Termagants and Duress!!
I am writing this now at 0200 hrs in the morning because Hari made me an offer I couldn’t refuse:p . The theme of the post is Kurukshetra. Specifically Kurkshetra ’09.

As you guys know I am the student director for guest lectures, well if you dont know, well then you should:d It has been a very interesting experience so far I have to tell you. Its pretty thankless much of the time. You will mail 40~50 ppl over the weekend and about 10 of them will reply and every other week maybe one will agree to give a talk. As if that is not enuf we have these geniuses who got back to us with statements like "Pongal aprama kelunga. Sir, ippo romba busy?". This after having been sent a mail and a fax stating that our event is a week after Pongal.

You know i have always wondered what it takes to get a governement organisation to agree to do something. It goes something like this
Day 1: Director to his subrodinate "Help these people out"
Day 2: Subordinate "I was in a meeting"
Day 3: Subordinate "I have to talk to my team"
Day 4: Subordinate "I have to talk to my superior"
Day 5: Subordinate, and this one is a classic folks "You don't call; we'll call you"
Day 10: Subordinate "Yes yes, i am sorry i still haven't spoken to my team yet"
Yes folks!! It takes a governemnt organisation more than ten days to say a simple yes or no. Btw I'm still waiting for that reply.

There are other extremes too in this business. One person kept nominating his boss to give a GL in our event. Intrigued we decided to check out their profile. So we did what any self respecting modern man would do. Yes we GOOGLED it! And guess what the only relevant hit to their company is in the DELETOPEDIA - a dump where you dump what is not acceptable to even that other dump.... Yes Yes!! You guessed it!

But people all that wiseracking aside this year's Kurukshetra promises to be a rousing event with a Video Conference with Dr. John C. Mather from NASA, a Nobel Laureate to boot!!, Dr. Ganesh Natarajan, Chairman, NASSCOM and Dr. Naveed Hussain, VP, Boeing India.

A workshop on Animation by the man who worked on Dasavatharam, Brian Jennings is nothing to sneeze at either. Make sure you attend that. The events contain The Usual Suspects,(uh people by that I mean the events that are traditionally there... to check them out go to http://kurukshetra.org.in/). But in addition there are this year's Debutantes GodSpeed, a Remote Controlled IC Engine Race with stunningly cool new track and finals under the lights, and Fox Hunt, the traditional favourite for radio enthusiasts.

I am told the K! Online Quiz and K++ are already underway. With Dalal Bull going up any minute(or day:P)now.

Keep reading this space for further updates.

Signing Off,
Yours Truly

Of Birthdays, Blackforest, Large Prime Numbers and 69

Well the day started half an hour in advance.......... A couple of fellas calling me up early to wish me........ Claimed i would be busy with important calls at midnight and tht I would ignore them then........... Real smart alecs.......... And then the conference happened........ You know wat they say............. "SSDD".......... pretty close:p. A finer concerted effort of browbeating i have never experienced before.......... Of course they did have the advantage of numbers.... Thot i got out of that one pretty well............ :D classic move giving ppl 5 choices and telling thm to take their pick........ Neatly done even if i say so myself.

Hmm... Figured i was par for the course so far. Little did i know i wasnt even close to the truth. You know i was wished by nearly everyone i knew on 14th morn itself.... Figure u cant call it anything but morning as it was after 12 and the next day but doesnt make sense to start the day with night. Anyways went to sleep around 2 after a pleasant conference which kept dwindling down progressively as time went......... Pareto deserves a mention here to btw:p

The day began bright and sunny. Of course i got up at sometime around 8. Ate some soji tht mom had prepared for me.... Dropped mom at office and sat down to breakfast... For some reason i booted up the system and wat do u know the next thing u know the time is 12 and i have been playing age of empires for nearly 3 hrs........ Those 3 hours turned out to be the most hassle free hours of the day:D kidding ppl....... Anyways i finish breakfast and lunch at one go only to realise i had invited a few ppl to lunch at sangeetha...

