Good Morning!

It is 6:30 in the morning and I am awake. Awake in spite of the fact that, I slept at around 3:30 last night, awake in spite of the fact that, my alarm did not get a chance to scream today. I have a 7:30 class and had found myself looking up at my watch at six in the morning. Then, instead of falling back asleep, I had decided to get up!

Its nice, its nice to see the morning after such a long long time. Its nice to enjoy the serenity in the atmosphere, with people around you, all fast asleep. Its nice to see the red sun play hide and seek in the clouds, its nice to see the little sparrows getting disturbed by the sudden morning breeze, its nice to see the leaves of trees consoling the birds that their fluttered feathers actually look good on them, kind of bringing out their subtleness. Its perhaps the best start one can have to his day. I feel glad, I didn't fall back asleep.

Often, I wonder, why can't I have the world on my terms? I want to live in a place where its night when I decide to go to sleep, and its early morning when I decide to get up. I don't want stupid small clocks deciding what I should do and what I shouldn't! I want to get up early everyday and see nature flicking its magical wand to decorate itself. I want to get up early and watch the squirrels scurrying around. I want to see who wins among the sun and the cloud, in their childish play. I want to be a part of nature, to be free from the guilt that I, as all other human beings, have alienated myself from my very root. I want to go back to nature, I want to live freely, far far away from an artificial world!

My Tryst with "Matka"s.

Matka - (mat' kaaaaaa.... ) 1. N. Master of Technology Students of IITs. Coined by the B.Tech (undergraduate) students of IIT Kharagpur.
2. Adj. Very Stupid creature, not necessarily human.

Warning: Calling any one "matka", specially if he/she is not one, might lead to loss of life or property. Also, as per the directive of the Supreme Court of India, the attacker (who was called matka, by mistake) cannot be prosecuted!

Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen, this is the definition of "Matka". This term would have been included in Oxford dictionary long back, even before "lathicharge", but apparently, one of the person in charge of inclusion was a "Matka" once in IIT Kharagpur! Well, thus you can see that having IITians in top ranks world over is not always a pleasant thing!

My experience with "Matka" in IIT was so far restricted only to labs, where these creatures would take extreme pleasure to see us in trouble. And not many would disagree to the fact that lab hours could have been really enjoyable, but for these matkas. Its like, you are having your viva, and your professor has run out of questions and in a while, perhaps would have started asking nursery rhymes, when a matka barges in and starts asking stuff that, I bet, even he doesn't know! And you end up getting C in lab. Consider another case, when you have submitted a lab report, and in KGP, lab reports are prepared in the last moment, its not that we are lazy, but we take pride in the fact that we can complete magnanimous amounts of task in enviably short time, with the strained voice of Atif Aslam in the background reminding us of our distance from civilization, "dooooriiieeeee"! So, consider a situation where you have prepared a 10 page report in 30 minutes (well thats the time you get between lunch and lab!), with tables and graphs and crap. In the lab, with a sense of pride and self satisfaction, you submit the report. An hour later, a matka calls you (it took the matka one hour to figure out what you have written!) and says that, you did not put the scale in your graph, and you get a C, again!

But that was not it! In my final year, I had to take PG electives, that is, I would do my classes with the first year matkas (its a shame you cant ask for their "intro" or take their OP, now see, whats the fun without that?). And let me tell you, sincerely, from personal experience, Matkas are dull! They are, in some respect, even duller that George W. Bush! Firstly, they keep on standing up while answering or asking a question in a 30 strong class! They also keep standing up while giving attendance, and man! they attend classes every single day! Not Satisfied with these, the Matkas keep asking stupid questions in class, something that even a kid would figure out. Also, if a Professor does a mistake while writing a formula or an equation, it takes the Matkas full 10 minutes to figure that out, and once they do, they start shouting like crazy, as if in a race, who could point that out the fastest! I mean, grow up kids!

And lets not talk about their understanding of the subjects, some of them could even make Einstein look stupid, all they need is an aureole, and you could paint them and put those paintings up in a temple and worship! Once, a professor asked, how would you plot the probability density function of a sampled speech signal. Its very simple, really. You normalize the speech signal, break up the amplitude range into class intervals and go on ticking the proper class interval whenever you encounter a sample. At the end, you plot the curve! Leave aside answering to the professors question, half of the class raised their hands when the professor asked "who can't plot the pdf now?", after having explained the whole thing two times over! And to say, they are graduates in electronics engineering, or rather, they are electronics engineers!

Now I know, why graduates from IITs do not prefer to complete their Masters here. Its perhaps the aversion to the classrooms, where these matkas would once sit that drives them out after graduation, not only from the institute, but from the country altogether!

Disclaimer: Author does not intend to hurt the sentiments of any communities, other than Matkas, but since they are dull, they would take more than a year to realize that its them the author has written about! Also, for the readers who are dual degree students, the author wishes to clarify that they are not referred to as matkas here. Only the two year M.Techs are eligible for this grand title!

The Accused, The Trial and The Sentence...

"... don't walk into my footsteps. It is a horrible and painful journey. "

Well, the journey so far hasn't truly being pleasant. Believe me, its very very painful. You feel lonely, even in a crowd of your friends and acquaintances. It seems as if anything and everything that is happy in your surroundings is mocking you. Every little incident, however unimportant it may be, reminds you of those pages of your past that you would prefer to tear off.

I don't mind the pain, really, because this is my punishment for being horribly mistaken. And as a student of communication engineering, I realize how much a wrong estimation is penalized. So, I have learnt to live with the pain. However, something that bothers me the most is, after completing my "sentence", how much will I change? And I don't see any good changes on the cards. I fear, this awful experience of mine will turn me into a cynic. Nowadays, when I see movies or read novels, and whenever I come across a happy event in any of them, my reaction is like, "huh! like that could ever happen!!" I now have problems in coming to terms with any good thing happening to any one, be it even me! I blankly stare at problems that I successfully solve, in disbelief - "Now how could that happen!"

I have no idea of what I will become after passing through this sentence, this stage in life. But all I know is, I will have only myself to blame for all this. How could I not foresee this, how could I not consider failure to this magnitude. May be because, I never imagined I would fail, for I even today fail to realize, where I was mistaken, where exactly I went wrong. In the trial, the prosecutor did not even care to turn up, leave aside speaking. It was only me and me alone, shouting, pleading, frantically running here and there. And then, I was sentenced!

I object ... Your Honor !!

The Nor'wester - A sonnet

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"

I would once wonder, I would contemplate

if it was just to see thee in the beauty of may,

for "thou art more lovely and more temparate"!

Alas! I would once summer's beauty defy -

drunk in thee, for thy to me was untiring;

eternal, even death to me would fail to deny.

li'l would I know, fate against me conspiring!

Now when I watch summers passing by,

I search thee in the bright sun, the skies fair.

Its then that I realize how foolish was I,

To think of thee as my golden summer.

No, in a summer's eve, only a nor'wester is thee,

that destroys everything - as thee hath destroyed me!