On a house hunting spree!

I am on a house hunting spree now! will update this space shortly!

Update: I'm finally done with the house hunting (in fact it was basically a room hunting stint) process. Thanks a million to my friend karthik. He has been instrumental in ensuring that my search ended fruitfully.

Last Punch: Since my next post is resting peacefully in my fully packed computer's hard drive, I'm unable to post it. I shall post it soon. Tab tak is update se hi kaam chalo yaar!! (As if u people are dying to read my next post. He He...) Chalo yaar Cya...

~IT's My Life

To err on G-Talk!

First things first... I would like wish all my blog readers a very happy Ganesha chaturthi.

A few days back, I was on g-talk as usual, when one of my friend kiran logged in. I was busy chatting with some one else, so I hardly took any note of his entry. When I was about to log off, I checked the list of on-liners once again. One of the things that caught my attention was the online status message of my friend kiran! He had been retaining an ‘age old’ status of ‘egggjjjhaaam fever!!’ (I don’t remember the exact verbalization of the status. So please bear with this closest approximation.) Now the status against his name read, ‘A ray of hope’. I wondered what he was up to and what was that ‘Ray of Hope’ all about?

Given the fact that I surf internet on a dial up connection (which is pathetically slow) that costs me quite an amount, I usually don’t strike unwanted conversations and invite ‘trouble’. His new status drove me curious (and not to mention, provided the much needed inspiration for this post) and I couldn’t resist the temptation to chat with him. Little did I know, that this chat was gonna end up in a ‘comedy of errors’.

Since the original conversation was carried off the record on G-Talk, I don’t have a copy of that befuddling chat, verbatim. I am sharing with you an approximate, but close to the truth version of the same...

S: En le UV rays nan magane? What's up? How are u maga?
K: I’m fine le. What about you?
S: I’m fine Kano… Where are you staying in B’lore now?
K: In Basavesvara Nagar...
S: Where is it maga? I guess it’s close to BSK?
K: What’s that BSK?
S: Banashankari Le…
K: No man… Actually it’s quite far…
S: Hey! Will it not be problem for you to commute?
K: Illa le... The bus facility is nice maga… So no problem…
S: Ya we have cab to the company na… It should not be a problem to us…
K: Hmmm… ok…
S: Hey did you collect the appointment letter from the placement cell?
K: Le yaav appointment letter macchhaa?
S: Le… Invyaad iruttappa??? MindTree’s maga… Naav Invyaad collect madkollokke saadhya helu?
K: Oh… Wait… I think there is some confusion here…
S: Matte in en confusion Le??
K: Whom did u want to chat with?
S: Mamaa comedy beda… Tell me did you collect it from college or not??
K: I’m not the kiran you wanted to chat with… I’m his class mate… I hope you know me… Read my name fully…
A pause... I opened the link of his orkut profile to confirm if I had managed to figure him out finally... Yes! I can be quite a dumbo at times!!!
S: Oh shit! #$&%... Sorry Le... I thought you were 'that' Kiran...
K: Its ok le… Sorry yella Beda…
S: Trust me… This is supposed to be the most hilarious episode I have ever had… Trust me; I had no clue that you were not 'that' kiran maga…

The rest of the conversation was all about me trying to patch up the embarrassment I had caused. It went on and on for another 20 odd lines. But I couldn’t help myself from laughing boisterously. What a terrible confusion it was?

For you kindest information:
· S – Suresh S. a.k.a Suri, K- The other Kiran!
· Jargons like macchhaa, Maga, etc are a part and parcel of the local lingo and are used to refer to your near and dear ones, especially your sidekicks!

PS: Poor chap kept chatting with me all the while thinking that I had struck that conversation quite consciously. Ha Ha Ha… (Wicked smile...)

Okies. This is it…

PS (PS): A couple of days back I spoke with someone called Pavan for a whole 3:27 minutes without even having the slightest of a clue which Pavan was I speaking to? I know quite a few of them. After he finally axed the call, I was sure of one thing; both of us had really confused each other to the core!! Ha Ha Ha… (Wicked Laughter…)

Ok Ok... Time for some update!