Now u know me........ I dont like wasting good food....... So i dont:p But believe the second and third lunches were easy to push in but i had to balk at the fourth one....(For interested parties the second lunch consisted of cheese kulchas and the third one of paneer pulao.... The fourth was sadly a dried Butter Naan......... maybe if it had been hot and fresh......... But we will never know the answer to tht now.....:p) Now when my friends decide to do something they always do it in style........ My birthday was no exception:) The lunch party consisted of vishnu, rajesh, siva(tho he didnt eat squat), nitin, su and hari and myself of course.

Already filled to the brim i waddled to the gallery(waddled is a joke and none of u r allowed to refer to it as such..... u can call it walking thank u very much) along with the lunch party and an edict was passed by general consensus that as i had come to college i should stay there till 5 atleast... And then lo and behold Vinod joins up with us......... Vind(as he likes to be known) was discretely engaged during our impromptu lunch but completed his engagements ahead of time and met up with us....

After about ten mins Vind and Vish do the disappearing act............ The first and the best surprise of the day was to follow....... Pras joined up with us(And no thas not the surprise).. The guys(and gals) had got me an honest for goodness BlackForest cake.....(Guys u r the best:) ) I was thrilled to say the least(Actually vind let the cat out of the bag before he left but i acted surprised and brilliantly too i think:p). And thn they tell me their nefarious plan ..... I am not to have a single bite.... Well we couldnt have tht now could we......... After a brief struggle and some quick hand eye co ordinated moves i managed to polish of a goodly portion of the cake..

You know when u were younger and your parents gave you birthday parties........ These parties generally had a theme........ Well this one had a theme as well after a fashion...... "Ever wondered y u cant have sex at a speed faster thn 68 miles per hour??"..... Well the answer to tht was the theme of my birthday....... Seems my constant mouthing off in tht particular topic was the reason for tht theme being chosen..... Heck even the candles spelt 69....... I still have the card and the mug tho:p

Went home and was taking a nice bath when who of all ppl should call but my interviewer form google........ Now u see i could be excused if i wasnt expecting the call......... Because i WASN'T:p Well toweling off i sat for the telephonic interview and he hit me straight away with a puzzle.... Now u see i was still in the off mode mentally and i took some time to warm up.... Took nearly 20 mins to solve tht one.......... The data structure q was easy tho.. Got tht straightaway.. And thn he just had to go and ask me a q tht i knew but i didnt know(they are the worst type u know........ U already have heard the q and know all the incorrect answers and y they are incorrect but not the right one......... well tht was my last q......:( )

Never one to tempt Providence and with the number of surprises i had tht day i slept off early.........

And that people was a recollection of wat is most probably one of the best birthdays that i will ever have......... Thank u guys...... U r the greatest.....*sniff sniff*(jus kiddin' :P ................... abt the sniff part:D)

Kurukshetra 07

It started like this. We at CEG wanted to start an event that would encompass all departments, all branches and start something different from what was already existent. What we decided on was we wanted to create a synthesis of engineering techniques, skills and thought processes, for while engineers think differently from doctors and scholars what is more important is that engineers think differently from each other as well. How a mechanical engineer approaches a problem is vastly different from how lets say a civil or computer science or an electronics student would perceive it. We wanted to create a stage nay a battlefield for the exponents of various engineering techniques to showcase their skill, their stamina, their drive to win for what can be better for the engineering community as a whole but a test of strength, a test of character, a test of will. The name Kurukshetra practically chose itself for the event. Like any proper war there will be a lot of smaller battles. These battles are going to take place in the areas of MODELLING,DESIGN,PRESENTATIONS,SOFTWARE QUIZ and MANAGEMENT. The mother of all batlles is going to be in ROBOTICS of course.As you can see our battle arena includes a nice blend of tests. There are not only the events where you are expected to get down and dirty, sweat and make things work;but also events where you are expected to be suave and poised and cool and calm. Kurukshetra tests not only your qualifications as an engineer it also tests your resolve to be one and your qualifications to be a representative of the engineering community to the rest of the world.

