Rain, sleep and morning classes...

Monsoon this year has been a disappointment in most parts of the country and even here, it has remained cloudy most of the time, but it has not rained much. When it does rain, who does not love to curl up under a blanket and pretend to sleep and put-off the day's work. It is one of the simple pleasures of life that we all enjoy.

It was such a morning today: curling up under the blanket was highest on my list of things to do for the day. But not everything happens the way you wish. It was a Monday morning! Even Garfield, who had nothing to do apart from sleeping and eating, hated Monday mornings. So do all of us! Monday mornings are heralds of another week of endless classes, more to study and labs and worst of all, lectures where I do not understand anything thanks to the skill of the instructor or maybe my own inability to grasp the subject.

But the rain made it even worse! What can you do except wake up and go for classes especially when there was a chance of a tut test at 8am! For 4 hours, from 8am to noon, I went through the motions. The only thing that made me get through those 4 classes was the promise for what was to come after that. No, not lunch, which is always disappointing, something we BITSians have got used to. It was a looooooooooooooooong afternoon nap. Oh yes, it was awesome! 4 hours of classes washed away by 4 hours of blissful sleep.

Afternoon naps are awesome and this sem, with no classes in the afternoon except on thursdays and fridays, I am making the most of it. A far cry from my previous semester when one lab or the other had its doors open for me! I can never forget those days............ Wait a minute! Oh my God! A two and a half month long vacation has removed the memories of those days and I feel better, now that those days and its memories are far away!

New Sem, new people-Same old story

This semester, I am doing my E&I courses, but it all seems a bit new and strange. Maybe because lots of my batchmates have gone for PS-2 or maybe because I still inhabit the world of lectures and tuts, with the shadow of surprise tests looming over my head (must not forget the 2 Tests and compre that will be heading my way) while most of my friends are searching for novel ways to spend time since they have completed their electives already.

Some have reverted to serious gaming, others are preparing seriously for the next set of exams for their higher studies and if what I hear is true, there are nerds who go on as if life does not go ahead unless you study your textbook everyday. There are also those fighting (rather desperately hoping) for placements to pick up pace here. I am thankful to God that I am a dualite and will pass out only two years from now and this is keeping me away, albeit temporarily from the placement fiasco. There is also the wise but desperate guy trying to woo a girl to pass time! (biriyani from Calicut anyone?)

Until this semester, my corridor in the hostel had some of the proest gamers in campus along with the most committed insomniacs. Get up at 4 am to take a leak, you will see (or atleast hear) someone working their best in FIFA or AOC or CS or maybe a newly released movie or just rock music! That is commitment. Salvation, Godfather all have left their rooms and are doing their PS-2.

There is something else that I miss too. Having Joe Sunny just around the corner was fun, I miss his calm n cool demeanour, I miss the effervescent Adityan and I miss the always reserved but "happy to help" Arif. Inspite of all this, life goes on. A new season in EPL has begun, Vishnu aka Lovely_Rascal is back to what he does best (irritating me and getting hurt in the process) elections are around the corner, a new batch has joined (a bit too stupid since I heard one of them saying 'I didn't get into any club or department. That is seriously bad for me'. Not his exact wordings as he said something in hindi which meant something like his life is so ****ed up), tests have begun and instructors are back to their boring best. Two new mess contractors, who I must say are better than the previous ones we had, although not by much and it might a bit too early for judgement. Well, there are certain things that do not change. Life goes on here as it always has. Got to go, rumours of a surprise test in tomorrow's tutorial!

Spare a thought for the runner-up

There is something more painful than losing, it is losing and ending runner-up. It simply makes you want to kill yourself. You rue those moments when you could have killed it, you want to go back in time just this once, you wish you had done something just at that specific moment and then when you come to realise that it is all over, you wish you were never there and had not put up a fight. I have had such close calls in my life, albeit in my own world of quizzing and school life were a moment's mad rush just ruined everything.

I hate close calls, not because I hate the lost nails or the adrenaline rush, I feel really sorry for the poor dude who just gave it everything and still lost and its even worse if the person who lost, deserved it more than the person who actually won. Such was the case with the Wimbledon Men's Finals of 2009 that pitted Andy Roddick against Roger Federer who was on the verge of becoming the most successful Grand Slam player of all time.

I am delighted that Federer won his 15th grand slam, but somehow, I am not able to focus on that. My heart goes out to Andy Roddick who took the fight to Federer and infact, Federer was looking a worried man on more than a few occasions. Bad luck, Andy, because having to serve from behind in the final set was a handicap that you could have done without. Just to put things into perspective, Federer had not broken Roddick’s surve until that final point of the match and had won his sets on tie-breaks. Just compare that with Roddick, who broke Federer twice and won the 1st and 4th set on the back of those breaks. Federer won and it is great and he has reached somewhere no one has ever gone before and to him, this is just the beginning of setting new frontiers for the next bunch of tennis players waiting to be come up the ranks. But, spare a thought for Andy Roddick who played the game of his life and for the third time lost out to Federer in a Wimbledon Final.

Kipling really meant it when he said

If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same


and incidentally, these are written on the players' entrance to Wimbledon!

Our Downfall

If the world as we know comes to an end, reasons could be global warming, war or terrorism or economic meltdown. Whatever the name given, it all comes down to some of the simplest feelings that make us human: selfishness, greed, lust and jealousy. These are inalienable feelings and so one might argue that since these feelings are present in every one of us, the end of the world is bound to happen.

I think it does not have to be so, since the control of these feelings can lead to a happy life for all of us. If we are able to free ourselves from the clutches of these feelings to some measure, the world can survive. However, if we do not find it in us to overcome these feelings, we better brace ourselves, for the end of the world is much nearer than we think. We are in a world ridden by crises- poverty, hunger, conflicts- the root causes being our feeling of self and ego.

Some find it beneath themselves to use public transport, others build palatial houses to feel good and hear others praise and sing songs in their glory, many are busy making money as it has become the ultimate end for them rather than the means to live. Heads of state and executives fly around in private jets and limos whereas most of the population break their backs for 3 square meals a day. Religious leaders, blinded by their own version of teachings, instigate conflicts and declare war, killing thousands each year. It is a strange irony that faith was invented by man to hold himself up straight during times of struggle, but that has now become the main cause of conflict. We must also remember that no religion in this world propagates hate, rather all of them preach acceptance and tolerance.

Unless we learn :

to overcome our basic instincts and realise that we are all equals

to tolerate and accept each others right to live, faith and freedom and

to stop considering only ourselves, the world will end, and it will happen soon.