Reference Points

It was the last exam of our second semester. I had reached the exam hall a bit early since I was done with the revision somewhat two hours before the exam. My semester exams were okay okay and I didn't wanted this one to go away in a similar fashion.

While I sat on my bench,I saw the guy who sits ahead of me. There's some unusual thing about this guy which would make you respect him. He wears specs,has mustaches and light beard but doesn't care to trim them. Neatly dressed and quite reserved. His face remained quite expressionless and calm,knocking out the exam fear.

In the first four exams,I had not talked to him much,but this time,I decided to get into a conversation with him. He was from the Electrical Engg department which I understood from the orange strip on his ID card. 

Me: Today's exam is a bit tough.. I guess there will be a lot of diagrams to draw

He: Yeah.. I'm sure there will be some tough numerical as well.

Me: Lets see.. anyways,done with all the chapters

He (In a modest way): Don't know.. Lets see :)

Me: Ahem! Don't try to be so modest.. how much did you score in the first semester?

He: Umm.. 9.37 points. 

It was a sudden shocker for me,he was the college topper and I guess he had scored the highest in the city as well. He didn't ask my pointers and by then the supervisor had entered the hall. 

That evening,I was back to home after a long train journey and from the shelf,I decided to pick up 'The Greatness Guide' by Robin Sharma (P.S: I love reading his books again and again,it rejuvenates my spirit). I reached a particular topic called  'Choosing Reference Points'.

I re-introspected my performance over the year,I mean the last two semesters. I found that I wan't aiming much from the exams,thanks to the tremendous amount of complacency I had gathered during the year. The entire year was spent without much hard work and with low expectations.

I decided to change this habit and start with new and more efficient habits. I asked to myself "If he can,why can't I?" after all god gave me everything that I needed . I decided to set him as a reference point for my exam performance. I decided to set some more reference points as well. For example,there are some guys in my class who are good and regular at completing assignments,I'd refer them for my progress in assignments and continuous checking would help me buck up whenever I get loose and lag behind. Some guys are good at workshop,some are good at managing the class affairs. When I check their performance and I try to learn from them,it does wonders.

"There's something to learn from everyone around us,all we need is a positive attitude"

The best thing about reference points is that you always get a direction and standard. Merely saying that I'll get 9 points this semester becomes a bit vague,at times you don't know how to approach things. Don't ignore the fact that there are some smarter people around you and it's always wise to learn from their work and get it incorporated into you work. 

Monkey Thieves

I am not a fan of any particular show on TV! I have this habit of surfing between channels and then fixing up with something that I like. In such a attempt,I ended up on National Geographic (I used to be a great fan of Nat Geo Wild in my childhood) and I found this particular show being aired.



Initially I thought it would be a special episode of any show on the lives of macaque monkeys,who are well reputed for their restless activities. I love this species and I decided to watch the show,however later I found that this is an entire show itself,the show's name was 'Money Thieves'.

The production team has done a great job to make the viewer understand the monkey's life. This show is based on the lives of monkeys in the city of Jaipur. To be more specific,the show showcases the lives of a gang called the galta gang. The group lives in a temple and is well fed by the devotees, thanks to the love of Indian people towards Hanuman Ji,who incarnates as a monkey and helps lord Ram to defeat Raavan . The devotees therefore religiously feed these monkeys.

However,apart from the food they get at the temple,they are quite efficient thieves as well, terrorizing the people and vendors and snatching away food. The effect of economic slowdown takes a heavy toll on the amount of food provided to them and hence the troop resumes to thievery to feed their bellies. The group becomes too large and ultimately splits up into two.

This show brings awareness on the loss of natural habitat of many species due to cutting down of forests. These animals find themselves in an urban surrounding where their food pattern changes and so does their style of living. Hence,it is quite interesting to see the changes caused due to loss of forests. A mutual respect should be maintained between human beings and other species and if this respect is violated,both the species face trouble,which is well brought into the picture in this show.

The innocent thievery made by the monkeys is quite cute to watch. They fight with each other and with other gangs too. Sometimes they need to face the monkey catches too. Their life is full of struggles but they don't give up and strive to survive. 

How I got into engineering

Engineering is one of the most respected things to study. The foundation of any country is laid on the shoulders of capable engineers,doctors and managers. Their skills and their creativity determines to what extent a country can develop! Therefore the vision of any country must be to nurture the talent of the youth and promote them to become skillful professionals who'd strive to make their country a better place.

I am an engineering student,I got into engineering in  a purely conventional manner just like many other students of our country. I managed to score well in Higher secondary (10th grade) thanks to the limitless cram work I had done in the entire one year. I passed off the exam with a decent 88.8 percentage of marks,decent enough to get me into the science stream,I had a special interest for economics apart from mathematics and physics,but I decided to opt for science.

