it in simple words, I will probably be a single guy who’s bachelor status wont be threatened by proposals to get married until I hit 30(hopefully). So, I wanna flirt flirt and flirt as long as I am legally/morally able to. And as we all know, first impressions are ever lasting, and god knows why, the female kind get way too depressed as soon as they see that your people are missing/have deserted a guy’s capital city (the head-quarters :P ). And your people moving out of my capital city (Head-erabad) in search of a better future, is something which I wouldn’t want to see. So lets hear out what your requirements are.

LoH : You see, we are very reasonable people who have very reasonable demands. Here is a tentative list of demands by my people, all very very reasonable indeed.

The List :

• A trip to Paris every year, to get a haircut from Claude Baapkilele, Johhny Depp’s hair-dresser.

• A trip to Sydney, Austrailia in the near future, my people are die-hard Nicole Kidman fans and want to congratulate her on her engagement with Keith Urban.

• A fortnightly visit to Habeeb’s saloon in Banjara Hills, we’ve enquired about the prices, 500 bucks for 15 minutes of massage, which is extremely reasonable.

• Only Almond hair-oil to be used, specifically the brand “Badamstein” manufactured in Germany, coconut oil wont be tolerated. An all-body curfew will start with mass agitiation and boycott the minute a jar of mustard oil or any naturo-therapeutic oil enters within 50 metres radius of our living areas.

• My people were very impressed with Diana Hayden’s advertisement for Lo’oreal, so they want a complete makeover with the complete L’oreal hair kit to be done only by Claude Baapkilele.

• Keeping in mind the welfare of my people who aren’t in the capital, I demand a ban on the use of Odomos or Nycil prickly heat powder as it causes asphyxiation and has led to the demise of many of my comrades.

• Also, it will be a very reasonable request to suggest that my people be cleansed with bottled mineral water at all times, considering that the economy is on the boom and that they need to have a higher standard of living.

AK (who is pretty dumbstruck with all these demands) : All will be done, in due course of time. I bow in front of you oh almighty LoH, will take care of all your needs, just keep your people convinced that my capital is the ‘happening’ city, that their future will be safe and secure over here as their interest will be taken care of.

Starts to think – Now I need to go and discard that “dhuradha pathraadhi thaiyilam”( a smelly oil from the Kerala Ayurveda samajam) which mom had sent by courier. I also need to go in search of a substitute for Nycil, may be Shower-to-Shower will be a good bet. Will ask mom for 3K stating that I need to upgrade my PC and instead buy ‘Badamstein’. Also need to stay away from that Somu Sen guy, he brings Bengali food for lunch which smells all mustardy!

Goes into a brief trip down memory lane

Age: 15 days (mom told me this later)

Mom rubs her hand over my head (all curly hair) and the nurse standing next to her says, “achhu NTR laanti juttu unnadi” – meaning my hair do was similar to that of NTR , one of the then famous telugu film stars.

Age : 10 years

My hindi teacher in school catches hold of my hair and throws me out of the class. I so wished that I was bald, it would have been so good if she’ d had nothing to pull at that moment :(

Age : 12 years

I am made to wear a frock and sport hair clips ( have mentioned this in an earlier post ) for having bushy hair and not getting a hair-cut. God I so wished that these damn hair dint grow so fast and be easier to manage.

Age : 14 years

Spent literally 2 hours on the barber’s chair, the guy was really sweating it out trying to cut my hair down to the popular “Military hair style” which was the fad in those days.

Age : 20 years 250+ days (getting back to the present)

Those were the golden hair days man ! Now, I spend hardly 30 minutes at the barber’s shop, which includes reading Cine Blitz for 20 minutes while waiting for my turn to sit on the hot-seat. The barber is all smiles to have me as his customer, he’s getting money for little or no effort. Using scales and compasses to measure the changing boundaries of the ever-expanding forehead has become a sort of a daily ritual now (sob sob)

26. Quandaries of an exam-giver

If you think I am gonna be talkin about the pre-exam blues which each one of us face, or our futile attempts at guessing the supposed paper pattern/expected questions, nopes, I aint gonna bore your brains with such stuff. There are more pressing matters which for some reasons have always remained unmentioned. This post is an attempt to put forth some of the unusually regular quandaries which an exam-given runs into on the D-day.

‘The diet’ - Very very crucial. Most of us, aware, that eating some junk before the big day can only but ruin the already slim chances of succeeding, end up eating really less, also the safest stuff possible (which in my case is just a can of milk). Well, if you happen to belong to this category, then you would know that the ‘tummy’ begins to growl asking for something more filling right in the middle of the exam. The paper seems a lesser and “easier to conquer” menace when compared to appeasing the demands of the holy “Lord Belly”. And if you are the “exam day-junk food/any food” eating variety, then you must be really lucky for not having had a rough-belly-exam day till now.


‘The Ride’ - God creates a lot of hurdles en-route from home to the exam hall ensuring that we stumble at least at one of them, enabling us to take our minds off the exam for a while, and get tensed about the problem at hand and worry to death as to whether we’ll be able to write the exam at all ! The Bus failure, the fight with the auto-driver who happens to take you through a little more circuitous route than the usual, the forgotten bus-pass, the ‘blessed hall ticket’ which takes off from your pocket and sails through the window while you are busy searching for your bus pass, stumbling on a beggar while running after the hall ticket, (the bloody driver of )the Maruti van which transfers a lot of the mud-puddle’s contents onto your jeans, the next auto-driver who doesn’t have the adequate change/chiller and the policeman outside the exam center who doesn’t believe even a bit of your story !


‘Sweet Lullaby’ – A song by ‘Deep Forest’, which you happened to hear while mugging up some formulae in the morning, manages to linger in your head through all this madness thus far. What’s more, it stays stuck in the head all through the exam, thereby making the event of doing the paper ‘well’ improbable. Not to mention the strands of hair that fall right on the question-paper while you constantly try and pull your head (with both hands) apart trying to throw this song out.


'Oh!.......Pretty woman' – While searching for the bench allocated to your number, you happen to have a glance at this pretty pretty female sitting right in the front row. “Why dont such pretty people even venture anywhere near my college” is the first thought that flashes. Disaster strikes when you go and ask her(with a broad smile) about your bench’s location and she replies in this awfully croaky, loud and anti-flirtatious tone. “Glad that such people never venture anywhere near my college”, is the first thought that flashes.


'Cupid strikes!!! ' - you figure your location, take a look around and see that the seating arrangement is two-in a bench, get seated and pray that the other person doesn’t come for the exam (a full bench to yourself is the ultimate luxury during an exam). Then, you see this mystically beautiful ‘Damsel in Distress’ (DD) rush into the room trying to figure where she has to sit. The whole class have their eyes on her, even the geeky nerds are eyeballing her through their +7 sighted spectacles. Cupid strikes, hits four love arrows in your butt making you numb to all the exam hysteria. “Love at first sight” seems an understatement. “Truly, madly, deeply” may be able to justify the extent of the effect of Cupid’s artillery. And what’s more, she comes and sits right next to you, giving you the ‘hi’ with a smile while all you are doing is staring at her with the jaws wide open.


