Maybe I should shut up

Its been a long time, almost four months since my last post! A mistake on my part, certainly. But I'm just human, why should I take the blame. Its the complete fault of Karnataka Power Corporation Limited, with some inputs from Microsoft, some inputs from Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited and Mozilla Firefox, and some more inputs from my inverter manufacturer :P

I would say so, but then I remember what this is all about. Growing up! Well, not a sense of what in you'd generally expect when someone talks about growing up. No, I'm not talking about the wonderful memories of childhood, the sheer delight and light-headedness of that era gone by, the coming of age of a junior homo-sapien and so on...

That, we all unanimously agree was unforgettable. The past. The glorious past. But here I am, referring to an entirely different form of growing up. The growning up of school going tube-lights to college going citizens, of unmannered, uncivilised youngsters to educated, informed youth.

The first thought that comes to my mind when I think about a University, an engineering college, is... hmmm... Friends? probably. Girls? you bet ;) Messing around with the teachers?more likely than not. But what is it that I really think about when it comes to a University? Innovation. And what is it that is important for innovation? Character.

And here is where I was in for a rude shock. I've been to a dozen colleges a Bangalore. And a couple of nationally reputed colleges. They have the students. They have the brains. They have the resources. Everything that one will ever need to make it large. But where is the innovation? India has almost half a million engineers passing out of engineering colleges each year. Go open a newspaper. Any newspaper. And scan through all the copies of the past one year. How many of innovative ideas did you see coming out of Indian colleges? Ten? Twenty? Alright, at most fifty or lets take it as a hundred. So two million engineering students (Half a million x four semesters = two million students studying engineering at any given point in time) are giving us just about hundred innovative ideas an year.

Why? Just another why you may say. But an answer is not what I ask for. I want response. Maybe this medium isn't really going to make headways on national television. But does that really matter? No. I'm just putting forward, what I think, one semester into my engineering, is the main reason for this lack of innovation.

It is, quite frankly, the ideology of the students, the character of the students.
"Oh! You wanna go to a *TECHNOFEST*! You freaking geek! College is not where you waste time on weird technical festivals! Go out there and enjoy life, go booze man! Who wants to waste time making stupid projects?"
"Whaaat?! *TECHNOFEST*?? We've got exams next month man! I've still got three units remaining! Who wants to waste time making stupid projects?"
And this is not exactly what the problem is. People think studies and fun don't mix.
Guys who slog all night and top (sometimes flunk!) the exams on sheer theoretical knowledge find technical innovation a waste of time, a form of "fun" and "time waste".
And guys who booze all night and may score lower than the sloggers (and sometimes top!), again find technical innovation a waste of time, but this time, as a form of "geekiness" and too much "hardwork".
Its just two sides of the same coin, where neither heads nor tails works to our profit as a nation. Only the select few, neither heads nor tails, where the coin stands upright on its edge, are the ones who contemplate innovation.

So what stand am I taking? All I am putting forward is that we have to stop competing for life and death within ourselves. There is an entire world out there. And we are the representatives of our nation! The second most populous nation in the world has no indigenously built fighter aircraft, express train (India - 150kmph say, World - 500kmph +), super car, ultra tall skyscraper, in short, any indigenous engineering marvel. How is that possible?
Well, we do have weirdo governments hit by multi-crore scams, widespread corruption, spending crores on statues and fulfilling personal whims. Hmmm, so very advantageous to the advancement of the country!
But just blaming the government will not take the blame off us and give us a clean chit.
We need a demanding education system, with non-volatile funds, whose utility is at the sole discretion of universities.
And universities which promote innovation rather than GPAs and marks.
And companies that hire people based on not just their marks, but overall capabilities.
And organisations that have scope for widespread research and development.
Where creating an engineering marvel is not a once-in-a-blue-moon affair, but a daily way of life.
That is what I envisage for India.


Maybe you're wondering if I'm prodding dangerously close to the Aamir Khan-3 Idiots message or the Chetan Bhagat book and columns. And with due respect to these gentlemen, all I can ask of you is -Grow up! You ain't in school no more!

The nation awaits you!

Bring about the revolution!

I live in India. And I love my India. But that doesn't in any way mean that I'm a good cricketer does it?