As I got into 11th,I was not sure in how to approach the subjects. I took wrong coaching and I screwed up almost the first six months with poor marks in the unit and terminal exams. I changed my  coaching classes,and things did change,the new sir,a chemistry teacher mentored my progress,teaching me enough of chemistry to bring about any sort of conversion. I did fairly well with the organic part and slowly bucked up in the other two parts of it namely inorganic and physical chemistry.

Mathematics was a total failure in 11th,I didn't get a proper approach to calculus and I screwed up with the differential calculus (which later has become one of my favorite subject) . I surely got weak with the mathematics part. Nothing bright happened with physics either,with me lacking in the conceptual part of Newtonian Mechanics and oscillations. Textbook were appearing boring and I never fared off well. 11th grade was bad at personal level too. I suffered a lot of embarrassment from my classmates,thanks to the weak links which earned me the tag of a failed crammer who crammed in 10th to get into science,probably it was enough to get me into a doubt on whether I did justice to myself in opting for science.

The only good thing for which I would remember 11th is for the computer science part. Our school teacher taught us from the root level and I worked hard to get the fundamentals of programming right. We had C and C++ in our portion and I did well in both of them,thanks to clear concepts. (Please note: The fundamental to programming is clear logic,be clear on the how to approach a problem and then code it in the given language,you need to get the commands right,but logic should be clear before you proceed)

With a bad approach,I scored some 78 % in my 11th grade's final exam and I had left all the hopes of getting an admission into a good engineering college. The vacation between 11th and 12th was short,and the immediate step I decided to take is change my coaching in physics and mathematics. The beginning of 12th wasn't so rocking. More of personal embarrassment I suffered,and I became completely demoralized.  There was a vacation in may before the school finally resumed. This vacation was the turning point for me,I read 'The monk who sold his Ferrari' by Robin Sharma and I finally realized where I was going wrong. I read 'The Greatness Guide' by the same author. Both these books made me believe in myself and I realized everything was getting screwed up because I had lost faith in myself.

After the vacation,I was determined to proceed. I scored 68% in the unit test,but I took this score as a benchmark and I worked hard in school,coaching and then at home to grab all the concepts and
do well. Within two months,my physical and inorganic chemistry improved,physics was fair,I covered both electrostatics and magnetism and there wasn't any problem. The real hard work I made was in mathematics,where my new teacher patiently solved all my doubts and got my concepts clear. I grasped the integral calculus and spent time revising the differential calculus. I suffered more of demoralizing from my classmates but I decided to ignore their comments and alienated from them. In pure solitary,I worked hard with my aim clear.

After two months in the first terminal exam,I got the results of my hard work,scoring 10% more than the unit exam,getting 78%. I worked with my concepts in the succeeding exams but could score only 68% and 72% in the two prelims,however the exams were tough and I found myself doing better than most of my classmates! Finally it was board exam time,with my aim entirely fixed at doing well at boards. The exams went off well,but my parents had already decided to get me into a B.Sc college for a majors,thanks to my poor scoring. But I didn't lose hope.

Apart from board,I had appeared for the National Defence Academy, Gujarat Common Entrance Test and The All India Engineering Entrance Exam, the first two went off well but I hadn't really prepared anything for the third one.

Finally,the month of may arrived and it was result time. One after the other,results were out. I was confident that I'll score decently,but my parents didn't feel the same and somewhere back in my mind,I was a bit discouraged due to the same. Okay,now coming back to results, I scored 88.2 in my board,with 84 in physics,88 in chemistry and 95 in mathematics. I stood 9th best student overall in the class. I got 341 rank in the Guj-CET and  I cracked the NDA exams as well,getting a walk-in interview in navy (executive part). I got 122 out of 360 in AIEEE exam. I brought smile to my parents,meanwhile proving them wrong.

Unfortunately due to my extraordinary height of 5 feet 5 inches and a whopping weight of 80 Kgs,I didn't get an admission in the NDA. AIEEE score wan't high enough to get me into a National Institute of Technology or the IIIT (Not IIT). I got Shri Swami Atmanad Saraswati Institute of Technology in my Guj-CET counselling and I grabbed the opportunity. A bit of disappointment was faced in the successive one month. I didn't appear for the re-counselling and then after the final list was out,I came to know that I could have easily got an admission to any of the best institute in the State with my rank. Doors were closed,and I seriously found myself in a place where I had got into,but personally I always felt that I deserved something better. I tried to focus on the engineering thing and in two months I was over the depression!

