To Sleep or Not to Sleep?

So here's your usual everyday situation. Prof teaching in class. Guy sitting on the last bench and dozing off. First benchers listening intently to prof. Rest of the guys half-heartedly listening or 'conversing' or staring into space. It's the middle of quiz week (so most of them would be sleepy anyway) and it's a nice, pleasant day.

 

Somehow the prof notices the guy sleeping at the back of the classroom. Attempts are made to wake him up. Dazedly he realises that the prof is talking about why students should not sleep in class and that this topic was in fact brought about solely because of him catching his forty winks.

 

And hence followed one of the best conversations I have ever heard in class:

 

Prof: Why are you sleeping in class? Don't you sleep in your room?

 

Guy: Sir, I couldn't sleep last night.

 

Prof: So you sleep in class. Next class onwards you will sit here in the first bench, where I can see you.

 

Guy: ... 

 

Prof: Why didn't you sleep yesterday?

 

Guy: (And this is the best part ... He could have said that he was mugging for quiz, which the prof would have more readily accepted. But, no ... He had to say:) Mosquitoes, Sir.

 

Prof: ... Mosquitoes? Ah ... Ok ... So they bit you all night?
 

Guy: No Sir, I woke up at 3 a.m. and killed as many as I could.

 

Prof: You're an engineer, you should have improvised upon your methods of preventing the mosquitoes from entering your room in the first place.

 

Guy: Yes Sir, I woke up and I covered all my windows. (That's how the 'engineer' solved the problem.)

Prof: You could just have used mosquito coils or All-Out or something like that.

Guy: Sir I can't use mosquito mats because I'm allergic to them.

 

Prof: (dumbfounded) You have an answer for everything.

 

Our 'engineer' had made his point :P

Q: I use my cell phone for?

A: Apart from taking and receiving calls (or perhaps giving missed calls :P), I'm guessing the top answers would mostly be these (in no particular order):

• Taking photos/videos
• Playing games
• Listening to music
• Text messaging
  
• Internet browsing
  

However, nearly the most innovative and interesting use for phones that I have ever seen, I got to see today in Tifanys. (Sorry about the pic clarity though.)



An idli on a phone .. Awesome! Never even imagined I could use them like that!

So .. Next time you don't have a plate .. Well, you know what to do. :)

MSB = M?? Sciences ..

A very straightforward question to anyone who's reading this.

What percentage of the institute's major landmark locations (hostels, messes, facility centers etc.) is an average insti-resident actually aware of?

Normally I would not have given this issue much thought, since most of the people who I know had explored the place inside out within the first month of their arrival, and the rest knew most of the place before the end of their first semester. However, after this incident that happened yesterday in the mess, I was shocked to hear the things I heard, to put it mildly.

So I was talking to this MA freshie. General stuff, how's life, how're acads going .. the usual blah blah. However, as I casually asked her which hostels her friends are in, the "conversation" somehow turned into somewhat of a ragging session about locations of hostels, much to my delight. And the replies I got delighted me even further.



Here's how the conversation went:


Me: So how many hostels do you know of?

MA Freshie: I think 15, right?

Me: (with a very sweet smile) How many of those can you name?

Freshie: Come on da, I'm almost done with my 1st year, why are you ragging me now?

Me: Aww, come on .. Tell me. I just want to know. (Sweeter smile)

Freshie: Ok .. So there's Tambi and Pamba and Narmad and Godav and blah blah blah (She listed some 13 of them, leaving out Alak And Jam. Fair enough.)

Me: So which ones are the four newly constructed hostels?

Freshie: Uh, let's see .. Those are Tambi, Pamba, Mahanadi and Tapti. (Lol)

Me: Ohkay .. Then which is the hostel in front of Guru?

Freshie: (with a huge confident smile) Narmad.

Me: How about the hostel in front of Himalaya?

Freshie: Uh .. I'm forgetting the name .. Wait, I'll tell you in some time.

Me: Okay .. Then which three are the ones at the end?

Freshie: (again confidently) Ganga, Mandak and Mahanadi. (She didn't realise she'd already located Mahanadi elsewhere.)

Me: (smirking now) Nice .. Where's Alak?

Freshie: Behind Narmad.

Me: Ah. (huge grin here) Nice. How many floors does Tambi have?

Freshie: Come on da, it has four. It's one of those last hostels.

Me: .. (Lovely. What's next?)

Freshie: And then there's Saras too right, in front of Basera, next to the football field.

Me: What's the football field called?