Memory ‘magic’ :o – From then on, it’s downhill. Serendipity, but at such an awkward time !!!! .Cant help but have a look at the angel every once in a while, a question seems confusing, take a look at her and then get back to it and remain confused, this cycle repeating every couple of minutes. “Deep Forest” doesn’t seem to leave you alone, this attractive femme making matters worse. A question on probability gets you so transfixed that the question itself begins to talk to you, tells you “Go and talk to her, tell her how you feel, exams are here to stay, but this girl will not come back. Decide for yourself, your future is in your hands”. The mind goes all crazy, and efforts to get back to sanity by pulling your hair are frowned upon by DD. You realize the importance of buying two pens/pencils before an exam when she asks “Do you have an extra pencil” and you gladly give her one with a broad grin that would make Bart Simpson proud!


The 'beginning' of the 'end' - The exam time ends, and predictably, you’ve ended on the ‘screwed-up” side of the population. DD seems pretty happy with her performance, gives you a rising smile and starts making conversation. “Wow, this is my chance”, is the first thought that flashes, and you begin talking. The both of you are almost out of the exam center when a hunk on his bike comes out of nowhere and shouts “Kavita…”, to which DD responds with an enthusiastic ‘hiiiiiii!!!!!’. “Kavita, hmmm, sweet name”, is the first thought that flashes. “Hey, have to go, was nice talking to you, here’s my email id, keep in touch” and hands you a small slip. As you see her slowly disappearing from sight, the first thought that flashes – “ was that her boyfriend? Do I have a chance?” . “Then again, such pretty girls are never free, you should be foolish to not realize that dumbo !!!” is the second thought that flashes.


‘The Ride back’ – “Dejection”,one word to sum up the ride back home. What makes the ride worse is if you happen to meet some of your colleagues who have given the same paper and they begin asking “how was your paper dude?” Anyone who has done miserably would not want to talk about the paper, it’s only those who want to boast of their good performance that brag about how easy the paper was making life hell for the other people who would prefer to stay mum and rout internally in their misery.


‘The Sympathy vote’ : Once at home, the moment you declare that your paper dint go well, there’s this barrage of sympathy-oozing comforting statements from all directions, makes you wanna run away to some distant desert and never return again.

If the exam itself wasn’t tough enough, we exam-givers have to go through all these quandaries as well….Oh God, hope you are listening(praying with joined hands)

25. Reporting from Hyderabad, Deepu, For LPTV.

Hi, i am Deepu from Loose Pants Television Network famously known as LPTV. The last one month has been very busy for us at LPTV, for we have been doing extensive research on an outbreak of a deadly viral fever called 'Chickun (or chicken??) Guniya'. (Please go through the link to believe it).Immediately after we came to know of this we sent our special correspondent PSR Chaitanya and a freelancer Abhay krishna to Hyderabad where this fever has seen a rise in the past three weeks. PSR who was making a story on 'We don't have to cry anymore- There's hair transplantation' ,a documentary for people like him who believe in 'The more hair you loose ,the more head you get' has left his dear project to work on this very serious issue 'The outbreak of Chi kun Guniya- What and Why?'. Abhay, a freelancer, who has been busy doing a report on a multi national company called “ORGy”, rushed from ‘Hi-Tech city’ (where he was doin his report) to capture the essence of this “Chicken-mania”. Oh, by the way, “ORGy” is trying to address the problem of weight-gain and “excessive flab” which is escalating in the “software professionals” community. The heads of the company in an interview have said that they are shortly going to release a product called “Sexy-Flex”, a device which any software professional can use to lose the excess flab and weight while he’s watching porn on his PC.

Now lets get down to our subject 'The outbreak of Chi kun Guniya- What and Why?'.

Chicken guniya: Legend has it that the first incidence of this fever was found in 1755AD in a small village near Nasik ,when a sex-starved guy was affected by this kind of fever.The patient suffered from severe joint pains and had high temperature of about ...actually we couldn't find out the exact temperature.But yes, he did suffer from high fever for about a week. (atleast PSR says so). People in the village supposed it happened because the guy indulged in acts of physical intimacy (or bluntly ,sex) with a chicken. People called it 'Chicken Guna' ,guna here meaning 'sin' ,cos they thought it was wrong (They weren't metrosexuals , were they???:P). South indians in the village,ya those two gultis and the mallu girl got the name wrong and started calling it 'chikun guniya'.Slowly 'Chiken guna' became 'chickun guniya'

So nearly two and a half centuries later we are again getting to hear about 'Chikun guniya'. While PSR was doing his reseach at his place in Hyderabad , Abhay was talking to the general people in Hyderabad about the awareness of the disease and so forth.After interviewing about 143 people this is what we had:

The name 'Chicken Guniya' was no more used by the Hyderabadi people, especially in the old city area of the city.Instead people nead Quthbullapur called it 'Chicken Dhuniya' because rumours spread that customers of the biggest chicken centre in that area 'Chicken Dhuniya' were the ones affected by this fever. The poor guy sayeed bhai had to shut his shop down.

Friend:Tera chicken dhuniya kaisa hey bey.
Guniya patient:Kya bataoon yaar. Maa ki kirikiri, bahut dard dera baap.aage, peeche, poora baap.


Supposedly this rumour was spread by a house wife in the same area named supraja* for reasons not known to Sayeed bhai. Sayeed Bhai wanted his revenge ;so did extensive research to find out the motive behind the rumour.He eventually found out the reason and we don't know what he did ,but two days later people ina nd arounf kuthbullapur and saidabad started calling it 'Chicken Dhaniya'. So, what did he do????
Abhay our correspondent dug deep into the matter and figured out that supraja, a self proclaimed international chef was very famous her 'Dhaniya Chicken' Receipe and so set up a small chicken shop beside her house. So who ever bought chicken from her shop and paid 10 bugs extra would get a free receipe of 'Dhaniya chicken'.Now you get the connect, right????

Dhuniya to Dhaniya.So lets go all over the dialouge again.

Friend:Tera chicken dhaniya kaisa hey bey.
Guniya patient: Kya bataoon yaar. Mast hota bolke laya re. 10 rupaiye jyadha li baap."ek kilo do" bole tho, "accha hoga bolke 2 kilo lelo. phir nahi milega" bolke dhi baap. Ab dekh kya hua. Uski tho.....

Abhay’s dad has an attender who too thinks that it’s “Chicken dhaniya”. Here are excerpts from a conversation between him and Abhay’s dad.

Dad: Arey Jowahar, kal nahin aaye kya jee ! dumma kaiku mare??
Jowahar : kya bolon saab, biwi subah uthke boli mere ko “chicken-dhaniya” hai, bachon ko school leke jao aur khana banao. Khana bana bana ke laghta hai mere ko bhi “Chicken dhaniya” ho gaya, pura joint-joint dard kar ra !!!!