The pic in 'About Me' section has finally been changed to a more sought-to-be-close-to-a-decent-one. Few of my well wishers(?) (for reasons best known to them) had threatened to file a PIL against me, for appearing on public platforms, with visual IDs that closely resembled the looks of traditional 'Dhakoos' and the likes... Shayad maine un logon ki shikayat door kar diya hai :)

~IT's My Life

Alumni Meet @ B.I.E.T.

Yesterday evening was quite an eventful one for the reason that I had the opportunity to attend the alumni meet organized by our college. Bapuji Institute of Engineering and Technology, Davangere, is an educational institute providing quality Technical education. It was started in the year 1979-80 and has since then produced thousands (8000+ to be precise) of quality engineers. It is currently affiliated to the Visvesvaraya Technological University, Belgaum. I’m proud to be associated with such an organization.

Going by records, you would be under the impression that our institute, by now would have managed to establish a strong alumni base like many of the elite institutes in India. If you happen to have built such a notion in your mind, then that’s exactly where you went wrong! Unfortunately, our college hasn’t been able to trace back to its alumni base and utilize this resource to their fullest potentials. The reasons to this are many. Let by gones be by gones. There is no point in brooding over the mistakes committed in the past. The college admin seems to have realized its mistakes sooner than later, and is keen on rectifying them at the earliest. Keeping this in mind, they had arranged for an alumni meet on 8th September 2007 at 5pm in civil seminar hall of our college.

Compared to the previous year, this year’s alumni meet had more number of attendees both in terms of number and diversity of representation. We had people who had passed out of our institute way back in 1984 to the very recent batch of 2007. The ground was all set and everyone was eager to discuss on how to go about the whole initiative. Practically speaking it would be highly impossible to trace back every alumni of this institute. So it would be a commendable accomplishment, if we could at least trace back to the alumni who passed out of our institute in the recent years.

The event began with a beautiful invocation. It was followed by a feedbacks/suggestions session, where alumni shared their views on how to strengthen the alumni base. The following are the suggestions/ feedbacks given by the attendees of the event.

· The biggest problem the alumni are facing currently is communicating effectively with the institute. In order to overcome this, they need a common effective channel for communication. What can be more effective than having an interactive college portal?

Ø Building an interactive web portal helps the alumni to update their contact information without much of a hassle.
Ø The alumni can contact the college admin directly and can give candid feedbacks and suggestions.
Ø The college can promote itself through the website which would help aspiring students to get the required information about this institute.
Ø It will be a great platform to share tons of valuable information and can have experts in their own fields share their experiences with others.

· Inviting the alumni as guest to various events in the college would help them build excellent rapport with the students who are currently studying in the institute.

· Starting activity clubs to bring together students and alumni who share a common interests in fields like music or any other technical field. This would help them to get exposed to wonderful talents who share common interests and thus build new acquaintances.

· Inviting alumni with expertise in a particular field to deliver technical talks, conduct workshops for pre-final year students on how to face interviews, guiding students who are aspiring to pursue M Tech/MBA etc.

· The recent trends in campus recruitments reveal that most of the colleges which have a strong alumni base have managed to woo biggies in the IT industry to visit their campus for recruitment. As a lot of the college alumni are currently working for reputed companies, they would definitely try their best to persuade companies to visit our college and thus enhance the opportunities for students aspiring to get in to reputed companies. In order to achieve that we need to have a vibrant training and placement cell which should be headed by a full time (I say this because we are currently having one of our professors as our P.O., who manages this task along with his regular classes) placement officer.

· Issuing identity cards to alumni so that even after they graduate from the institute, they could still have access to the resources of the college like the magnificent central library, etc.

