Tuesday 2 July 2013

My Alma Mater

I always wanted to write my own blog some day and here I'm doing this. Feels awesome.
And guess what, I could recall no other topic than my memorable first year at IITR. Yeah, you heard that right, IIT, the very college for which people crave to get into.
So it all started with those dreadful 6 hrs, don't worry i know i'm starting from way back but I'll speed up the things soon. The seriousness kind of ebbed during the exam and probably that's why I ended up with Biotech at IITR. Never mind. I have still got much energy left to do something awesome with my life.:)

So here I go..
23rd July 2012,the day when I stepped into the holy city of Roorkee, the decreasing number on the milestone got butterflies in my stomach and when I finally saw the final signboard pointing towards the entrance, I was like


As we drove through the main gate bearing the engraved heavyweight Indian Institute of Technology, with palm trees standing tall on both sides of the road, it felt like the hardwork that I had been putting in for years really paid off and as they say 'bhai feel aa gyi'.
The grandiose main building with lush green canvas of grass in front, the holy church,a well equipped grand Central Library (and when I say well equipped; I mean it, MACINTOSH people) and world class sports facilities for every sport; from the gentlemen's game, cricket to the not so popular weight lifting.





What else do you need to spend the best four years of your life! o.O, yeah you need something else too; FOOD.Here comes the bitter part; mess food at IITR (or at-least at Rajendra Bhawan) is something that you won't even wish for your enemies.That all water no dal, dal; that steel strong chapati; that stale potato in almost every dish takes away the very feeling of hungriness and you end up admiring water, yeah they do provide good water; chilled as you would like it to be.

Coming back to the systematic recalling of events during my first year, here comes the first one, Fresher's Night. Well, I've got some cherish-able and some really forgettable memories attached.
Let's talk about the cherish-able ones first. I was kinda anchoring the event with two of my batch-mates. Those long practice sessions were really fun. It was probably the time when we interacted with seniors the most. Meeting the HOD and professors and dancing madly on random tunes afterwards made it worth memorable.
And then an untoward happening..!!.Oh God! I seriously don't want to talk about it. The very fact that the warden called my Dad at 3 am making my parents show up at the hostel at 6 (yeah, my home is just 3 hrs away from college) shows the intensity of the event. It costed me 10 disciplinary marks too. Damn, i had just started to get a feel of college life and here I was with a 10 marks penalty on my head. It pinched me for a few days but soon I got over it.And as the saying goes "Every cloud has a silver lining"..the life went on.
OK, lets come out of this mournful forlorn and keep moving. Hell yea..there's so much left to talk about.
Now came the period when there were all sorts of magazines kinda indulged into ambush marketing for their piece of paper.They usually conduct few rounds for recruitment. First one being a GD; that sounds professional doesn't it..and then 1-2 personal interview rounds. I sat for GG and IIT HBT and got through IIT HBT. And then there were recruitment for the various sections under CulSoc. I got through LS. People might call us 'Batti' but who cares, as long as the chapos and trips are coming. P.S.- no offences for other sections.
Coming to the academic part or the part "What my parents think I do at college", profs (not all though) at IITR are crap. They may have a hell lot of knowledge probably beacause of which they passed the recruitment procedure, but as far as putting that knowledge into our minds is concerned, they fail big time. Till now, Prof. Rajdeep Chatterjee (PH-101) and Prof. Ghosh (Inorganic Chem) are the only two profs who I believe have been rightfully chosen for their jobs. I might stand nowhere to comment on this, but this is what I felt.
First Mid Sems were on their way.It was a three day event, didn't even bother much.So, passed by swiftly.

Thomso 2012 (The cultfest)

It's probably the event that we fachas waited for from the very beginning of our college life, and the fact that it was happening after a 2 year suspension kinda uplifted the spirits. With Simple Plan rocking IITB, we expected a lot more than offered from IITR. Not much of the celebs showed up to brag about except the Indian Ocean, but still events like Footloose, Provogue and Musical nights were were able to break the rut of monotonous college life and leave us energized.     
 
End Sem skirmish

This was the time probably when we entered the archaic gates of the library. A place which appeared to be dead for the whole sem suddenly turns out to be the most happening place in the campus. With students buzzing around, you may feel lost at times, but trust me that's the way everyone feels around."Just keep calm and Mugstrong".

OK, so this was it. The very first of the eight sems was over and I ended up being a decent 8 pointer. Not only this, I kinda topped in my branch sharing the zenith with other two for whom I felt bad because everyone in my branch was like, I was the one who topped. I never really bragged about it but my batch-mates embarrassed me by bringing it up every now and then. I also kinda started enjoying it, well obviously not the chapo giving part.
Winter had come and rightly so. A one month vacation devoid of life is what i'm talking about. For some time you may admire the home made food and school friends but hostel fun has got no match for it.
Coming back to life in new year, the second sem finally kicked off.
Hoping to do a lot better this time, I let myself sway back into the good old times. This sem was no different, except for the fact that the profs had new faces and we had a tad easy schedule;because of the course structure being as such.

Cognizance 2013


Asia's largest technical fest, as they claim it to be, this was the event to watch out for. From the brutal bot fights at Armagedon to the adrenaline pumping robocar race at Power Drift, from the guest lectures by some of the highest minds to the awesome musical nights, this event had it all.




Now, an incident that i always wanted to write about.


At some other day me and my friends were doing some work for the magazine in the market. It was past 9 and we realized that mess would have closed by now and we had to find a way to fill our empty belly. Eating at canteen was an easy option but seeing a marriage party going on we stared at each other, grinning. OK, so we were all set to try that "Khana khane ke lie paise ni lagte, uniform lagta hai, uniform" thing.

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Me and my compadres entered the wedding as casually as we could ever be and straight on went on to eat a 'gulab jamun' (although I didn't try that, instead I went for coke). It wasn't a great move as very soon we realized that clouds of suspicion started hovering over the host's mind. Making a quick move we went to the caterers, pretending that we came here seeking an advertisement for our magazine. Soon, the host also arrived and here goes the conversation..
Host - What are you people doing here?Do I know you?
Friend - Sir we are from IIT Roorkee, and we are here to get sponsorship for our magazine.
(Here we were with the most stupidest of reasons)
Host - Don't fool me you brat. Just give me your enrolment no.
Friend - Sir,you are making an issue out of nothing. We just had one 'gulab jamun', and if you want we can pay you for it.
(What ? , you mean pay like Rs 15-20 and get over it)
Host - No, just do what I'm asking. Otherwise I'll call the police.
(POLICE!! POLICE!! POLICE!!, goosebumps followed by sudden chill and I was like 'beta aaj to gye')
Friend - OK sir, here you go but we are really sorry for our act.
Somehow we got away and nothing happened after that. God bless his daughter.
Embarrassed..Embarrassed..Embarrassed, but who cares, we didn't even know them.

Talking about some random fun stuff.

Fun never ends here, be it the long bakar sessions at Bru and Alpahar or the countless Counter Strike nights, late night football or the Rs 10/hr pool, CBRI maggi or Alpahar ke 'samose'...you have it all.
Soon, the second sem ended and this time I only managed to get a 7.6, a bit disappointed but 'chalta hai yar'.
So, this was it. A few hiccups but a wonderful journey so far. The only malice that I have at this time is that I couldn't get into anyone of the most popular groups of IITR. Never mind, who knows I might end up being in one in the following years and as The Beatles say it
                                                                   "Ob-la-di Ob-la-da life goes on.."