With pandemonium reigning supreme in Kuthbullapur and Saidabad, Abhay spoke to people from the ‘old city’, the most literate part of Hyderabad (pun intended), who are not ready to accept that a chicken can do any “guna” (sin). They strongly believe that the chicken was made by the Almighty to serve as food to mankind, not to commit sins like adultery (that too with members of another species).They won't accept any name starting with chicken and ending with anything else other than biryani.They will call it 'Chicken Biryani' no matter what. PSR came across a guy who said; "Dhuniya kuch bhi bolne dho, hum tho chicken Biryani hi bolenge.Duniya main chicken ka ek hi ho sakta hain.Chicken Biryani"


Youngsters from the more "hippy" parts of the city (read Yo Yo guys)have been calling it “Chick hi duniya”. Apparently, these guys got sick as soon as they got a wink from a hot chick and started screaming “This chick is my world”. Looking at the actual causes of the disease, they may be totally off target, but this excuse has worked miracles in front of their parents who have readily agreed to give ‘em all the money they want to pursue their “chick” so as to get cured. Silly, isn’t it !

Friend:Hey dood! how'z your chick hi somethin??
Guniya patient: Yo yo man!! It hurts in the arse maaan.Yo!

Calling it “Chicken Dhun-iya”, there have also been reports of people contracting this disease by receiving phone calls on GSM mobile phones; they seem to have heard a “cock-a-doodle-doo” tune from the other side, but these reports are yet to be confirmed. All Reliance users have been cautioned to not download any ringtones with the words “Chick” or “Dhun” in them , for the fear of getting this dreaded disease.


While their research almost came to an end, PSR found a good deal when a doctor offered him an Hair Transplant for Rs 6 a follicle instead of the usual RS 26 per follicle in Ahmedabad. So, he left his research midway for his surgery.Meanwhile Abhay is back to Hi-tech city unraveling the mysteries of "Sexy -Flex.".They also
had an important warning for all the readers here. People who fail to comment in their blogs from now on will contract Chickun Biryani err Dhuniya err Dhaniya err ya, Guniya.Now, dont ask me wat's in the name.So, people go flood in the comments while i Deepu will take your leave.





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Authored (mostly) by Abhay and (a little) by PSR. Visit PSR's blog.
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24. May-be or may-be not

May-be or may-be not,
do all of us think a lot ?

There are people we think of,
whom we like and cant seem to get our mind off.
Oh why is it so hard ?
Can an angel come down and answer this question.

May-be or may-be not,
do all of us think a lot ?

It’s the same image that hovers,
Wherever, be it the mall, the disco or the couch.
This one question which never disappears
“Do they ever think of us, as much?”

May-be or may-be not,
do all of us think a lot ?

Looking for endless ways to please them,
Searching for as many excuses
to get a chance to do something for them,
Always wanting to be there for them.

May-be or may-be not,
do all of us think a lot ?

Then again, there are people we think of,
who like us and there’s a need to reciprocate.
There’s a need to be sane all the time,
Walking on thin ice is’nt everyone’s forte!

Doing everything in one’s power to make ends meet,
To bridge the gaps, to learn to give and take.
To steer this ship we call our mind,
away from troubled waters and keeping it near sanity.

I never thought it’d be like this,
I never thought it’d be so hard,
I never thought if i would do things better
If I was given another chance!

Is it just that I think a lot?
Naah! We all do, don’t we? :)

23. Transvestites on exhibition

LISTEN U GOT TAGGED !

This is the first time that I’ve got tagged, lets see how I fare at this Tag-xamination ;) So, as Janani (my tagger) would say, lets get down to business..... This TAG is gonna be all about the MOST embarrassing moment/s in ur life.... so here we go....

Well, it’s quite tough to choose just one u know, coz there are so many worthy contenders for this prestigious accolade. But at the end of the day, there can only be one winner. So, here’s my winner tale.

Title : Transvestites on exhibition

Venue : St.Joseph’s High School
Day of the week : Thursday
Day Temperature – 30 degrees C
Forecast – Sunny

Rewind – 9 years back, when being in Class 6 was a matter of pride. The reason, because among all the Classrooms only the Class 6 ones had a separate balcony for themselves, each section had it’s own balcony (this was possible because there used to be one Class 6 Section on each one of the floors of the high school building). Oh, we had our own space, the breeze blew right into the classroom and we always had that much extra time to cover our tracks of mischief whenever the princi made his rounds coz ours used to be the last room in the corridor. Wondering why the excruciating detail on the location of my classroom, you’ll soon see why.

Well, Thursday is the one day of the week when we students are supposed to wear whites. Thursday is also the day when our class Leader or Prefect( a stern female, Miss S ) checks the whiteness of our shoes and chucks us outside the class right at the beginning of the day. Our class teacher (Madam C), an eccentric female, was quite famous to give ingenious punishments to students. Well little did I know that I would be on her hit-list today. On our return from the assembly back to the classroom, S stands at the front door, and doesn’t allow me to enter the class coz of unpolished shoes. I don’t mind, coz I’ve got quite a few others as company, and am quite sure that Madam C would let us all off because we were like 20 guys standing outside. She enters the corridor, sees the 20 of us, and looks at us keenly, as though we are some Mongolian tribals who have accidentally stumbled onto a Catholic missionary school.

Then S comes and whispers something in Madam’s ears and then she shouts “Today’s hair checking day as well”. I am like “Oh Shit ! I haven't even combed my hair today. Haven't cut my hair for 2 months now. Should have atleast oiled my hair.Bloody, keep sitting and watching that stupid WWF all morning and forget polishing and combing, now pay the price, Idiot !”

I somehow keep praying that she passes by me without noticing, but then, all wishes don’t come true you see. She halts, catches me by the hair and says “Abhay, what do you do with all the money that you save by not going to the barber?” I want to say “ Have spent all of it on bets in our gully cricket matches” , but end up giving her the stupid innocent bent-head smile. She takes me and a friend Arvind to the side and yells at the others - “Remove all your shoes and socks and leave them in the balcony, you’ll spend the whole day walking bare-foot”. Looks at the both of us and says, “The same applies to you two as well”. So we do as directed and remain standing in the corridor while the others rush into the classroom before Madam thinks of a harsher punishment. So this leaves the two of us at her mercy. She calls the Leader and yells “Oh S***a , get me the two frocks that I have kept in the bottom shelf of the cupboard”. Arvind and I look at each other, stare blankly at Madam C after hearing this. “Holy cow, she’s really gonna make us wear frocks !!!!”

Arvind and I try to reason it out with Madam C but she isn’t ready to listen to anything we gotto say. Says “You boys should be taught a lesson. You should look like students , not hooligans. You have to wear these frocks all day” . “yeah right ! like having a little extra hair was the one and only qualification to look like a hooligan…..Agreed that we students needed to be taught a lesson, but why just make the both of us the ‘bakras’, this is so unfair :(( ” S goes to the cupboard, does some searching and returns with a couple of cute looking frocks. One of ‘em a maroon one with grey stripes, the other being a fluorescent yellow one patched with marigolds and sunflowers all over. But they looked so small from a distance, I began to wonder whether I would fit in them? “Worst case, if I have to wear a frock, I’ll jump and take the maroon one, coz wearing a dazzling flowery frock all day will make the top headlines for the next few years to come.”


