End of an Era - Part 2: Mihir's Place

Mihir's Place.......bhai what can be said about it. I thinks it's safe to say that 4 years of engineering would have been a lot duller if not for Mihir's place.

This is a weird time for this blog , given thatIi'm here in Cal....but for the first time in the past two weeks have i found any time at all. But this blog is not about that....there will be another one for that. This one is about Mihir's Place.

Going back 4 years.....well it brings memories both cherished....and downright frightening. Memories of Mihir's apparent suicide attempt,mine n Ajit's complete disregard for it.....n even if we did bother, how exactly do you stop Quinty from going over when he's hell bent on doing it.N oh yes...the one guy who could have helped....was asleep in the bathtub....after having stopped a ceiling fan with his bare hands.Other's such as Sahil's "Walk the line "test resulting in him walking into a wall........bali's free loading....Mihir's balcony with senti talks about being a fauji kid and endless games of peanut butter are fuzzily remembered too....

That was only the beginning of a long ...eventful journey.Every party here , you were sure to run into WEIRD people. From his roommate to his roommate's sloshed mates...Himanshu who doesnt stop talking about bikes and Vishwanath who doesnt stop talking at all.Random people have landed up here....including the local mamu gang.

N then came the opposite of the mamu gang n walked of with Mihir's laptop .Over the past two years another creature has come to infest these hallowed halls....Palash the Pig( not as an insult dude...but then you arent really a rhino are you).

The last time I saw this amazing place .....t'was in the rush to get Mihir to the airport in time...and I regret that I didnt even wait to pay my respects as be the case.For 4 years we've talked about throwing Mihir's dad a party for providing us with this place......but as with so many things with us, it just remained a plan. It's unlikely that .....no scratch that it's probably downright impossible that we'll ever meet up there again ....but a guy can always hope cant he....

The end of an era....

A few weeks back Manyu said to me " We'll be lucky if ever two of us meet up in the coming years...three is a possibilty.All of us ....never going to happen. " It's only now, as I prepare to say goodbye to XII C ...after I've spent another evening with the people who've become family, that the true import of these words is beginning to hit me .And the sadness that it brings with it is surprising....sentimentality is afterall not my forte.The thought that we're never going to crash at Mihir;s place again...is a little incomprehensible to be honest

For 6 years XII C has been an integral part of my life in one way of another....we've endured past the shifting loyalties that college life brings on.We've all had our own groups and friends in college but I can say with absolute certainty that we're as much a part of XII C today as we were on the day of that photo session and on the day Makhija cried.

Sahil and Jimno went to Tolani, might as well have been in another city for all the freedom they got from there .And yet Mihir's place is the place to be on weekends. Manyu pushed off to another part of the country altogether and yet when he's back here it's as if t'was just yesterday that he was getting suspended coz of Vera. Ajit disappears from everyones radar for months on end , and yet when he's back among us , people still call him 'handle' and mock his porn collection

For the past couple of weeks, not a day has gone by that these memories and so many many more....Mihir's place and Gad's place, everyone sloshed and everyone sober.... they've made me smile .

We're always going to remain friends , these past years have ensured that.But all 6-8 of us sitting around with glasses in our hands , talking senti nonsense....that's over.

I'm sure my time in Cal is going to bring me a whole new set of friends and experiences and I'm excited about that . But I'm gonna hold onto those memories for a while longer. My next few blogs are gonna center around the people and places that made XII C . it's going to revolve around Manyu , MIhir ,Sahil , Lambu and all us other jokers.....

And for once , I'm actually looking forward to typing out my next blog .

IIM C campus

http://www.wikimapia.org/#lat=22.4448713&lon=88.3016574&z=18&l=0&m=b

Love the lakes!!Publish Post

Satisfaction

" Satisfaction is what we're all aiming at right? Our own satisfaction depends a lot , no ...scratch that...depends completely on our expectations of ourselves.It depends on what you set your sights on.It isn't absolute , it's relative. I've heard a saying " Aim for the stars, if you don't reach em' you'll reach the moon". BS. Total BS. Is this suppose to inspire people?? How can it?? If you reach for the stars and don't get em , how can you be satisfied with the moon? Wouldn't it have been better to be aiming for the moon in the first place?Atleast you can rest easy knowing you're where you set out to be. I envy the person who sets his sights on something and gets it.I do not like being the guy who sets his sights too high and lands up short, I'd rather be the guy who sets his sights 'short' and lands up there. I do not look down on the person who sets his sights lower than mine, I do however look up to those who set their sights higher.