I was playing cricket (forced into playing, rather!) the other day and its common for people, especially if they're Indian, to "assume" that any person on earth can do at least one thing- no, not write or read- at least one thing means either bat or bowl.
The question was thrown at me. "A little bit of both", I lied blatantly, I didn't have a choice, did I? So the teams were split and our team won the toss. "BATTING" they all voted unanimously!! There certainly is some undefinable force in all these people that batting is the "royal" thing to do. If you win the toss, you bat. If you chose otherwise, either you're a moron, or a cricketer with no knowledge (which once again goes back to moron).
The two experienced batsmen in our side opened the batting and scored some runs (extremely valuable runs for our team!!) After the fall of a couple of wickets, I was called upon. Oh! Not agaaaaaaain! The ball, a small round spherical solid with an even surface, thrown at a high speed towards my humble bat by a bowler after running a quarter of a mile. How I wished it would just touch my bat and race away to the boundary!! Or better still, it would miss me entirely, go behind my back and reach the boundary!! My team would earn five runs, without me having to face that scary thing. But you cant be that lucky.I missed a couple of balls, touched one of them which went to a fielder at deep backward point and I was picked up a single. What ecstasy!! I scored a run!!
This went on for a while, I scored at a rate shameful to even a five day match, with lots of protests from team members behind me. The innings came to an end five overs later, an over after I had gotten out for a humiliating nine runs of nineteen balls, caught behind by the keeper. With a modest total at our hands to defend (...thank God they had only one "me" or we wouldn't have scored a thing!), with lots of enthusiasm, my team took the field. The match went on, with me fielding at extra cover and not a lot many balls coming my way. I misfielded once, and because the guy at long off was standing way too straight, the ball raced along the ground to the boundary. What an insult - X-(.
Anyway, I did take a catch of the guy who had hit that four in the next over to make up for things lost. The captain risked handing me the ball for the second last over, with the opponents needing thirteen runs off twelve balls and four wickets in hand. I bowled my humble slow balls which dont even spin much, and this is what happened -

1. WIDE (required 12 off 12)
2. WIDE (required 11 off 12) and lots of screams from the fielders!!
3. Good ball finally...played to midwicket and no runs taken (11 off 11)
4. Slightly outside off-stump... ball beats the bat... wippeee (11 off 10)
5. Little more room outside off-stump... squarely driven to the boundary for four (7 off 9) How much they shouted..darn!
6. Straight ball at middle stump lifted up high...very high...long on making no mistake in taking the catch...AND I PICKED UP A WICKET!!! (7 off 8)
7. New batsman in...OVERSTEPPING...defends it back to me (6 off 8)
   
8. And now the ball which really decided the match... over the wicket, little short, heading towards middle stump...ball is lofted..."SOMEONE PLEASE CATCH IT" I scream!!! But how could they?!?! SIX RUNS over deep midwicket.
   

We lost the match, I was the hero of this one (for the opponents that is) and now there are more people who know how good I am at cricket!!


But here's what's wrong, why I am so vehemently unable to get things straight in cricket...Its not that I don't like cricket, I love it...I love watching the sport - Tendulkar stroking, Dravid defending, Zaheer swinging, Ishant bouncing, Irfan swerving, Yuvraj ransacking, Dhoni savouring, Sreesanth dancing - but when it comes to playing it, I have entirely no horizontal/ vertical/ diagonal judgment of a small ball that bounces off the ground, hits a wooden stick and goes flying into space!! I mean, heck, I see a small ball coming towards me and all that goes through my mind is - "Fly away ball, don't come close to me!!". If I'm bowling, my hand seems to disobey everything my brain asks it to do!! I don't know if its a paralactic error in my judjement of moving objects or just a lack of skill that the sport possibly requires. I am not allergic to balls, thats for certain. I mean, I don't see a football the way I see a cricket ball and hence, a performance many times better is awarded. The same applies for the small table-tennis ball, which obeys my orders! But a cricket ball, he is anti-me, he is bad, he is naughty and disobeying, he is not an ideal ball X-( !! Well, it is true that we all cannot be a King of all trades, and maybe playing cricket isn't my trade.