To be honest, I wasn’t in the best shape back then, with nick names like “motu-seth”, “gol-matol”, “laddoo” , you can get a rough idea , cant you ;) Madam C gives me the frocks to choose from, I grab the maroon one and try wearing it on. All this while, the other students of the class are peeping outside the window and watching us getting humiliated. “Please let this be a dream , let this be a dream, I cant bear this humiliation”. Turns out that the maroon one is too tight, I barely squeeze myself into it, while Arvind looked kinda cute sporting the yellow frock :) Then we are made to enter the class, bare-foot, wearing frocks and hair-clips on our head. Hear huge laughter from all directions……boy that was so so embarrassing. But this was just the beginning. My friends start to ask me out - “You are a pretty girl in a frock, will you go on a date with me ?” and then there are the other dim-wits who come up with lines like “ Mast lag raha hai mama….Anna, yellow frock main chamakra …….hair pins mast fit hai”.

Every teacher who walked in that day mocked at us, one of ‘em told “Who are these two new admission girls in my class, can you introduce yourselves? hahahaha” I had this overwhelming urge to jump off the top of the building that very instant, wanted to get out of school and rush to the barber to get my head clean shaven, may be a Michael Jordan look or a Mohican style ala David Beckham. Arvind was feeling even worse, his frock got him more attention, while I was struggling for survival in mine. “Arey, this frock is too tight, my whole figure is getting revealed, as it is I am no hunk to look at…..Damn, it’s suffocating!”


And to complicate matters, it started raining. It poured like anything for about one hour, enough time to soak up all the shoes out in the balcony. My wretched luck, am in a bloody frock and now my shoes are soaked, can it get worse. Yes, it did get worse. By lunch time, I had had enough of it, so me and Arvind decide and start to remove the frocks when Madam C makes a surprise entry, catches us red-handed. She makes us swap the frocks, so now, I am the one in the fluorescent yellow marigold-y frock. At least it fit better, poor Arvind had to struggle with the maroon one now. With five minutes for the lunch break to end, people from all classes start to rush towards our room, apparently news had spread far and wide that the notorious (I was quite famously notorious) Abhay Krishna was wearing a Yellow frock. So, now me and Arvind are these ‘transvestites on exhibition’ and students ranging from kinder garden to class 10 come to pay us a visit. Man, we couldn’t even eat our lunches that day. And our wet shoes dint make matters any better…It was one of the most embarrassing days of my life, an integration of many “Most embarrassing moments”.

Ps:
To this day I am remembered as the guy who wore a frock for not having a haircut, it’s a legend in my school. The story goes “Once upon a time, there was a boy who dint care for a haircut……………”

Time for tagging – I tag the following people

PSR

Pavan

Puneet

Mohan

Satish

June

22. Priceless

A Time Sheet ( a spoof on the MasterCard ad as well :D )

Discussing and designing the project : 20 hours

Working on the project in a team of 10 : 100 hours

Getting screwed by the profs while presenting the project : 1 hour

Cursing those bastards for asking stooopid and irrelevant questions : till the weekend

The fun and fights we had working together ( getting fucked too ) – PRICELESS :D

----------------- x ---------------------- x-------------------------

There are some ways in which it screwed us, but for all the fun we hav had, I love my college .

21. An ode to School days - 1

“School days were so much fun, I wish I could go back in time” – how many times have I heard this, from the people around me and myself as well. ‘School time’ memories do have some kinda zing, some magic associated with ‘em.

It was so easy to top the class back in school. Hardly any of us gave a damn about studies in the first place, school was meant for masti, total fundoo innocent fun. Exam time, just mug up some stuff on the last day and voila, end up getting first. Things were so simple back then, I agree that there was a certain sense of competition among a few of us to get the first rank, but even if one didn’t, it was no big deal, life just went on, there was always the next test to try for the first place. There was just this one guy whose mom and dad would refuse to come collect his grade sheet if he ever got a second or third rank.


Over here in college, amidst hungry ‘text book knowledge-mongers’, I find myself at the lower end of the pack. Have no qualms about it anyway, have been bindaas about grades all my life, that aint gonna change no matter what. But the point is, with people who have just ‘text books’ and class notes for all three meals of the day, writing the same exams as you are and relative grading being employed, is there any chance of not getting ‘screwed’ !!

Back in school, I was the only guy in the top 5 who used to share all the home work assignments with others, the others dint because they had a valid reason not to. The punishment for sharing a HomeWork used to be quite severe, but I liked playing risky, the usual me ;) . Not that I never got caught, there was this one time, when I had done mistakes in my Math HW , which showed in almost half the class’s notebooks because all of ‘em had copied my stuff. The prof was distributing the books back to the students, but just about half the students got back their books. Then he announced “Those who haven’t got their books will get it tomorrow, I haven’t given them today because the cane stick I had ordered for these people hasn’t arrived as yet.”. Turned out, he had spotted the mistakes in all the books! Looking at me, he said “Now tell me who showed his book to others.” Don’t know why but I got up on my own, can never forget the thrashing that I got that day, but that didn’t stop me from sharing my home works in future. Only thing being that I spent more time doing my homework correctly, so that I never would get caught :P


Over here, it is I who is the copier, there hasn’t been a single assignment which I can say I have done totally on my own. The irony is, I haven’t been caught here till date, TouchWood!

It was so easy to get girls to notice you. The whole class could be called a microcosm in its own right, with girls’ interests the ranging from being Harry Potter fans to Bharatnatyam professionals to Missionary helpers(really respected these girls for their commitment to social work). As for the guys, it was cricket, all kinds of gully sports, junk food, video games, home food………… All one had to do was, just be good at whatever he was, he was sure to get noticed, by the right people more importantly. I used to give my own labellings to all the drawings in my text books, for instance, each organ of a cow’s body was labeled as one of the characters of ‘The Simpsons’. Mahatma Gandhi always had a lush blue wig filled with curly hair, one black eye like a pirate, with a parrot on his shoulder while Adolf Hitler had to be content with a shaved look, a G-string and a feeding bottle in his mouth. Somehow, this did strike a funny chord or two with the girls, and they promptly let me know of it too !

Now if I do something similar in college, I’ll probably get myself a ‘label’ as ‘WEIRDO’ I guess…… As it is, there are hardly any Venusians here(literally, the number is so so less) and even among them, there is hardly any femme who’d get out of her world of “books” and notice, leave alone appreciate. Moving from school to college was like moving from the lush gardens of France to the Kalahari desert in Africa. The draught, the dearth is so so acute, believe me !

I realized one post is too small for this, there’s more to come…..To be contd in the next post……

20. Brokeback Diaries

Here's stuff that happens to you when you are broke.

1.Whenever you meet anyone you know , you’ll visualize them as a big bunch of green dollar bills ( you think of dollars and not rupees coz it somehow sounds cooler – the U.S effect )

2.You become an ‘expert Scanner’, swim through all your draws for the oh-so valuable ‘chiller’ that’s left in ‘em.