Would I be satisfied working with Infosys ?? No I would not, I'm not going to be satisfied with my lot. But I do envy the guy who sets his sights on Infosys , gets it and then dances like a maniac.He's achieved what he set out to achieve. I know what I want right now....IIM. Am I going to get it?? Not likely. People tell me to take it easy, that I have a good job in hand , that I always have next year. I cannot understand how that works. I do not want the job, I do not want to wait till next year. In absolute terms , I am better of than the average joe but in relative terms , I failed to do what I set out to do.The frustration that comes with knowing that, no matter how well you seem to be doing is very very difficult to express. It's like a thorn in my side , I cannot ever truly ignore it. It seems to me as though virtually every en devour that I have set out on , I have come up short of my expectations.There was the whole IIT gamut , then the 3rd year project , the 4th year project...and the latest entrant ...IIM.

I've blown two interviews. I've got another to go that I am well short of prepared for...It's likely going to turn out to be another disappointment to join the ever growing list.Another thorn that will refuse to be ignored. It makes me wonder....Is it worth it?? Dreaming Big....oh sure , when you pull it off once in a while ,1 in 10 shots maybe, it's great, the satisfaction is immense ( Even then , I wonder why are we so happy?? Isn't this what you set out to do, so shouldn't it be par for the course that you achieved it?Or are you surprised that you did achieve it?) but the frustration that comes with the other 9 times is infuriating.Even knowing all this and feeling all this , I still aim high , but every time I do, every single time I ask myself ....Is it worth it??

I do not have an answer yet."

This is what I wrote on 20th March 2010 ,before the IIM C interview .Sad ,depressing , boring stuff......n then 10th April 2010 happened. 10 April 2010 5:35 p.m....Its pretty much etched in my memory. For the first time I've actually achieved SOMETHING . Regarding this blog , something made me not publish it....I'm glad I didn't , because just that stupid action of not publishing it meant that I had some little iota of belief left in me and maybe that's what got me over the line.

Oh and.....I have my answer :D

Welcome, Class of 2012! | Joka Times

Welcome, Class of 2012! | Joka Times

Pointless thoughts....

How the time for dreams of the future seems to slip past unnoticed, until in reviving them a man realizes, with a shock, that the privilege is no longer his to entertain, that it belongs to those younger faces he sees on all sides, laughing in the tavern and on the streets, running wild.

A breath of fresh air

Even as I write this, the markets are getting ready to open up trading again.For the first time in Indian history the Trading had to be stopped because the Stock Market had hit the upper Circuit breaker,or quite simply put the growth had crossed the acceptable levels for a single day-over 1300 pts.

Now most of this doesn't really mean a lot to me but I  can see where the market is getting it's optimism from.For the first time in a long time we have something close to a decisive mandate, the possibility of a government actually being able to govern rather than constantly having to please its 'allies'. What the Congress has done to deserve such trust , I do not presume to know, but they have been handed the responsibility and now there is the hope that they will at least have a decent shot at being able to shoulder it.

While I'm not particularly pro-Congress or pro-BJP or pro any party for that matter ,it's quite easy to see primary reason for the sweep in this election.It stems from the fact that the Congress has a very clean and able leadership (although in the lower echelons it suffers from the same ailments all political party's suffer from).Right from eggheads like P Chidambaram,Montek Singh Aluwalia to astute politicians like Pranab Mukherjee.But perhaps the principal reason is our PM.The  sincerity and honesty associated with Dr Manmohan Singh coupled with his clean, down to earth image is a far cry from the controversial background of his primary challenger L.K Advani.And the less said about people like Mayawati the better,they don't even exist on the same page.

Here I must admit that it makes me feel better somehow to have a man like Manmohan Sigh at the helm with a young albeit untested Rahul Gandhi waiting in the wings.It's a far more heartening turn of events rather that say L.K Advani-the man who single handedly brought religion into mainstream politics and whom I hold resposnible for the Babri Masjid Demolition-as PM and Naredra Modi-the man who did nothing while Gujrat burned for 3 days and 3 nights even added fuel to the fire and who even today swears by hardline Hindutva which I cannot stomach-waiting to take over.

Perhaps my optimism is misplaced and 5 yrs from now we'll know for sure.....but even then if I were given a chance to change this mandate, I wouldn't -I sincerely believe this is the best possible outcome this election could have thrown up and that we have a lot to look forward to in the coming 5 years.