The event was presided by the principal of our college Dr. B. T. Achuytha, who gave valuable insights on the current ventures taken up by the college management. He went on to speak about the expansion of the ECE and CSE department. He also spoke about plans to build a sophisticated auditorium in the college campus, which would be able to accommodate around 1.5k – 2k people at a time. The college looks forward to get some kind of monetary assistance from the alumni. Being a full fledged private institute has its own limitations. Hence I don’t see anything wrong in them seeking help from alumni in this regard. Our principal also promised to look in to the issues discussed in the meet and do the needful.

Everything has to have a beginning and this alumni meet is definitely a small step in achieving the same. It’s good that they have taken some firm decisions in this regard. We still have got a long long way to go. They have kick started a new movement. I wish them great success in their venture!

PS: The next alumni meet is scheduled to be held in the first/second weekend of December 2007, in Bangalore. I am really looking forward to it. Hope they disseminate the information regarding the same well in advance and ensure that the meet is a grand success!!

Winning – A counter perspective!

I received a sms from a friend of mine, which said, “Winner can show you the way to success, but a loser can make you aware of all the ways leading to a failure.” What a beautiful thought isn’t?

It has always been a mystery to me as to why people always turn up to only the winners (or toppers) to get the much needed tips for success. When I was in school, a lot of my friends used to approach the toppers of the previous batch and enquire about their methodology of preparation and the way they managed their time. They used to run behind them and ask them about the strategies they adopted to succeed. I didn’t see anything wrong with that. That is exactly how the world goes about. People always turn to winners for advice.

You might have already begun to feel that I’m some kinda rebellion or something, who is all set to break the norms of the world. No!! Not actually…What really bothered me then were questions like, is that the only way to succeed or achieve your desired goals? Aren’t there any alternative approaches to do the same? Amidst the devouring eagerness to achieve success, what my friends usually forgot to enquire, was about the set backs he/she faced while achieving the same. I was pretty much sure of one thing; success isn’t always a cake walk! There ought to be hard times and there ought to some sacrifices behind great achievements. But unfortunately the world around us barely seems to acknowledge the same. We all feel it pleasing to know about the brighter side of the success story.

Labeling winners as a different breed of species altogether isn’t fair enough. At some point or the other, they too would have begun the race as beginners, just like anyone else. Then what is that makes them stand out of the breed? It is their ability to hold nerves till the very end, when others failed to do so. Sometimes I really feel that what one needs to know about winning is not what he/she has to do, but rather what he/she must rather avoid doing!! With this very logic in my mind, I would often consult a lot of my seniors who, not necessarily had topped the class but rather failed to do so. Trust me folks, I always managed to gain more information from them than what I actually got from the so-called winners/toppers. Those whom I approached, told me clearly what-not-to-do, rather than what-to-do. As I used to implement those tips, I would discover that it was those crucial don’t-do-these set of tips that helped more than the lambi list of must-do-these ones!! One mustn’t blindly follow the tips given by a winner for success. He or she must have the patience to analyze the situation he is currently facing, along with his/her limitations. When you know precisely what you can’t possibly do, then it becomes very easy to build a winning strategy that would suit you perfectly. When I see parents forcing their kids to run behind a topper to gather those precious pearls of success mantras, I feel sorry for the poor kids. The mantra for success isn’t that generic folks! Remember that what’s good for someone might be fatal to the other!!

Now having spoken about a counter perspective on winning, I would leave you with the following set of questions to think about:

Is it always a winner who can enlighten you about the infallible ways/secrets for success? Aren’t failures aware of what it takes to win? Isn’t he/she worth being consulted for an opinion or guidance? Don’t you feel that all winning strategies are unique in their own sense?

Just a tangential thought!

They say that the most successful people in this world are those who have handled their failures far better than they handled their successes. It isn’t a crime to approach a failure for guidance. Is it? Think about it… You might actually be seeking a piece of advice from one of the most successful people in this world!! Trust me, by doing so; you would be doing yourself a great deal of favor!!

PS: I remember having read this long time ago on the cover page a note book, “I cannot give you the formula for success but I can definitely give you the mantra for failure, try to impress everyone.” See it’s as simple as that!!

~IT's My Life