3.Hair needs a wash, shampoo needed big time. So, gather all the chiller you can possibly see, go to the store only to find that you have fallen short by just one rupee, your favorite brand seems so out of reach now. Can actually see it waving you good bye from the shelves. Settle for a third rate brand which has the picture of a girl with slices of lemon and mint on her head, MAN !!! The worst part is when you open it and it starts smelling like Mango!

4.So wish the talk-time on your cell could be converted back to cash.(Wondering how the money for a phone recharge - that’s another BIG story all together)

5.Every meal of the day requires pre-planning, search for a Source or Scan for chiller :(

6.Start praying that you win one of those online lotteries, wanna try your hand at double-struck, but even that guy wont accept ‘chiller’ :P

7.Start using detergent sparingly ( ditto of Kamal Hassan in ‘Pushpak’ – soap water only for the underarm sections of the shirt )

8.Your debts with the newspaper guy reach new heights. So much so that he wants you to work under him now, throwing newspapers @ 6 AM daily.

9.Your gal wants to meet you tomorrow, is expecting a treat from you and here you are all broke, sitting on and watching a pirated CD of ‘Broke back Mountain’.

Luck seems to have deserted some of us, it’s like Ganguly’s sweet timing, existed once upon a time, is’nt visible anymore.

19. PERFECT !!!

I’m all bubbly, filled with excitement; it’s my first train journey. Get into the wagon merrily with my buddies, we settle in a cool deck close to the “pantry car”. The train begins and we’re giving high-five’s and thumbs up’s to each other (literally :P) all in a jocund mood, no one except me notices a queer looking pantry staff man spying on us from a distance. He gets a stiff stare from me, nevertheless continues to look intently at us as if his life depended on it. I get back to having fun singing and dancing ignoring that fella. After sometime, I see that guy talking to someone. WAIT a minute, I know the guy he’s talking to, that’s Donnie there! I had seen him once in the supermarket, a friend of mine who was right next to me then had told me that Donnie was a funny guy and his blogs were quite good. What is Donnie doing talking to this fellow? I see Donnie giving the guy some money, something’s wrong here. The both of them come charging towards our group. In an attempt to begin a conversation, I say “Hi Donnie!”.

He doesn’t respond, on the contrary, grabs hold of my neck, pulls me out of the huddle and yells “PERFECT!!!”.

He drags me all along the pantry car holding my neck ever so tightly all along. Why is he doing this to me? I try to break free but he’s too powerful. I want to scream but I am all choked up, no words coming out of my mouth. Why isn’t anyone helping me? Can’t they hear my cries?

After we reach the end of the wagon, he relaxes his hold on my neck. I open my mouth to shout at him when, with a sudden jolt I feel drained. Begin feeling weak, am in a daze. Hear Donnie saying - “Life’s a bitch! Why can’t I get her out of my head? I want to move on but that’ll never happen! Why, because I am screwed, that’s why. Why can’t she like me like I like her?”

Saying all this to himself, he looks at me, and before I know it, I feel even more drained. Have no strength left to speak. What’s he doing to me? Never felt so weak and weightless all my life! Donnie grabs my neck tightly, screams “Fuck YOU !!” and pushes me off the train! Here I lie, wounded in the bushes along side the track.

Who am I ? I am your regular MIRINDA 500 ml Pet jar :)

18. Rape me ?

One of the very many senseless discussions among hostel-ites.

Me : Heard the song "Rape Me" by Nirvana.

Phani : Nopes

Me : Rape me....Rape me my friend...Rape me...Rape me again.........

Phani : wats the deal with rape and drape?

Me : Drape ????

Phani : Dint u sing - Rape me...Drape me my friend ....

Me : No, how weird is that. Ask your friend to rape and then drape you as well.

Phani : Yeah right, as if just asking your friend to rape you is totally normal.

Me : I never said that.

Phani : Go suck a lemon

Phani : Rape me again....who'd want to get raped again baap?

Me : Arent we getting raped. Each semster, a whole new set of professors, but the same old gang-rape.

Phani : Seriously baap, i am getting tired of all this.

Me : They should put up a sign outside colleges during counselling sessions : "Beware! Rape inevitable ! Be PREPARED !!! "

Phani : No wonder, why all of us have plans to be re-incarnated Phoolan Devi's and Deva's once we pass out.

16. Veteran Blogger

Was just wondering, how does one become a veteran blogger? What does it take to earn this prestigious title? ;) The other day, a friend of mine commented on my comment on a supposedly ‘veteran’ blogger. Does it have to do with the length of the time span for which one has been posting? Does it have to do with the number of posts one makes. Or does it have to do with the quality of the posts a chap/chapess (LOLZ , coined this just now) writes ? Or is it something unanimously agreed on, a dogmatic reality ?
The word veteran generally refers to the length of the posting time span, related to ‘experience’, but it doesn’t somehow fit in with blogging. Who is experienced and who isn’t ? how does one make this difference ?

15. Result : FAILED !!!!

Here ‘s the deal. The girl you like, so much so that you spent sleepless nights over preparing lines to say to her whenever you meet her the next time. No, these lines are not the special proposal lines or the cuddly wuddly flirty lines, but the absolutely normal non-reasoning-conversation-builder lines, because you stutter and your mind goes blank when you see her. Writing stuff down and memorizing them, just so that when you meet her next, you make the conversation worthwhile, because you hardly get to meet her c/o your hectic schedule. Never did you prepare so much even for the toughest of your examinations, you may never have encountered exam fear, but this is nothing like that. The “damsel in front - inability to yap” syndrome is not so uncommon, but the way you handle it is like the most peculiar way in which it will ever be handled :P . You like her beyond reason, want to see her smile, want her to give you some attention and all the exam preparation is in view of passing this “All Clear Test”. The test is called so, because if you pass the test, you are given the “all clear” signal to fly in the skies of infinite bliss and happiness, unaware of anything else going on with the world.

But this test is far more complicated than you think it is. Any exam will have a certain timing, a fixed paper pattern, previous year’s papers (they are a BIG help ;) ) but here, there’s no clue as to when the test will start, you can call it a POP-test, coz the ‘femme fatale’ can POP up right in front of you at any moment. Forget about the fixed paper pattern, as for the previous year’s papers, haven’t found others who have written this test before (earnestly hope someone who reads this actually has taken it , plzzzzzz ).

So, you sleep at day break, wake up at sunset , have a headache coz of the irregular and excess sleep, rush to the mess to get some coffee to clear all the clogs in the head. You pay for the coffee at the counter, take the cup of hot brew-aroma spewing Nescafe and turn around to see HER. She’s right in front, so close in fact that you start shivering. A sip from the Styrofoam cup would have helped to calm the nerves a little, but she gives you no time.

She : What do I do to get my passport made? I want to write GRE in September, what all should I do to get my passport made?

You : uhhh…..hmmmm…..a passport ? hmmmm….uhhhh

She : jaldi bathao naaa…..

You keep scratching your head, trying to search for answers which don’t seem to come out, coz no part of the brain is working. You try to think of the various memorized lines and see whether any one fits the bill in this situation, but you get bowled. There’s no solution.