Now my only aim is to get better points in my semesters and then get a job with handsome salary or to directly go for MBA and this time,I won't make the same mistake,I'll prepare for the entrance exams in a more disciplined way. My only aim now is to get my life in such a position that after 10 years, I don't repent that I made mistakes when I shouldn't have made. I want to get a clear aim now and I don't want to be distracted by the distractions that students of my age find. I am getting aggressively active in Social Media and I want to explore all it's possibilities,sort of an out-of academics interest I have decided to pursue. But my main focus will always remain the same,to perform fairly in the academics part. 

Samosa and tea...

It's almost 5;15 pm and the sky is changing it's color from a combination of blue and white to reddish orange. After a hectic college schedule of 10-5 I'm totally exhausted. I barely caught an auto-rickshaw from the college and I get that irritating call! Yeah,that's my room partner (Ankit,whose college timing is 8-3) just woken up after the afternoon sleep.

Me: hello?

RP: Kamine,where are you?

Me: Just left for the room

RP: idiot! Want to top or what? Attending all the lectures..

Me: So will you come and meet the Head of Department the next time my name gets featured in the low-attendance list

RP: Attending lectures for studying or just to fill up the attendance sheet?

Me: You're too dumb to understand that! Or may be you must sleep for some more time

RP: No! Enough sleeping,I want to drink tea,get some tea when you return


Me: I've been paying for the naashta (snacks) for the last two days. I don't have any money


RP (in a friendlier tone): Arey! We will share it! I'll pay for the dinner tonight.


Me (still looking for a better bargain): Leave it! I'll pay for my own dinner. I don't have money to fill up others' tummy!


RP: Don't cry now! I'll get the movie tickets tonight okay? Don-2 is a hit! 


The offer is tempting enough for me! The unofficial peace treaty has been signed between us.


Me: Okay! But I'll get the tea only,nothing else okay?




*second room partner (Gaurav) screams from behind*


RP2: I want to eat samosas. 


Me (to RP1) : You'll pay for it?


RP1: I don't know! Our deal has been finalized okay?


Me: no samosas okay?


I reach the locality till then. Both the room partners fight ignoring that I'm still on the phone. I decide to cut the phone and get the tea! 


The chaiwala (tea vendor) makes the best cutting-tea in the world! I decide to get six glasses of tea. he packs them up in plastic packets. My eyes naturally get attracted to the samosas freshly prepared. "Both the idiots will be hungry!" I feel (yes the softer side always cares for them) . I get 9 samosas packed for them, meanwhile calculating how much money they owe to me!


After 5 minutes of walk,I reach the room. Gaurav opens the door,hungry and frustrated by then. Ankit rather remaining silent, thanks to the deal we already made!


RP2: Some people are too selfish! They're able to pay for the Manchurian balls at the canteen when they are with classmates. Useless people! Can't do anything for the room partners.


*RP1 decides to ignore the conversation and instead pretends to text his girl friend*  


Me: Some people can taunt but can't appreciate their room partners. I brought the tea.


RP2 (frustrated): I'm hungry but who cares,bring the tea! 


I place both the samosa's packet and tea on the table,room partner's frustrated look vanishes after he gets the smell of hot samosas.

RP1: Wow! You brought samosas?

*Ankit leaves the phone in the bed and rushes towards the table. Gaurav blocks him*

RP2: Girlfriend went to sleep or what? Go and cuddle her.

RP1: Jaa na.. we hae equal share,3 each!

We three settle to eat,and the cold war silently comes to an end.

Friends are recognized by the love between them and the selfless help they offer.....but without any doubt, it is these silly fights that bring us closer than ever!

Arizona plans to spread awareness of highway dust storms in a unique way

The state of Arizona has planned to combat it's old enemy in a new way. Summer dust storms,harboobs are quite troublesome for the drivers. These storms reduce the visibility level and also increases the risk of highway accidents leading to loss of property and life.

                                                   (image courtesy:  newdeal.feri.org )

However,Arizona has planned to combat this problem in an interesting way! The state is trying to promote awareness about this problem by conducting a haiku challenge. 

Haiku are micro-poems that contain 17 syllables arranged in the format of 5~7~5 syllables. These poems have originated from Japan but have considerably been popular in other countries too! These micro-poems are short but convey great poetic excellence and meaning. It has been popular among the twitter family too,with increased number of people tweeting these micro-poems under the hashtag #haiku.

Basically the challenge invites the twitter users to tweet haiku about the dust storm under the hashtag #harboobhaiku. This unique idea came out during a brainstorming session conducted on how the social media could be used efficiently to reach out to the drivers! Social media is connecting in a stronger way with the common public and these connections can be efficiently used to bring awareness to the daily life.