MODELLING opens you to a world of creativity- the chance to do a Cindrella act if you will(You ofcourse would be the Fairy Godmother!!). Take the junk given to you and fashion something useful from it and u have got it made in modelling. You think that is too easy fine then come up with your own product and bring it to real life.DESIGN will test your knowledge of curves and lines. You think your a Ford in the making then head over to Kurukshetra and we will see if you measure up. You have a new design for a water powered rocket or do you swear by CAD when it comes to designing? If the answer to that is yes then you know where to be from Jan 4th - 7th.

Are Robots your cup of tea? DO you have a BOT that is versatile, that can wrestle, that can race, that can find its way through a maze?? or Would u like to make one?? Then head over to CEG from 4th to 7th of Jan next year.Budding Professors in the making, Innovative Social Workers, The Messiah to Industries who is going to solve their problems. Are you any of these? Do you have a cogent manner of representing your ideas and concepts? If yes come and impress our judges and walk away with huge cash awards. IF your answer is no, well come anyway and learn from the masters how it is done!!

Software is making it big in the world out there - Fact. Well our online programming contest is guaranteed to grip you and haunt you. Try it!! Or if a little B&E is what you have in mind then try our Access Denied and show the security experts who you are!!Circuit Debugging masters, people who have an amazing amount of physics stored upstairs, people with a penchant for coming up with crazy,complicated solutions to simple problems - you have found a safe haven here. Come, Participate and Win in our TECHCHALLENGE.

Quiz - the first open quiz in the history of this 200 yr old college(The K! Open Quiz) and the only individual event in the entire 4 day event(The Lone Wolf), make this "a sure to be" truly memorable eye catcher. Come and get a piece of the action. You think you know more about the words Bull and Bear than zoologists!! You think you can pull a chestnut out of the fire?? Have you been tempted to play the market but have not had the capital?? Well Dalal Street is for you then. Try our stock market simulaton event and you will swear by it for sure. You think you have the panache, the suaveness, the skill to market your products to anyone in this world?? Well here is your chance. Sell your plans and products to our judges and walk away with pockets overflowing!

Well No symposium is complete without Workshops and Guest lectures and Kurukshtra is no different. Come to Kurukshetra and interact with top professionals and veterans from various branches of engineering and management. Listen to the GURUS tell you what to do. Glean all you can from them for they are sure to make you a better engineer more than anything else.

All work and no play makes a Jack a hebetudinous boy. We wouldnt want that now would we!!. So to spice up life we have the TECH HUNT(that is a technical treasure hunt that guarantees to keep you in a heightened state of excitement). We also have ALCATARAZ(try breaking out from the hell-hole that we push you into with your brains and raw knowledge that you possess as your only tools of redemption).Get back to the basics and have some fun. Try our gaming section if the processor up there gets heated up. Do you dream about being a mayor of a city or a superhero ?? Well then here is your chance to be both!!

Well, people all we have left to say to you is "FALL TO THE MATTRESSES".The rules of engagement are simple.This is a No Holds Barred, Winner Takes All war.
Let the Battle Begin!!!!
For further information contact - http://www.kurukshetra.org.in/

.............................................

I had a trip down memory lane and i was pleasently pleased to say the least(:D). I went to school yesterday and the school was in the midst of sports day practice. That brought back a lot of fond memories alright. Although i was never a whiz at sports i have to say i had my share of successes at the school level. The best part of my final sports day was tht we managed to do something that had seemed near impossible before. We(CHEETAH) took the house champioship away from LEOPARD. Now for the uninitiated (i am sure most of u have already guessed ryt) these are two of the 4 houses of our school the others being PANTHER and JAGUAR. The celebration tht we had tht year was awesome u just couldnt catch us - ryt from the 5th std to the 12th std. and whats more it was almost a clean sweep in all the divisions so the victory was even sweeter and what made it special was tht most of the office bearers were from CHEETAH in my final year. I was SPL, Vijay was Sports Prefect and Dharma was Cul Sec and well we went out in style is all i can say[:)]