But yes, I am looking forward to the Champions Trophy to watch some good quality cricketing action from the Gold mines of South Africa!! And hope no one tosses the ball towards me to celebrate a victory or express anger over a defeat. But if it does happen, I will take to the field again to see if something has changed, if my cricketing skills are better, if some "tooth fairy" has blessed me with a gift of cricketing. Until then, its a wait! But one thing is for sure... right now, the cricket ball is certainly not in my court!!!

Goatee, Chai, Punk n I had no better job this other day and set out to check out prospective colleges to "groom our brilliant, made for engineering minds".

But then, we had just passed our 12th standards and were full of energy (yeah right, it was more of joblessness). So we set out on this journey to visit about four-five of Bangalore's finest colleges. And it wouldn't be an understatement if I were to say it is now among the most cherished days of my life!!

Now, we met somewhere near MSRIT, me the first to arrive, as always, followed by Punk and Goatee and Chai.

• Punk's brainchild (and our first mistake) : Lets walk to MSRIT

So there we did it, walked 2kms odd to get to the college. We checked out the college, went through the floors over and over, only to discover we were in the wrong block, went to other blocks, and blah blah blah. Not quite an interesting thing to do, interviewing people about their colleges, they all seem to "Number One-ify" it in unison!!
Oh, and did I tell you, we met at 9am and exited MSR at about quarter past eleven.

Our next destination was chalked out to be Bangalore Institute of Technology (heck, its got some name, but I'll just stick to BIT).
We took the trustworthy BMTC (which was most un-trustworthy towards the end of this account!!) to Market Bus Station and well, Goatee left us for some personal commitments to join us later after we were done with BIT.
But before that, a special mention of the roadside mutton kebabs we had in a dinghy place near the bus stand (Goatee's brainchild!!). And take my word for it, it was marvellous!!
So here it was that Punk, Chai and I left for BIT.

• Punk's brainchild again (and our second mistake) : Lets "walk" to BIT

We still had our energies intact, so another 3kms of walk (that's cause the 1.5km odd distance was doubled in our confusions about directions!!) did not really matter at that time.
Now frankly, BIT isn't a very astounding structure, eight floors of bricks, stairs and elevators which do not work. But then, its a great place to study (or so I have heard) and so came...

• My brainchild (our third mistake) : Lets check out all eight storeys

So with just our legs to carry us around now (poor things had no chance of rest), we did about five floors, when we gave up and retreated to the ground!! Thirsty and tired, the three weary travellers were unsuccessful in finding any "Elixir of Life"!! The time, I suppose, would have been about half past noon by now.

Hoping our next destination would be more worthwhile, we headed out to BMSCE, and this time, thanks to Chai stopping another one of "Punk's" from coming up, we took an auto there. Goatee joined us there by half past one, before which the other three of us had scrutinised this college in and out. Another stint of blah blah blah in there and we were conked out of energy. After a round of lemonade (man it was heavy on our pockets!!) we went ahead to our next destination, but wait, not before another mistake!! After asking for directions, we were hit by...

• Goatee's brainchild (yeah, our fourth mistake) : Lets walk to the bus-stop

Are we insane or what, but money does matter dude, when its all pocket money keenly saved!! So we walked, and we walked, (stopped for a softee) and we walked more. Arriving at a bus-stop with 600mL of coke just purchased, we sat down like tired warriors. But destinations aren't that easy to reach, are they. Fifteen minutes later, our tube lights were to burn, and hey will you believe it, we're at the wrong bus-stop. Oh Gosh, can anything go more wrong?? Another half a km and we were at the right bus-stop (which was guilty of being the wrong one until proven innocent :P ) and some time later, amidst slight drizzles, we were in a bus to Banshankari Bus Station. About half past two, or maybe three, we were there. Yes, we had finally reached Banshankari.

But, picture abhi baaki hai mere dost!!

Yeah, if you haven't guess as yet, the next college to be checked off our list was PESIT (or so it was supposed to be!!). A couple of inquiries posed to an eager auto-driver (whose curse turned out to be one of an Egyptian Mummy for us, for we didn't heed to him) told us that PESIT was roughly 6kms from the place. Thank goodness, Punk cannot hit us with another one. But our decision to save money (we each had daily passes and hence buses were our passport to savings!!) gave us in, as here came...