Source:

http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/06/15/us-arizona-haiku-idINBRE85E0EO20120615

Power of Social Media: A nine-year-old girl's blog goes viral!

There are probably millions of people who are into blogging,Martha Payne is one such girl. However what's unusual about her is that she's just nine-years-old and she has turned up to a unique and interesting way of raising charity! Her blog neverseconds has gone viral in the past few weeks and has got over 6 million hits!

(image courtesy: blog.hellomagazine.com )


She actively blogs and photographs about her school lunch. She has a unique way of describing the food by giving a detailed information about it ranging from food rating to mouthfuls to the price to the number pieces of hair found. 

Her blog has served as a nice forum of debate and discussion,attracting a large number of comments to her posts and eventually drawing up quite a fantastic amount of money for her charity mission. She has raised  stg £80,000 for the charity Mary's Meals Kitchen in Malawi. 

The controversy

The Argyll and Bute Council stopped her from taking photographs of the meals following a newspaper report criticizing the meal arrangement. This was followed by her writing the following post

This morning in maths I got taken out of class by my head teacher and taken to her office. I was told that I could not take any more photos of my school dinners because of a headline in a newspaper today. 

I only write my blog not newspapers and I am sad I am no longer allowed to take photos. I will miss sharing and rating my school dinners and I’ll miss seeing the dinners you send me too. I don’t think I will be able to finish raising enough money for a kitchen for Mary’s Meals either.

Goodbye,
VEG

The post eventually received over 2800 comments,drawing criticism from people and fans all over! 


A large amount of support was seen on twitter too with #neverseconds trending for over 5 hours. Finally the ban was lifted by the council leader Cllr Rody Mcuish. 


Finally she is back to blogging and rating meals in the unique style. This incident clearly exhibits the power and unity of social media and also on it's direct influence over the traditional media. 


Sources:

• http://www.siliconrepublic.com/new-media/item/27810-9-year-old-blogger-sparks-a/
• http://www.business2community.com/blogging/the-power-of-blogging-how-a-9-year-old-girl-became-a-social-media-star-0198932
• http://neverseconds.blogspot.in/2012/06/goodbye.html
• http://neverseconds.blogspot.in/

Top quotes-Part 2

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” 
E. James Rohn


"It is not flesh and blood but the heart which makes us fathers and sons."
Johann Schiller


Giving is the secret of abundance.
Sivananda


"Development of compassion and understanding for others can bring us the tranquility and happiness we seek." 
 Dalai Lama


"Fortune favors the brave." 
 Publius Terence 


"If things seem under control, you are just not going fast enough." 
Mario Andretti


"True change is within; leave the outside as it is." 
 Dalai Lama


"Pain is temporary. Quitting lasts forever."
Lance Armstrong


Source:
Tweets that I came across

The Teacher of Management

There's a post graduation course called Masters of Business Administration, more popularly known as MBA. These graduates are hired by firms where they exhibit their extraordinary skills of managing affairs,be it handling clients,handling the clerks,managing the accounts and so on. (P.S: I don't have much knowledge as I am an engineering student). These managers are paid huge amount of money to manage the affairs of company and optimizing the company's performance.

Okay,now coming to the point,this post has got nothing to do with these MBAs,I just thought of enlightening the readers with all the knowledge (or ignorance,whatever you call it) about the same. Apart from these professional institutes that teach management skills,there's one more institute or I say a single teacher who teaches management,called life (I guess you've already guessed it!)





Life introduces us to different situations at different ages. Each of these stages of life has good things to cherish about and some challenging things and difficult times. Fortunately,be it good or bad,situations always teach us something or the other,and almost every time we face some them,we always find a refined version of us! (Well the fact can't be ignored that some incidents leave us in deep trauma,and if that has ever happened to you,my sympathy is with you and 
yeah! Time is a great healer of wounds).


In life,at different situations,we are surrounded by different types of people,ranging from parents to teachers to girlfriend(s) to wife to children to bosses to clients. Each one of them have different expectations from you,as an individual and you need to manage all the relations pertaining to them! Initially we may not be good at all of them, we may tremendously fail at things,but life,by virtue of time and failures,teaches us to become better in managing people and handling situations. These lessons aren't provided by any other school or college in the world.

"Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success."
Dale Carnegie

 Situation after situation,our life gets molded,and if we look back at time,we will realize that how some difficult situations that we came across left making us stronger than ever,and also improving our management skills. Late Mr.Steve Jobs puts it in a better way:

"Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."