Freshie: Ok, wait a sec. I know it's called something, it's definitely not Sangam, I'm forgetting the name.

Me: ...



My expression? LOL. And it got better ..



Me: Ok .. So pack hostels, how many departments do you know?

Freshie: I know most of them, not all though.

Me: Where's Navarch?

Freshie: It has this big wave tank right, I saw it once, although I don't really remember where it is.

Me: Biotech?

Freshie: Somewhere at the end of the main road.

Me: Chem?

Freshie: Near basky courts. (I figured pointing out the difference between Chemical and Chemistry wasn't really worth it.)

Me: ESB?

Freshie: I know where all of these are da .. Why are you paining me?

Me: Ok, what does CRC stand for?

Freshie: Classroom Complex.

Me: ChLT?

Freshie: Chemical Lecture Theatre. (Lol again.)

Me: CLT?

Freshie: Classroom Lecture Theatre. (Double lol.)

Me: Ok .. MSB? (Warning to Mech junta: BRACE YOURSELF)

Freshie: Mathematical Sciences something na?



Yay .. Whatte freshie!


(continued)

Me: Uh huh ... (Imagine the expression I had.) Okay .. Okay, that's good. HSB?

Freshie: Ob I'd know HSB da, it's the Humanities department.

Me: Ok .. where's HSB?

Freshie: 2nd floor of CLT na ..

Me: And where's MSB?

Freshie: 1st floor of CLT.



That was it. The Lol-Theorem had stretched beyond limits by now. I couldn't take it any more. And thankfully by this time, she had finished her dinner and made some excuse about going to mug. And I went over to some Chem junta and told them this story, from whom I got reactions totally appropriate for Mathematical Sciences Block. Of course, I got some chiding for ragging people like this at this time of the year, but I could sense it wasn't whole-hearted.

Anyway, nice dinnertime entertainment, I gotta admit.

And you might want to rethink the answer to that question after reading this, if you had it all figured out :P

And yet another one :)

I guess my blog is pretty much on its way to be the official limelight for all those silent, living-in-the-shadow creatures that are found in the campus, as all of you readers are going to very solemnly acknowledge by the picture that I am uploading in this post. I really don't know how they do it, but somehow all of these guys seem to intuitively navigate their way right in front of my camera, and they seem to do tiny little animal/insect dances (which may or may not be cute, depending on the life form). From cats sitting on my windowsill in the middle of the night, to leeches stickily climbing up my door; from bulls with raging hormones to red ant infestations, I'm just like an animal magnet (Not to be taken literally).

Anyway, this guy is officially the most recent addition to my list of weird creatures to have posed for my camera.


Beautiful, ain't he?

And despite the poor thing having only seven legs, the determined struggle that he put up against my desperate efforts to sweep him out of my room really deserves special mention here. Sometimes I really feel like applauding all creatures like this, who have tremendous abilities to invoke inspiration.

Anyway, I have to admit, Spidey here has certainly inspired in me a huge new-found respect for Little Miss Muffet, and she has my complete sympathy and understanding for jumping out of her tuffet (which, by the way, I did too .. only that it was a chair and not a tuffet). Anyway, I salute her too .

And lastly, I guess it's time I changed my blog description a bit: The lemonades aren't being given to you to freshen you up, but they're necessarily required to be there just in case you need calming down. What say? :P

Hello?

I've been here in the insti for only one and a half years. Not a very long time, but then, the variety of ways that the people here use to draw my attention towards them, has diversified to such an extent by now, that I feel a post is absolutely required to highlight the most interesting ones. Of course, there's the usual occasional person who adds me on GTalk using ids like rakhisawant or yellowredboy, and the frequent forwarded message from unknown numbers belonging to people who are too "shy" to tell me who they are .. But these two specific instances definitely deserve special mention. (And I will be adding more when they happen.)


14th February, 2008: 3 o' clock in the morning. My phone rings.

Me: (groggy voice) Hello?

Guy on phone: Ya, hallo, is this Akshari?

Me: Yeah .. Who is this?

Guy: Ya, uh .. um ..

Me: Hello?

Guy: Mumble-mumble.

Me: Sorry? Didn't get you.

Guy: Ya, uh .. I just wanted to say .. uh ..

(No sound for 10 seconds)

Me: (still groggy) Hello?

Guy: Ya, uh .. Sorry. (Whispering in background)

Me: Hellooo?

Guy: Ya. Uh .. Uh .. Happy Valentine's day.

Me: ("Huh?") Oh .. Same to you. Who is this?