And then you blurt out – India ke bahaar jaana khai kya ?

She : Obviously, what an answer. Now tell me will you help me in getting my PP made?

You : I …..I…..I……don’t know anything about it…….ummmmm, I….I….may not be of much help……..u know……….

In the meantime, a friend of yours and hers comes by, he’s the guy with all the answers always. She catches hold of him and tells him about the PP issue.

The Friend : I am getting late to a meeting, but if you are ready to walk along with me uptil there, I can tell you the whole thingy in a precise and concise fashion. (What a loser, who talks like this.You are bloody angry with him, but as usual, stay silent)

She : Chalo, I have no other work anyway, will walk along with you. ‘Choooo chweet’ of you to help me. come lets go, you’ll get late otherwise. ( Damn, you hate it so much when someone else gets that kinda mushy praise, so wish it were you who'd be gettin that)

You : ummm…..uhhh………bye……… (did she even hear this ? )

And there you are, all cold, be it the coffee, or the mind, all gone numb. There she goes away again, leaving you pondering over what is it that should happen to make things work…..as usual, nothing comes to mind, you order another coffee and say “Life goes on”…………..

Hal ticket Number - IC – 302
POP-test no : 1038
Result : FAILED – This student should be put under probation and a special award has to be given to him because his outstanding score has been recorded in the “All time lowest scorers Hall of Fame”.

13. Heart shaped Wonders

Love is in the air kathey! Hmmm, yeah it really is. Me and Phani, wanted a change and went to the bakery for dinner (they've got chaat too, yummy) and saw the highlight ITEM there. Heart-shaped mini cakes, ek dum mast looking, too tempting to resist, just big enough for two ppl, serving the couples (can call them couple cakes too actually). They were so tempting , i just wanted to have them, ditto with phani. We reach the counter, look at the cakes(the big heart had little cherry colored hearts on it, looked so tasty) look at each others faces , step back from the counter and stare at the cake from a distance.

Me - Shall we buy it?

Phani - what?? no way dude

Me - arey it's lookin too tasty bey (i know i may sound crazy , but a mere look at food makes it tasty for me :) )

Phani - It's only for couples bey, we are outcastes in this bakery,we are only supposed to stare at such beauties (the cakes and otherwise too :P).

Me - yeah, as the guy in Hyderabad Blues says "You can see, but you cannot touch :)"

Phani - bloody, see that guy with the cute girl, ya the fat guy , with the spectacles whoz totally gettin bald..........how in the world do they get gals baap, tell me, aint i smarter than him

Me - why even compare, if you're John Travolta, then he is Johnny lever ....hahahaha

Phani - but then, how does this happen, every 14th we end up talking with abt the same ppl, the same stuff, over and over? Isnt there an answer? am I ever gonna get a girl :(

Me - arey i want to buy that cake, i want to eat it right away.

Phani - you mad or what, the shopkeeper will think we're GB's (gay bastards...this is strictly copyrighted college lingo :P )

Me - let the shopkeeper think anything he wants, hunger comes before gender , i'd rather look gay and live than look straight and die of hunger.

Phani - OOk, do watever pleases you, i too dont mind sharing it with you, lets eat with the same spoon too, attract attention , what say? ;)

Me - You are hopelessly single, only such a mind in need can churn out ideas like these :P Chal, lets pack the cake, eat it in the gully outside, in the dark alley behind the bushes ...hahahaha

Phani - You sick fuck, buy the damn thing and lets leave.

Me - Fuck you Bitch, I'll go and get it...my tummy is callin for the cake "Oh meri munni cake, main aa gaya, tere liye bahaar leekar " :)


ps: All outcastes on valentine's should have a special bakery to go to, where there'll be half-hearted cakes (both in shape and effort). may be some outcastes (of the opposite sex, not stressin on it though :P) may get to talk to each other back into the game from such novel joints ...wat say... i am sayin this bcoz ppl like me 'n phani need these novel joints, coz anything happenin for real without a miracle seems to be unimaginable :(

12. The Missy behind

Chris, the hunk on his way to the dungeon people call a lecture hall, realizes he's late. Enters in through the back door,sits on a squeaky bench which attracts undue attention."Why me, why do i always get the squeaky ones?" , he wonders. As usual, he isn’t able to make head or tail of the lecture, seems LOST. He tries to stay awake with all the strength left in him.Looks at his watch, scratches his head, gives his neck some workout, stretches his legs, sends his friend an SMS and looks at his watch again only to find that one ONE single minute has passed since the last time he’d seen it. The professor seems to go on and on endlessly, Chris is clinging on to dear life, trying to stay awake and come through this ordeal Alive!

Then suddenly he gets a reason to stay awake - A girl sitting just behind him, in the next row, coughs. He’s got a mission now, to find out “Who’s that girl ?”. Thinks for while, cant turn right back as it would make him look silly, so realizes that he needs to accomplish the task with the limited neck-rotation range. Time’s not a problem, it never is when you are in a lecture hall, coz the clock just stops ticking :) Now starts to think of ways, gets very weird ideas. Takes his left wrist (he sports a watch on his left hand) close to his face and starts tilting it in such a way that the reflection of the glass frame zeroes in on her. But does take care that he doesn’t make his viewing efforts obvious to the girl behind. The watch rotation strategy works, but only partially, the IMAGE is’nt clear, it’s all blurry. All he could make out of it was that it was a fair female with long hair….."hmmm, that reduces the list of suspects ;)" he thinks, that’s coz many of the gals in his class are of the bob cut/mushroom cut variety.

Ponders for a while , hears her cough again, so is even more eager to solve the mystery, listens to the prof for a while (courtesy sake) as he is still on the lookout for a way. Sees the guy in front has a pair of sunglasses (the reflective kind) in his bag. Do anything to stay awake and not listen to the lecture ,that was his motto. He takes the glasses out, and thinks “aah, this will do the trick, these shades will gimme a picture of the princess sitting behind…”. So engrossed is he in his musings that he doesn’t notice the professor standing next to him all this while.

Prof : GET UP !!

(Chris does slowly , with the squeaking chair making his rise even more dramatic :P)

Prof: What are you trying to do?

Chris thinks “Should I tell him? He’ll commit suicide if he knows the scant attention I am paying to his lecture, being busy on a girl quest instead, I’ll remain silent”.

Prof : Please leave the class.

Chris bends to take his books, then turns around to leave from the back door. Manages to steal a glance at the female behind, whom he was trying to figure out for all this while. Turns out that it was Reggie….Oh so beautiful Reggie! He had a liking from the time he had joined college. Gets a big smile from her and walks out like a victorious warrior :) “Mission accomplished and done with the lecture too!” he muses as he walks out. What made it still magical was the killer smile she gave passes at him in the end. Begins to wonder “ May be she did notice all my efforts, may be she does want me to notice her…Naah! Be the pessimist you are, just stay away, you cant take girls! …. But that one smile has made my day”.

Footnote :
Remembered this SMS that I got off late.

