The Chronicles of a Happy Life

Some people of my batch have taken to playing a very primitive game on the first floor of our hostel, late into the night. I can’t believe they are wasting their time and energy like this! Don’t they understand the value of time?! They should be sitting in front of their computers, searching for and downloading good TV shows like ‘Sex and the City’ (dunno why some guy downloaded only a few episodes scattered over a few seasons. Isn’t that against the sacred law of downloading or sth?), ‘Simpsons’ (I want more) and the 70s show (the person who stopped downloading right after ‘Donna’ got that uniform should be tried as a war criminal!).

Now, back to this primitive game - they give it the name of a noisy insect, which in a weird way makes sense since it involves people making much ado about nothing at frequent intervals. So what if some spherical object hit three thin sticks instead of hitting some other thick stick?!

As I’ve said time and again, I’ve nothing against sports. But these people insist playing right in the middle of public shortcuts (Isn’t the ground only intended for people to walk along the diagonal from one corner to the next?). Not only that, these people also have the George-Bush-syndrome, they believe that everybody has to either be a fervent supporter of whatever they are doing or be crazy! And it gets worse. If the beastly spherical object gets thrown/hit at you for no reason at all, instead of being sorry and apologetic they expect you to throw it back at them - and they maintain an expression of angry impatience while you are doing it!!!

It also gets stranger when people on TV play it. How can anyone watch 22 grown men, who should know better, chase a little ball, and then when they finally see it coming to them, do their best to bat it as far away as possible? Some people who watch like to hurl obscenities while all this is going on. And then they call it the gentleman’s game!

Yesterday evening, I witnessed an interesting discussion between our resident Paresh Rawal (PR) and the resident one-man Think Tank (TT). The scene was a dilapidated classroom where innocent school children were punished by the modern education system during the day and we were punished.. uhm taught by CL at night. Our prof was a young dude (in all senses of the word!) and so Think Tank felt obliged to address him by his name whereas Paresh Rawal held that ‘Sir’ was the appropriate honorific to be used. This difference of opinion eventually led to a colorful exchange of words that included well-thought-out predictions on the moniker to be used for both parties by their respective progeny and so on, but a discussion of that would be a digression from the topic of this post. It also set me thinking.

In my first year, when we healthily interacted with our seniors - many happy and painful (sometimes together) memories there… I wonder why nobody has posted on it so far - our elders insisted that we address them as ‘Sir’ and ‘Madam’. It was a IIIT tradition. Of course, we willingly complied. I’ve always thought that it was a little silly but a tolerable foible of the seniors who did mind being called anything else. A guy I know once threatened to kill me just because I referred to him by the pronoun ‘him’ while talking to a junior in his presence! (He finally let me off after a couple of runs to and fro across a hostel wing). After the freshers’ party, we were told that we could address them by their names. However, the habit stayed with most of us till long afterward. Even today, I might start the conversation by addressing the senior by his first name but somewhere in between ‘Sir’ slips out of my mouth.

I’ve also had the opportunity to see the other side of the coin. I couldn’t interact much with many of my immediate juniors but the current first years have addressed me as ‘Sir’ more than most English Lords ever hear in their lifetimes. At one time, I tried to fight it. I explained to every junior that I saw, that I was not even a distant relative of any member of the English peerage and so the honorific with which he addressed me was not technically correct. Unfortunately, there were just too many of them and it was impossible to keep track of who had been instructed and who hadn’t. Furthermore, an entire batch of them would be added every year and it would be asinine to repeat the entire exercise all over again! So I gave up. It does do some good I guess. It does teach one the correct pronunciation of ‘Sir’ and ‘Madam’ and that would definitely help if one finds oneself working in a conservative bank somewhere.

BTW, I’ve managed to lose my big fat dictionary in my small room :( I’m as stumped as C was on Valentine’s Day ‘04, enroute to the terrace of the girl’s hostel! :D

It’s Nappy’s birthday today. Dude, wish you a long and fruitful life and everything else…

I was born at around 1:40 AM, 29th December, 1984 (So now you know abt the number in my blog address!). Some people firmly believe that your birthdate has a lot to do with the kind of person you are. I remember, once in first year, I was having a mess table discussion with Joon. I told him that the great Dhirubhai Ambani was born on 28th December and so was Ratan Tata… Thus, I joked that people born around that date are industrious, ambitious and hard-working and it was destined that I become a great entrepreneur. He chewed on his food for a moment and then said, “Vishwas Rao was also born on December 29″… I really didn’t, have much to say after that…

As a matter of fact, I was a great believer in astrology till I came here. I had read Linda Goodman’s ‘Sun Signs’ from cover to cover and the stuff about me and people I knew was almost always true. Of course, I’m more rational now and I’ve realized that a large number of vague statements with witty examples from real life not only make interesting reading but are almost always right about yourself and people you know, especially if you want to believe them. Also, in IIIT, I’ve met three other people - Aseem, Rao and Amit Handa born on the same day as me and all of us have totally different characteristics :D Btw, a good side effect of my faith in astrology has been that I can remember birthdates quite easily which is good.. even though at times, I’ve been terribly teased because of it ;)

I’ve never tired of looking for ways for classifying people.. This does not mean that I’m judgemental. I love to be friends with all.. It’s just that I’m somewhat of an amateur anthropologist - I love studying people. their reactions to different things, what motivates them, etc.. Not too long ago I read a book on the four personality types of Sanguine, Melancholy, Choleric and Phlegmatic. People who are Melancholy are perfectionist idealists and great for intellectual work but they also tend to be depressed for long periods of time. Cholerics are those who shout, “Do it my way… NOW!”. They are excellent at getting things done but some people find them arrogant and overbearing. Sanguines are everybody’s best friends. They excel at dealing with other people but they are not very good at maintaining systematic, order. They are the artistic type. Phlegmatic are not very good at anything, but they are the most peaceful. People love them though they are too lazy to even change the channel on their own! That is the best classification of people I’ve come across. According to the test at the back of the book - I was a combination of Melancholy and Choleric.. which makes me the ideal candidate for a high-paying job or starting my own business - you never know, what these recruiters or venture capitalists might be reading ;). Also, this means that I generally like girls who are the Sanguine type… all of which is perfectly true.. So what type are you?

Election fever is over. The results have not been announced though, the reasons behind which only God and the Election Comm know and that after repolling X-( “Who did you vote for?” was about to become the standard icebreaker on campus. It should be relegated to the bottom of the pile of ice-breakers, right there with ‘How was your exam?’ and ‘did u know we have an assignment submission tonight?’ Thankfully, all the contestants I met limited themselves to ‘Did you vote?’ Apparently, all of them think I’m going to vote for them - which is good, in some ways >:)

While on the subject of irritating things… work/play stopping problems with my PC are on the top of my list. Frequent readers of my blog know how much I love my computer and I just go crazy when I see that it’s sick.

It really sux when people you want to talk to don’t have cell phones and people you don’t want to talk to, generally have them with unlimited talk time to boot :( Jagan, I hope you remember me when you buy your first cell phone.

My cell phone has a virus :( I got an sms and when I replied to it.. all of a sudden the number of unsent messages in my cell increases from 7 to 254. I’m going crazy deleting each one!! If this was the USA, I could have sued the company and become rich by now… and I wouldn’t have to study for these stupid end sems in such beautiful weather. Dammit!