And then ofcourse i meant Shankari M'am. I had gone with Bharath actually. Since we both had been blue eyed boys of the school we had quite a good time. Shankari M'am(history) gave us a lot of scoops i suppose and thn we went and met our language teachers(i dont know why but those ties are the strongest actually - the ones with language teachers). Mangla Gowri M'am(english) chatted with us for some time. It is thn tht i realised tht my propensity for idle chatter and casual chit chat(especially with teachers) had not died away just subdued.

There is always this sence of peace tht i get after i go to my old school. The fact tht i spent 14 years of my life there might have somthing to do with it i suppose. I was practically grinning all day yesterday. And thn today mom was cleaning the house and well i started going through all my old certificates. My my!!! i had a lot of them. I really am talented (even if i say so myself:D). That helped me pass time today. It was fun going through all tht. I had won the general proficiency abt 12 times all over and the english prize 5 times which is a perfect score(5/5). U know looking at all tht i should say i was really the darling boy of my school. Too many incidents point tht way for me to ignore tht fact i suppose.

Well i had a real good time these last two days going back to my school days. Well ppl like i said i am so vetti u myt get another update within the next two days. Until thn this is urs truly signing off bubye................. and keep luking at this space:D

Tum Di Da

Tht sounded nice so i put it up thr dont ask me why[:d]. U know looking back on this sem i have to say thrs been a lot of the gud mixed with the bad. I have gone throught varoius phases transitions and man a lot of confused states. I never remember apologising as much as i did this sem(for some inexplicable reason tht has stuck to my mind) and well this sem was a lot of bother. But hey i steadied a lot of realtionships (read: friendships) this sem.

U know these times when u feel like talking but dont know wht to say well this is one such time. I mean come on i have so much to talk about but nothing seems to be cohesive ryt now. U know bcos of the roller coaster nature of this sem or wht i dont know but i spent a lot of time recollecting my school days. Siva i think got his fill of my school tales this sem. he must have heard everyone of them and vishnu has heard all the less scandalous ones i suppose.

Those were the days without any pressure on u. man life was easy back thn. For me the worst part of this sem has been tht i lost my confidence in between(believe it folks i was just posturing at times. it was pure bravado :d) but i guess i cant knock this sem entirely. I dont rem much of class tho this sem. Most memories are of compsoc and the gallery and eureka and brainscan. Lol we got a lot of work done this sem. Whew!!

Now the endsem time was a big laugh. It was fun. All those late nyters(studying) all nooners(sleeping) man this is fun. And believe me most conspiracy theories are created at this time only. Not tht this sem was short of conspiracy theories. I rem this started with a couple of rumours which infact realigned friendships and the sem ended with the a couple of rumours which shuffled the previous alignment.(U guys dont understand thas fine i dont either but it happened).

Every sem has a particular pattern. Well this one had no fixed pattern. Hey i really forgot the fun part. The post compsoc meetings were the best we have had so far. And lol we had lots of ppl joining compsoc in the second year too(Wonder whom we have to thnk for tht - would tht be nari or vc??:p) Srivats me and kanna had some fun on orkut with respect to a particular issue but the hoem has to be SIVA"S Ottifying. Effecient usage of orkut was examplified by this one initiative.:d

And ppl guess who siva met this sem??=)) u will never guess lol. Uknow siva's no fear policy is to this se wht vc's 32 was to last sem i guess. no urs truly always seems to get out of these skirmishes well u know. but thn i dont want to push the fello too far as he has a few promises to keep. Now all said and done i guess this sem is special but not in the way u ppl might perceive it. Hell Normally a sem like this would be forgettable but not this one.

Well any more mindless banter and i myt get adverself afflicted by somebody so me signing off.
But hey keep reading this space for i am vetti and updates myt occur frequently.