Barkha Dutt(the NDTV interviewer) ask some boys,

Q. What do you guys do to get a girl’s attention?
Ans: We have to ride bikes, learn to play the guitar and drums, get our hair streaked, get muscular going to gyms, follow them like dogs….Damn , the list is too long, and embarrassing too :P.

She asks a group of girls ,
Q; What do you girls do to get a guy’s attention?
Ans: Just smile once and he’s all yours :)

11. Attention!!! - What the heck

“Attention !” – “I’ll do anything man, I am even ready to shout ‘Attention!’ like a military general, just to make her look at me, because once I get the look naa, I can work my way through with my charm”, says my friend. I say, “ Arey, there’s your cute school friend at the other end of the hall, who’s constantly trying to get your attention, and you are totally ignoring her”, to which he says “no dude, she’s not the, u know, girl friend type. She isn’t demanding, high handed, flirtatious which are total turn on’s for me. She too easily agrees to what I have to say and hardly asks for anything, giving me the impression that she doesn’t want to be anything more than a friend.”

How often does this not happen, the person you want to talk to isn’t as eager to listen to you, as is a person, whom you aren’t so eagerly interested to listen to, yourself. The wretched irony of life, or can it be thought of as a guiding light? Don’t you hear people saying, “What goes around comes around”, or is this just a myth. Lets just not confine the issue to talking, lets take it a step further by saying that the interest you show in a person, the effort you put or want to put to get that person’s attention does not get the kind of reciprocation or response you would like to get.

When it comes to love, a good friend of mine says, “I just cant understand the concept of adjustment in love. People say, why go searching for love when there are people you know who are ready give you love? How can you adjust and compromise in matters of love?”. I’d say a better word for it would be “contentment”, but that’s a secondary thing. If you are in love with someone who isn’t interested even the slightest bit in you, then what does one do? Reassess whether is it really love or is it just infatuation packaged in a glittery wrapper ? Or Continue to be in love without letting the ‘person’ know of it? What if there is another person in love with you already :o ? Or Stay contented saying, this wasn’t meant to be, so let me search for other open roads? Another friend of mine says, “Adjustment is a part of life dude, u have to adjust yourself according to the circumstances and situations”, but that’s a separate issue all together.

We so desperately try to get that someone’s attention, we’ll try every trick in the book, every potion and spell that we know just to get noticed by the right person. And invariably what happens is that it’s everyone else other than that someone, who end up noticing you. And the same holds true for people trying to get your attention as well, you are so busy trying to get someone else’s attention that you don’t pay attention to the efforts made to get your attention. Sounds clichéd, twisted, but that’s the way it is.

I have got so vexed looking at how this “vicious circle” gets formed everywhere, that I’ve stopped consciously from making efforts to be noticeable, even accidentally. Have resigned from the “Attention-mongers” department, have adopted the “if I have to get noticed by someone, it will happen eventually, no point in trying consciously to draw attention.”. have begun paying Attention to every possible attempt made to make me feel better or happier and it is giving me a lot more satisfaction coz I can see the happiness in people’s face when they get the desired reciprocation for their tries.

But then again, the chirpy child within me gets outta control now and then and gets back to trying to impress upon people and get me noticed. There’s this conflict which crops up every now and then , but finally practicality wins(I hate it to win, but it ultimately does) and I am back to being what I have always been, a poor “Attention - gatherer”.

8. Should I, should'nt I ....Sleep

They came, they taught, we slept ……this is the story of every engineering student(may be every student even). “Hall sleepers”(of the lecture hall) is a new generation of people, a new race with an attitude, still in it’s evolving stages. Will come back to this later.

Have encountered so many profs over the 6 semesters, there’s one common element in all of ‘em. That being, their incapability to understand a student’s reluctance to voice his/her questions in a huge classroom!! Come on man, these people have done such superb specializations, done double-triple PhD’s , earned god knows how many gold medals, but cant figure out this one basic thing! We (students of my college) are all habituated to sitting in a normal classroom (one of max strength 60) all our lives. Even there it’s only after a lot of hesitation did I manage to call a lecturer and get a question answered. Here, it’s a lecture hall, a class with 300 capacity, with about 200 people sitting!

The professor, like stands on the podium, 50 feet away from the nearest row of students, speaks into a mike and uses a huge slide projector and all sorts of gadgets to substitute a basic chalk + blackboard combination. How is this different from, say , a distance learning program, or an online education program? Even there you get to see a screen with slides from a power-point file and the interaction is one way. I am comparing it with distance learning also , because many studs ( I am one of them ;) ) aint accustomed even now to this environment and end up sleeping through most of these lectures. Now sleepers come in 2 baskets themselves, one group of sleepers are the ones who don’t care going to the lecture hall and sleep in their rooms, while the other group care enough to come to the Lecture hall but have a good nap there. In fact, distance learning is still better, don’t have to go through this drudgery of “only physically” attending these lectures while being “mentally snore-driven”. Then there is this guilt feeling that crops up every now and then.

Rahul - Arey, we should not sleep in our rooms during lectures man, we should try to atleast attend lectures.

Me – What’s the use bey, u’ll go and sleep there too.

Rahul – But that gives a different, some sort of a satisfying feel dude, we can say that we atleast tried. Atleast get to see girls naa. i know whom you look at all the while....You Chupa rustham, bastard!!!

Me –yeah right! but she's like always first row baap, hard to catch a glimpse of hers from the last benches sadly :( Anyway, see the practicality behind it, at least you get to sleep in the cosy blanket in your room, you need to crouch, bend and sleep at awkward angles over there …. Hahaha

Rahul –The profs are always armed with those sleep missiles in their tongues baap. The minute they start talking, we all fall down immediately..lol

Me- It’s more like a lullaby, the moment you hear it, it takes over you and closes your eyes for you. These people can be great hypnotists man…..or they can even offer Sleep-therapy.

Rahul- Ya, that will be great. We’ll open a new health service, caption “For all the sleepless people of India…Come, welcome into the world of Signals, Probability and Microelectronics….we have experts from all over the country, gold medalists…If you don’t fall asleep in 5 minutes, we’ll give you back your money.(by the time you wake up , we’ll be off with your money …LOLZ) ”.

Very few professors even care or give a thought to the student’s inhibitions to raise his/her voice in a classroom. A better communication mechanism between the prof and the students will certainly improve the student’s learnability and throughput of the system as a whole. Till a solution to this problem is found, you’ll find lecture halls filled with sleepers and girl – gazers like me ;)

7. A Little less conversation :)

Here’s the scene, 3 guys (we are BTech students), Me tarak and srikanth goin out to get ourselves cell phone SIM cards. We move out of the hostel to the auto stand nearby, one of the auto drivers comes up and asks “kidhar?”. We say sector – 11. The guy, first shouts something in gujarati to all the other drivers in the stand, then says 30 bucks no less. None of them will agree to take us for 20 now, whereas it actually costs even lesser than that. Fuming, at the first TOPI we are made to wear for the day, we hop in. The auto starts

Tarak - Bloody fellows, it’s a monopoly they run, they know we are helpless, cant go anywhere else for autos (our college being in a semi-jungle doesn’t help).
Me - Once we pass out of here lets start an auto business, make a new stand, with 10 brand new autos….caption will be “ faster than a Ferrari, cheaper than a Maruti"
Srikanth (gonna call him Sri frm now on) – Arey seriously baap, if i don’t get placed this May, then my parents are gonna kill me. i haven’t prepared for any competitives, my score is way below Danger Line…
Me – No probs bey, our auto master plan will succeed u see….
Sri – Stfu.
Tarak- guys guys, lets talk crap, we do it the best. After 3 years in college, the best thing that has happened to us is, the fact that we can talk loads and loads of non sense and make people listen to it as well. It’s a refined art u know !
Me – ekdum right. We have discussed on so many issues, below the belt ones, above the thigh ones ;), extremely volatile ones too, not to forget.