• Our combined brainchild (And by far the BIGGEST mistake of the day, number five for the record) : Lets take a bus to PESIT

It doesn't sound a big deal, does it!! We walked around the bus-stop a little, and asked this bus conductor (a Suvarna 600-C) if it went to PES college. He consulted the driver and answered in the affirmative. Glad, we entered this completely empty bus. Engrossed in our talk, little did we realise what was happening. After a ten minute wait in traffic, the bus set off on the Jayanagar Ring Road. We were virgins in the area and had no idea about the direction we were supposed to be headed in (yeah, we hadn't done any homework about our plans!!). Expecting a six kilometre journey on a great road to last no more than 10 minutes, we were in for a shock. After travelling for some considerable distance, we asked the conductor how much more were we to go on, and we were told that he'll let us know once PES college is reached. We were soon on Hosur Road, when I told the guys we weren't on the right track, but then we were hit by...

• Their brainchild (Mistake number six, and I did not like the feel of it) : The conductor knows where he's taking us, lets continue in the bus.

So there we went, on and on and on, in the pretty serenity around the road with the emphatic flyover bang in the middle running along. After at least 30-40 minutes of travel, watching luxury car showrooms go by, the conductor came up to us and asked us to get off, our stop had arrived. The sight on getting off, well, shocked us!!! We were at the edge of Electronic City, about a 100mtrs before the NICE flyover (seriously, that's what its called, "NICE flyover", weirdos!!). And there stood, PES college.

Yes, it was PES college alright, but not in the least where we intended to be. PES School of Enginnering, a great structure in the middle of nowhere. Punk broke into laughter, all of us joining in, making fun of our mistakes, tired like we've never been tired before, and losing all hope of actually making it to the real PES Institute of Technology that we were supposed to go to. And amidst all their whims of giving up and going back home, time was about 4pm, with rain clouds hovering over, I came up with...

• My brainchild (Unbelievable, but I dunno if this is a mistake or not, yet I name it, Mistake Number Seven) : I'm not going back home before I am done with PESIT.

Taking cue, the Four Fools set off to cross the busy road, an adventure in its own right, and took a bus to Silk Board Junction. And on that journey is when we came up with a lesson we had all learnt on this day, the only positive outcome of this useless, tiring and incredulously long journey : "If ever we are rich enough to afford a BMW or an Audi, here's what you have to do; Go to Banashankari, and get into a 600-C; They'll take care of all your needs to reach the showroom!! BMTC Zindabad!!".

A change of bus at Silk Board and a sometime later, tired like crap, we were back at Banashankari Bus Station. At about quarter to five we found a bus which went to PESIT (this time for certain as we had roped in a PESIT student to accompany us there!!). Our arrival at PESIT was welcomed with heavy rains and then we went about blah blah blah-ing here as well. The buildings here were much better than the ordeal at BIT, but reaching there, I swear, was nothing less than war.

We were outside the college by quarter past six, where we had roadside Gobi Manchurian and some chat, the manchurian considerable better!! And then we were in a fix, with three routes leading home, and none of us knowing which would be shortest. After much debate, we came up with, yes , another one...

• Combined brainchild (Maybe its not, but I'll still label it our eighth mistake) : Lets go home via Shivajinagar!!

We walked about a kilometre to a bus-stop from where we were told we'd get direct bus to Shivajinagar. But after some wait, we boarded a Pushpak to Banshankari Bus Station (although none of us were interested in going back there again :P). The four of us seated in place for three, the short distance was quite an enjoyable one, especially after we saw something called a "Psycho Clinic"!! After reaching Banashankari a little while later, we boarded a bus to Shivajinagar, which took a whooping 60minutes to complete!!

Chai slept, Goatee whined, Punk "music listened" while I, well..talked. And being tired like hell, legs aching and minds racing, we were soon at Shivajinagar Bus Station.

The day had finally come to a close, lessons learnt, colleges visited, city combed and most of all, energies drained. The four of us parted ways here, headed to our respective homes. So that is that, end of a great day, that each of us shall cherish forever...