THT WAS A LONG TIME AGO........
Well the whole family was down with conjuctivitis and enjoying a midafternoon siesta over the weekend when suddenly my mom
brought up my impending birthday and asked what i had planned for it. I replied nothing special but this started us of
thinking about my past birthdays. I have had every possible kind of birthday party i guess.
In my younger days there were lots of children and friends around as i lived in a flat and my birthday parties would always
be well populated. As i grew older i grew out of the birthday parties in the traditional sense. Also since my birthday falls
on the 14th of november it invariably happens that my birthday is kind of a semi holiday at school.
Its the birthday parties i had in the 10th 11th and 12th that i value especially. And well the major point of discussion on
that day was of course the 11th standard birthday party. Tht year i decided against calling anybody home and decided to give
the usual treat in school itself. And as usual classes were unofficially suspended on tht day. The first hour after lunch we
had physics and the physics teacher Hepzibah mam was fresh out of college and very close with our set as we had been the
first set that she had taught.
It was suggested by someone that it would be nice to have ice cream and since i had not yet given my birthday treat i went
upto the headmaster's room and asked him permission to go out for 10 min or so. He was surprised by the request and asked me
why i wanted to go out then. I replied with perfect equanimity as though it was regular everyday occurrence that i wanted to
go buy ice cream for the entire class. When he asked me " But why?" i told him tht it was my birthday and i wanted to give a
treat. Anyways i was given permission and i brought back two 1 ltr ice cream tubs. Try as i did i could wangle only 10 spoons
from him. 2 of them were used up by the head master and the assistant headmistress.
Off to class i went and well there were 4 rows so tht left 2 spoons per row. Hepzibah mam had a scoop and thn the ice cream
tubs were passed around along with the spoons. After everyone had had a spoon it went around for a second round and well
everyone including the teacher ate the second time as well. After that since we had lots more time to kill we played spin the
bottle with mam and believe me that was a lot of fun. The dares that we came up with were interesting but then most went for
truth and boys being boys u can understand when i tell u lots of secrets were spilled that day. Gossip material for nearly a
month was generated in about 30 min or so. The teacher was absolutely horrified at this and said u guys are a set of idiots
to moon over girls at this age(How true she was !!!! I Understand more clearly now tho i did get the general conept back then
itself but i have now seen lots more people mooning and fawning like fools over women i guess :d).
Ofcourse what crowned of the event was tht whn i recalled the activities to my asst headmistress she expressed the tamil eqvt
of EW!!! GROSS(not to spin the bottle :D but to the ice cream eating incident). And well my mom reacted that way too. She
told me i pull a stunt like that ever again i have it coming to me. Lol those were the good old days i guess.........

DAMN WHT HAPPENED THR??

Looking at the previous post and comparing it with the rest of my posts i realised tht it was not my usual style of writing. The dark foreboding style has never been mine. i leave tht solely in the hands of the russian authors.

U know this sem had its bright moments too. It was not all dark and depressing. The talks with raghav on the way home - the preparations for Eureka(had a real blast during that).
I dont remeber much of classes this sem. Algo was always interesting but the rest were dreary and boring . I have to say Eureka was really a very good period. I actually had a lot of fun getting it ready.

Brainscan was another fun event. Both with eureka and brainscan the seniors gave us full freedom and getting the papers ready and conducting the events was interesting and well.... in a way heartening.

A-> XYZ was formulated at a time when guess i was feeling real warm and fuzzy but those moments were a bit infrequent this sem.

And hey before i forget i have to say the G81 reunion was a time when i had a blast. An entire weekend at Mayajaal with a license to party. It was awesome. I really enjoyed myself there. U should have seen me dance away to glory(Now my friends will always attest to the fact that i have energy on stage but i cant dance for my life and thas wht happened here too) and well i guess i made a lot of acquaintances thr.