The best part of life is that knowingly or unknowingly,we get enrolled to it's course of learning and that we remain a student of it at any age. Willingly or unwillingly,we need to take the lessons and learn from them. Truth,no matter how bitter it is,always brings about positive changes. Miracles can happen and who knows something miraculous is waiting to happen in your own life,thanks to the better manager you are becoming!

Sources:
Wikiquote: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs

Brainyquote: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/topics/topic_success.html

The genius inside us

I was wondering what makes a person a true genius. Being a science student and taking special interest in the biographies of scientists,I always cherished their lives and their works. It feels great to know more about the extraordinary achievements they have made,especially because it always makes me feel inspired!

I always wonder whether it is the "genetic factor" or they are "god gifted" or something else that makes someone a genius! Definitely,they are gifted with some special interest in a specific field. But is that the only reason why they rise and shine?

We too,in some way or other have a special interest in some field. But,perhaps we have never shown any special enthusiasm in cultivating the interest. May be someone is gifted with special talent in dance,some have special interest in singing,in guitar,in piano or may be in horse riding. However,we choose to go with the crowd,always preferring to give a special impetus to academics over anything else.

I won't blame the children in this case! They don't have any fault whatsoever. The parents,in this competitive age,want to ensure that their child's future remains secured. hence,a special care is taken that the children excels within the academic field and get an admission to one or the other good colleges,and then get added to the ever growing league of doctors,engineers,chartered accountants,researchers and so on!

However within this force of engineers,doctors or chartered accountants,there hides enormous talent who could become the next Michel Jackson,Pele or Madonna. However,the creative side under them is choked to death in extreme cases,or exists only as a hobby.

Several students and professionals,despite performing well,face a lot of depression,most probably being pushed to do things they don't want to pursue! There is a serious need to understand that life can be awesome by pursuing the god-gifted talent. Initially there may be a large amount of struggling,but enthusiasm when directed in right directions can overcome all sorts of hardships.

In the end I'd like to quote Aamir Khan in 3 Idiots

"If  Sachin's father would have forced him to become a singer and Lata Mangeshkar's father had forced her to become a fast bowler,then they wouldn't have ended up in being where they are currently"

The Presidential Election

For the past one month (and probably more) Indian politics has been on fire. Prior to this,some amount of similar fired up activity was witnessed last year when Anna Hazare charged in with the dream of bringing about a watchdog to corruption,more famously known as 'Lokpal'. Delhi was on fire,and so was the entire country,people's frustration over corrupt governance was quite naturally visible by the numbers of people that came to open support! And this wasn't all,Baba Ramdev too,took the advantage of the situation and brought the attention of the nation to the massive amounts of Black money which were deposited and safely kept at Swiss Bank.

Unfortunately,our government,which promised to act seriously in both matters,failed to show sincerity in any one of the matters. Lokpal bill and black money remain stagnated in the places where they were,one year ago. A series of political meetings took place,and the entire country remained glued to the Hindi and English news channels which used to bring some or the other experts to talk on the same!

One year later,somewhat same amount of political activity is again witnessed and the media is active in a similar fashion. However this time the common man isn't the participator,he remains the observer,with media being the eyes to him. The race begun and a lot of names were thrown in,a lot of speculations happened and a lot of articles were written. As time passed,newer names were thrown and more of media blah blah took place. Some ministers,some leaders,and the Ex-president himself is into the race. Each day,and infact each hour something new is taking place. The election has turned into a game of chess,where it's quite impossible to determine the winning name until the results are declared.

Some semi-national parties (I call them so because they play a significant role in the national politics but are much more active in one or maximum two,three states) are playing the major moves dragging their coalition partners to the back-foot. These parties have a special importance and they have seized this opportunity in the best manner, to make their importance felt in the right manner! These parties have nothing to lose,but have a lot of say in the number game that is taking place. Their activities are also pointing at the amount of decentralization that has taken place in the recent years.

Amid all these number games and speculations,the management capacity of the national parties is also to be observed. Their coalition plays a major part in their power and if they are not able to manage and keep their partners satisfied,they can be in serious trouble,which in an extreme case can lead to a mid-term poll. They have to manage 50% of the total votes,by hook or by crook! Also,the candidate selected would play an important role in determining the execution of the policies. An apolitical candidate selected can be expected to be fair in the execution part. This is also the major concern for the opposition parties. A president comes with a lot of powers and wrong use of these powers can lead to disastrous results and unbalanced democracy!

The election activities have been quite rapid and major twists and turns have been witnessed,even in the time span of hours! It is quite difficult for any political enthusiast and observer to predict the outcome. Hence,all we can expect is that the body of our elected representatives choose the best of the best and our democracy remains  safeguarded under fair and worthy hands.

Jai Hind!