Change is the only permanent thing in life

First of all, I'd like to thank blogspot.com for preserving my account which has been inactive since the last 2 1/2 months. There comes a time in one's life when one feels that it is the most difficult time of one's life. I have been experiencing thousands of such moments during the last 2 months. I had heard that life would be busy in IISc, but the actual experience tells u more than just hearing about it. Believe me, there have been some moments when I thought that I've made a wrong choice. But thank God, who gave me sufficient strength to tolerate these hardships.

Over this period of life, one thing I’ve come to know...."Human beings are immune to changes". The life @ IISc has been a lot different than the graduation days. I had been a 'last moment studying' student until now. I (& I bet, most of the engg students) used to while away the time, 'jab tak paani sar ke uper se nahin jaata'. On the contrary, one has to literally start studying from the very first day in IISc. So, being a normal human being, it was quite difficult to adapt to the changes. So, I had a hell of a time getting used to the new environment. But now I've got somewhat used to it.

Here, I'd like to mention an article in TOI which I happened to read. The article goes like this:

Whenever you think you are going through the most difficult time of your life, stop and think. This may be just the experience you need to snap you out of your complacency and breathe life back into your soulless existence, break an ongoing cycle of failure or somehow be the catalyst which pushes you towards a brighter future.
Next time you feel like your life is collapsing around you, ask yourself why and then take a step back and welcome the changes that have been put in place to save your sorry excuse for a life. And you will then understand that only real insight is born out of trauma.

High Tea

At the time of admission, we were given a card inviting us(freshers) to join the Director of IISc for High Tea on 16 aug @ 5 P.M. To the most of us, the word 'High Tea'(HT) was new. So, ppl started taking their own meanings out of that term.

The day started off with two lectures in the morning & one more after the lunch break. The third lecture was, Ohmygawd!!, one of the most horrible lectures i've ever attended in my life. I ( & hopefully most of my classmates) couldnt understand a single wordin the whole lect. After the lect, when i asked one of the PhD students(who also attended the same lect with us), he said that it was one of the best lects in his life. How guilty i was feeling at that time!

Now coming back to the topic, many of my frenz went to attend the HT party after having a good evening snacks in the mess, assuming that they'd b served with tea only at the party. When i went to the Gymkhana Hall to attend the party, i was actually shocked to see a fine arrangement of chairs n tables & waiters roaming around to serve the guests(freshers). It was then most of us came to know that high tea means the snacks & tea/coffee taken in between the lunch & dinner. We enjoyed the foodstuffs as always. But there was more to the party than just the food. The snacks were followed by the speeches of a few honourable ppl of the insti., officially welcoming us to the insti. Being a PJ lover, i can very well recall a PJ cracked by the associate director of IISc during his speech. He said, "Do u know why LeT(Lashkar-e-Taiba) chose our insti as the target frm the whole lot of instis in India(he was referring to the unfortunate shoot out incident that occurred in dec 2005), bcoz we're the best".

I think this was the last party of this term for me. Bcoz, after that horrible lect n a lot of assignments pouring in, I think it's time to check out some books.........

My Experinces @ IISc

After almost two months of vacation (which I wasted(?) in sleeping,watching tv, attending parties n all n hey..no orkutting), I was getting anxious to get back to work. I boarded the train to Bangalore at Nagpur station on 29th July. The journey was nice in the company of an MBBS student (no need to tell it was a gal) who shared a side berth with me.

When I arrived here in Bangalore on the night of the 30th, I started searching for an auto which could get me to IISc from the railway stn. As I came just out of the station, I was surprised to see a counter mentioning "Indian Institute of Science Welcomes freshers". I reported to the counter n some seniors welcomed us (me & other IISc students in my train) & took us to the hostel in a van. This was the first time that I was traveling in a vehicle which had written "On Government duty" on it. The first two days were quite hectic because of the admission process, medical check up n registering the courses for the first term. My legs started paining like anything, thnx to the huge IISc campus. The very next day, I went to a shop n bought a bicycle. The next few days we tried to explore the IISc campus n nearby areas.

To start with, Bangalore climate is beautiful. It's cold out here most of the time. Believe me, it really is the greenest city. IISc campus is huge n well maintained. I think govt is really concerned abt the sporting activities over here. There r separate grounds for cricket, football, hockey, Lawn tennis court, volleyball, basketball, badminton... There's a Gymkhana building which consists of a well equipped gym, chess room, table tennis room, billiards room, carom room n of course a movie hall....n hey gymkhana is not only abt sports n entertainment. There's a spacious library in the gymkhana building which has books in 7-8 languages including marathi, hindi, english...Now coming to the curricular facilities, labs r 24 hrs open for the students. In addition to the department labs, there's one Super computer Education n Research Center where pc's with huge monitors r available for surfing, coursework etc. Each student is allotted an adviser who's a faculty member n who helps the student in each n every matter, may it b a course selection matter or a personal matter. In the 2nd yr, each student is allotted a pc in the lab for doing project work. There's a credit system in which each course has certain credits n one has to complete a certain min no. of credits in each term by selecting the subjects of one's choice frm a long list of subjects. One gets a CGPA out of 8. Hostel blocks r good enough. The new blocks even hav door bells in all the rooms. Regarding food matters...there's a juice center in the campus with subsidized rates. Mess food is as usual. There r 3 messes...both veg n non veg available.There's no word like limited(which we used to hav in spce mess) for any food item...not even for the sweets, ice creams, etc....thnx Govt of India for being so generous.

Everything is available inside the campus including a hair cutting saloon, a general store, a laundry, a tailor n a health center. For the readers, students amongst themselves hav formed a lending library where english novels r available on nominal charges. The seniors out here r very helpful...no ragging....n wait...the most important thing....gals....they're much better than wat i expected...thnx to deptts of biotech, physics, chemistry,ecology...The other day, we had Freshers party which included a Salsa workshop n dj nite.

While we're discussing all these, one thing that is worth mentioning is the expenditure. the annual college fees is Rs. 7515 p.a., hostel fees around 5000 n mess charges around 1100 p.m. One gets a stipend of Rs.5000 per month by GOI. For getting this, in IITs n other colleges, one has to do RA/TA ships. But here in IISc, no RA/TA ships. All the money is urs without any effort. Of course, the workload is too much. As told by the seniors, we'll hav a hell lots of assignments, projects n studies....

So, that's all I felt like sharing with all of u. I hope I get thru these studious hardships successfully...