Then we see a few girls (some cute some not) walking on the footpath.

Sri - Gujju girls have no dress sense.
Tarak – tht is ok, our AP girls have no sense at all.
Me – hahaha….look at that female, wearing Pink…..GAWD… I hate pink
Tarak – My dad bought me a Pink T with hearts all over it, I told him “ dad never ever buy me anything tht is even close to pink , leave alone hearts.”
Me – he’s from Old school naa, will take time to understand why pink sucks. Did u know purple is a gay colour ?
Sri – really ! how ? when ? where ?
Tarak - :o wow, this is news
Me – It’s not some flash news tht has cropped up all of a sudden, it’s been there for years. In Spain I believe, if u wear a purple T and walk around, guys are gonna come and flirt with u…what a situation that would make right
Sri – I mean, here we are, conservative Indian guys, very conscious of ourselves, being chased by guys in a country where it’s all legalized, so cant even goto the cops :)
Me – I tell u, this colour choice fiasco will never end….all colours will gradually be taken by some new category of ppl (I meant a category with a newer and more weirder sexual inclination than all the existing ones right now..not being racist baap..spare me tht crap)
Tarak – ya, tomorrow , u will get up and realize,all we can wear is the silver coloured suits which we see aliens wearing in futuristic movies.

Sri – don’t u think all possibilities have been exhausted already, I mean there are just 2 genders, and so total possibilities that arise are 3 right….there cant be any more I guess…what a discussion we are having !!! this should be recorded (they dunno tht I am recording it, mentally)
Me – U never know, there may come a day when all homos who support arranged homosexual marriages will form a group….say the arra-homo group( in tamil arra means half btw) and say all people supporting it must sport Yellow !!! There u go, Yellow goes out of our clothes colour dictionary then, doesn’t it !
Tarak – So many of the top German people were gay, Hitler, wagner (a musician..mozart types) ….The ‘swastika’ – or the Mother cult which hitler started has its roots in homosexuality. The strength and will they get from male to male attraction is what they use to make their race superior, is what the swastika group is all about.
Sri – Don’t know anything bey, tomorrow we may become gay ourselves, if we don’t find good gals now.
Me –arey its better to be nono–sexual than homo-sexual baap, seriously.
Tarak – Just over heard a guy telling his girl, “why do u want that one, it’s so expensive ! ” to which she says “all my friends have it so I want it , that’s it !”
Me – demanding gals, ever ready to give guys….that is the story of an Indian pair 
Sri – antha ledu, have seen girls take the lead and pay the money in many cases.
Me – This is news, not happened to me till date ;)
Tarak – as if u have a girl…we are all the “not looked at” crowd dude. We are a part of the GGTP group (Good guys but Too polite) Good guys who are too polite and non-interfering types, so cant approach and talk to girls!
Me – And simple funda, as long as we don’t talk to them, they wont know we are interested, so they wont talk…..giving rise to the ever increasing phenomenon of “one side Love OSL”.
Sri- the movie “arya’ tries to give a good color to this OSL, but in reality it’s really the most frustrating and ‘cant do anything’ type condition really.

IF u liked this conversation, I will update it further, with more interesting stuff. The auto can go on and on u know, with us discussing stuff inside….plz keep my auto running.

6. Confession

The wise men say,it is always better to tell the truth. When you are hiding a certain something from a person (can be for various reasons) , it is said that telling the Truth will unburden you , give you peace of mind. The very reason you may be hiding a secret ( a bad phrase ! ) is because of the feeling of uneasiness and the uncertainty with which the other person would respond upon revealing the secret. Mind you, I reiterate that the reasons behind keeping a secret are best known only to you, so you are the best judge of the situation and no one is in a better position than you to take the decision. Doesn’t matter what the wise men say, you need to have the power to keep or reveal a secret after weighing the pros and cons of it and also primarily after you have evaluated whether the other person will be able to handle it or not.

As Jack Nicholson says in the courtroom during the movie “A few Good men” - “You want the Truth, You cant HANDLE the Truth !!!” Now here is a big time issue, how can you make a decision for someone else ? Is it alright to decide for another person without letting him/her know ? One may say that it depends on the kind of secret , the circumstances and the current situation. That is precisely the point right !! Taking all these factors into account (or a few of ‘em , whichever is relevant ) , it is you who get to do what feels right. There may be a cloud of uncertainty around, getting it cleared will be a major task. Talking to people whom you confide in helps, but it’s only through retrospection that you can have a satisfying answer. Think, re-think about it till a rational conclusion is arrived at.

Some secrets are taken to the grave. WHY ? If people always confessed and told their secrets out loud , the world would not be the way it is today. If Bush says “ I want a lot of OIL, those Iraqi bastards aint givin it to me , so I’ll fuck them and yank every drop of OIL outta their balls !” , think of what will happen……I cant even imagine . But this is an open secret. There are secrets which remain in the back of our heads, they do come to the fore front once in a while, we think it out, give our heads a little strain and decide its best it remains a secret and push it back to where it came from.

Actually me calling it secret is in itself not doing justice to the topic I am writing about. It would be better if I would call it “Concealment of Impactable Knowledge” . Because the word “secret” gives you a pre conceived notion which is already in our heads c/o films and TV…..It has a certain negativity, an element of unpleasantness attached to it.

5. Free Style

Does the almighty stop the rotation of the earth for a while ? Or is it just me...Why is it that the one hour CA (comp. Algorithms) class seems to last until eternity!!!!

Just before an exam, we scamper around learning this and that and how we wish that we had that extra minute or two. We always think of the wonders culd hav done with those minutes.....:)
The thing we need to note is, that the lack of attention towards the activity we are pursuing gives a notion of an increased time span. We feel there's more time at hand when we dont do the work witha level of concentration and dedication. After having read millions of logically derived mathematical propositions, you can have a chuckle at this axiom that i am gonna propose.

{Attentivity + Purposefulness + Dedication }
proportional to
{ 1 / (Time left to pursue the purpose}

The classic example I'd like to give is what my friend used to say when we got bored during the drab lectures " Paanch(5) minute se watch dekhroon, Do(2) minute hi hua kya rey bhai ".........

There will always be exceptions to this seemingly weird statement,but try to think why an exception becomes one and the truth comes out, the law applies even there, in an indirect fashion :P