Guy: Uh ..

Me: Hello?

Guy: Ya .. Uh .. So .. Uh .. I have pizza, you wanna eat?

And at this point he hung up, so any chances of me getting to have pizza with completely vanished, as did his identity. I'm still reminded of him whenever I have pizza.



13th January, 2009 (today): Noon. At CRC. Walking back to hostel.

I feel something fall on my head. Okay, maybe a twig or something and I brush my hair to make sure nothing's there, and I keep walking. Then it strikes me: There are no trees above me.

I look back to see what fell on me. There it was.

A tiny piece of chalk. Of all things.

Okay, maybe someone meant to hit someone else, I continued walking.

And there falls another piece on my head.

And another comes down next to me. And another ..

And that's when I realise that the culprit is some guy sitting happily on the 2nd floor of MSB, who understably stepped back when he saw me looking.

Awesome. So IIT contains chalk-throwers too, pizza lovers aside.


My conclusion: Some people never grow up, do they? :P

P.S. If any of these two guys are reading this, please do leave a comment saying it was you. :)

...

I'm bored.

And I want to see how many people would actually visit this page just to read this :P

Don't blame me afterwards ... I'm BORED ...

P.S. Please do leave a comment by the way if this annoyed you :)

All Leeched Out ..

I thought it would turn out to be just another day. I could not have been more wrong ..

My alarm rang at 7 am as usual. I woke up groggily, put the alarm on snooze and slept back. 5 minutes later again I hear the familiar alarm tone of my phone. Again I put it on snooze. Rang again after 5 minutes. This time I actually mustered enough strength to squint my eyes open, pulled my quilt around me to stay warmer (it was raining outside) and decided to finally wake up and do my normal morning chores.

Nothing wrong so far .. I picked up my toothbrush and toothpaste in the most peaceful mood imaginable. I put on my slippers, stepped out of my door, and turned around to latch my door. That was when I saw it.

My first reaction: Ugh!!

It was a leech.

A big fat, shiny, slimy leech.

In the most repulsive purplish brownish color imaginable. Climbing its way slowly and steadily up my door, leaving a trail of sticky goo behind it. With small antennae moving every now and then. Sticking to the door on its slimy little underbelly the way a starfish would stick on a glass wall (only much more disgusting).

For a couple of minutes I just stared at it transfixed in horror. There was a leech on my door. It was nothing more and nothing less than a leech. And it was totally freaking me out.

I decided to give it a break. Maybe when I come back after lunch, it might have gone.

Obviously it didn't. On the contrary it seemed to be bigger and yuckier than ever. And it seemed to actually have climbed higher, the last thing I wanted it to do.

So, I thought it might go away on its own, but since when does luck ever favor anyone in things like these? I waited 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 hours; it just seemed to be doing its own icky little ballet with my door as the dance floor.

I thought I might try removing it with a piece of paper (I have zero knowledge on what to do when a leech is on my door, by the way). So I tried scraping it off .. But Lady Luck still wasn't on my side.

Not only did I fail at what I was trying to do, because the thing was totally glued to my door .. I somehow actually sliced the leech's skin thingy or whatever-its-called a bit, and it started oozing some transparent stuff.

Ew.

That was when it developed this tiny tentacle-like thing, and it seemed to extend and stick to the door denoting its path as it moved down.

I gave up. I decided that I would just see what it does overnight, and if it doesn't go by then, I'll get someone to remove it off.

Came back from dinner. I had more surprises waiting for me.

The tentacle had detached itself from the door and was now hanging from what seemed like the head of the leech. And it appeared to be smaller in size. However, as I altered the direction of my gaze ..

Another leech.

TWO leeches. As if one wasn't enough.

Double Ew.

And the second one was bigger than the first one ever was, and slimier and grosser.

That was it. I gave in for the night. Thought I'll see to it the next day. Thankfully, when I got up in the middle of the night, the first one had made its way off my door to the wall. The other one was still stuck there.

In the morning, the other one was off my door as well, but then it was sticking onto the door frame. Lifting up its head with its tiny antennae wiggling about in a very mocking manner. And I have absolutely no idea how this happened, but somehow it just unstuck itself and fell down.

I couldn't help but say to myself: Hehehe.

So, my lesson from this experience:
Never use paper to scrape off a leech. It definitely doesn't work, and you wouldn't want to see what might just happen otherwise ..

And what to actually do when you come across an unfortunate situation when you find a leech on your door?

Fundaes anyone? :P