But i shouldnt complain. Ths sem was different. I guess i found some long time replacements for a few of my friends from my pre college life. I have never belonged in a group and its true in college too. this is the first time actually that three of my really good friends know each other.
Raghav again has played a real big role this sem in my life. Agni with him was memorable. U see the best way to advance in any organisation is to hitch ur star to that of someone higher thn u. My star was Raghav i guess. He's one person who has given me a lot of sound counsel this sem.But i remain aimless. My sole desire for this post was to write about the good times as well and i am digressing.
The best things that have come out of this sem are not tangible things. They are realtionships and the knowledge you gain about the people around you. I have no doubt that i will clear EDC this sem and i wont revisit tht issue again. But this sem i have done a lot of introspection and the last time i did tht was way back in eleventh(My previous all time low).
Now i guess i sign off before i start brooding again................

Mixed Emotions.......

The third semester. Great expectations and all that jazz was what we started it with. But this semester has caused a great deal of illusionment to me. I have no idea but this last 3 months or so I have been so contrary that I am amazed at times to think if that was me at all.

The sem started with me coming out of my closet(No snickering Folks!!). All last sem i had maintained a fair distance from the fairer sex. I decided to change that and in a way I guess I did. But that seemed to be the least of my troubles. The contrary nature of the semester started with the coll elections. I stood for class rep(why?? for the life of me i cannot tell u now!! because i dont know!!) Well that was a harrowing experience. Something that u dont want to go thru ever at all.

Thr was always compsoc work and while i seemed to be doing well in all my dept papers EDC has remained my bugbear this semester. I have no idea what i am doing wrong, just a suspicion that i am doing something wrong. The second contrary incident was of course the results. i got good results but not how i expected them to be. Grades were all upside down. But lets not dwell too much on tht.

Moving on .... For some reason these three months saw me more depressed and irritable than ever before. I have been floating in and out of relationships and not defining any of them. i dint even try to(and here relationships mean mostly friendships). I have not bothered to think about the consequences of any of my actions. Something that i have not done in nearly 4 years now. Why this recklessness u ask?? i have no idea. Just like, i have no idea about why i am depressed or why i am out of it at times.

I lost my temper with a classmate for the first time in nearly three years now. The last time i lost my temper in such a public manner was when i was in goa as part of our school trip during my final year there. I had thought i had got a hanle on my temper. But my emotions were frayed and i was at an all time low and it just happened. For my classmates in college who had herebefore seen only my affable side were surprised but then none of my school friends knew about it for surely they would have said i was slipping back into the quagmire i had gotten myself out of.(I am carrying on a bit here i know but still it took me a lot of effort to get a handle on my temper and i was surprised by the suddeness with which i lost it).

But all was not dark and murky this sem. During one of my lighter moods I came up with the A-> XYZ theory and lol tht was a lot of fun. At compsoc i guess i have started fashioning myself after raghav. Teh fellow has become like a mentor to me now. And i guess i am very simliar to him. The fellow is one person to whom i tell most of the things that is happening in my life. Other than that i seem to have cut myself adrift with talking to very few people about my true feelings or moods or states in the last few months. I guess only Siva has listened to them other than raghav and i was sorry to burden him with it.

Vishnu and Harini are two people i have closely interacted wih this semester.(hey this is getting too personal maybe i shouldnt mention so many names here....) Anyways Life is a constant struggle nowadays and I guess for some reason vishnu , siva and i have formed a close bond. The two have carried on a crusade to cheer me up i should say(not really understanding why but still making an effort).

This semester i dont seem to remeber much about classes except algorithms. Now tht is the one bright spot in the timetable. I truly enjoy those classes and no matter what the mood i am in i always perk up after this class. Great subject and a great teacher.

Well i wanted to mention about sparks but i guess this is not the blog to talk about it in. i will write one tommorrow for tht. this one is too dark and foreboding. for those of u who think i have been aimless in this endeavour or tht i have been too miserable... well tht was how i have felt in this sem so far. so i guess this blog is a fair tesatimonial to the mood i am in.

Adios Amigos ........ the next one wil be in a brighter tone i promise...... bear with me.