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Wednesday, January 30, 2008

A Crazy weekend in Hyd!

Weekend, Dec 1-2, 2007: There are times when life gives me opportunity to realize that I haven't yet run out of all of my energy. The weekend right before the Bangalore trip was one of those.

7:00 pm, Friday, Nov 30, 2007: Left office early to have Age of Empires (AoE) Sessions at a colleague's place
We played back to back AoE games till 10:00 pm and then played badminton (shuttle) just to stop in between for a while (an hour or two) before getting back into AoE wars. Maggi noodles, our good old friend, constituted our dinner.
...Wars continued till 7:00 am the next day morning.


7:00 am, Saturday, Dec 1, 2007: Crashed on bed as if I was not going to wake up before evening...
...crashed as if I did not know that I couldn't afford to sleep for more than an hour. And as (un)expected got a call at 7:05 am...cursed the guy who called...slept again and then as expected phone rang again at 7:45 am, rushed to home...not to sleep again, but to get ready to go to AOC grounds.

9:30 am: Football match started
10 mins each half...total 20 mins. Thanks to the organizers for warning us in advance that we would be playing with one of the best teams that Deloitte had (later on, they actually won the championship).
First half thankfully no goal (on us). Second half, the other defender of my team was as good as dead, but, he also came back to life when other team did a goal on us by a total fluke. How else would you describe a kick taken from half line resulting into a Goal?

Ohh...did I forget to mention that we were playing one player short...yup it was 3 on 4. Our 3 and a goalkeeper against their 4 and a goalkeeper plus 3 extras whom they were using as rolling substitutions. (Accepted that the field was a little smaller than one-fourth of an actual football field)

10:15 am: Rushed to reach school in time
Generally, we start teaching at the school at 10:00 am every Saturday as part of community service. After the match one of my team-mates dropped me at Panjagutta Circle, one of the busiest cross roads at Hyderabad, on his way back to office and there started another round of struggle.

Traffic signals are the most accepted and widely used as bus stops in Hyderabad. After making a few futile attempts of risking my life to board the correct bus, I could board a bus which was heading in the general direction of the school. Next signal, I saw that there is a bus, just ahead of mine, which was going all the way to my destination. So another adventure at the signal to get into the correct bus.
Reached school at 11:00 am and taught till 12:30 pm.

12:30 pm: aahhh....(Hopefully) Time for some rest and food
Another journey began: traveled sitting at foot-rest (steps) of a bus (no energy to stand)...then one auto rickshaw...another...it was 1:45 pm...I was at another team-mate's home

2:00 pm: Reached another team -mate's home to have lunch...
...believe me! It was a typical Hyderabadi curry...crammed with spices. I ended up adding more of curd - less of curry and with stomach full of water rather than rice.
By the time I could finish that small amount of rice I took into my plate, it was already 2:45 pm

3:30 pm: 2 more football matches
We reached to quarter-finals, to be played on next day, after winning a match and managing to draw another.
Took MMTS (Multi-Modal Transport System, city's train service) at 17:05 pm on the way back to home...hoping to finally get some good sleep.

7:30 pm: Woke up with sonic booms hitting my ears and blasting into my head...
...only to realize that my room-mates were back and one of my extra nice and caring room-mate was playing some high bass music on his woofers. After walking around for half an hour like a zombie and getting back my consciousness I suddenly felt like drinking alcohol that night.
Started calling up buddies...hunt ended with another AoE devotee agreeing for the Evening, post AoE sessions.

1:30 am, Sunday, Dec 2, 2007: Bike ride to cool down body temperature, heightened up due to shuttle matches
After Maggi noddles + AoE games + shuttle matches it was more than required to receive a little cold in order to better enjoy the latter half of the night

2:00 am - 5:00 am: All windows (of my room) open, that mild cool breeze, that red night light of my room, that rock and the company...
...Pink Floyd, Guns n Roses, Green Day, Verve, Bryan, Enrique etc. and other good Hindi songs...drinking that slowly in that ambiance...do I need to say any more!
*!One quarter Smirnoff down!*

(9:00 am: The captain had called up to know why I was not at the football ground for quarterfinals)
(9:30 am: Message from the captain, "dude! we gave them walk-over")

12:30 pm: Don't remember what woke me up but the consciousness wasn't very pleasant
There were series of successive blasts in my cerebrum: HangOver Baby!
Saw the miss calls and the message. I think I also made /received a call to/from a friend to make plans for the rest of the day before falling asleep again.

3:30 pm: I would call it a good day sleep
Another friend poured in and after collecting our senses instead of getting ready for an outing we started playing A O E again.

7:00 pm - 11:00 pm: We pushed out to hang out at Hyderabad Central (a mall in Hyderabad) followed by a good dinner at Chutney's (a restaurant near Central) before heading back to home

Heyy...I really need to crash now...feeling damn sleepy!!!

P.S. If you are wondering why the hell Bangalore trip is even mentioned at first place, well it cleaned considerable mess from my LIFE.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Fountain of Positive Energy

My Orkut (an online community) Profile description for 4 months (Oct-Jan 2007): the poem helped me survive through those tough times
-------------------------------------------------
No more: Booze, AOE & RomComs (From Dec, 2007)
Believe me it is not impossible...at least worth giving a shot at (both above and below).

एक ऐसा गीत गाना चाहता हूँ,
खुशी हो या गम, बस मुस्कुराना चाहता हूँ,

दोस्तों से दोस्ती तो हर कोई निभाता है..
दुश्मनों को भी अपना दोस्त बनाना चाहता हूँ,

जो हम उड़े ऊँचाई पे अकेले, तो क्या नया किया..
साथ मे हर कीसी के पंख फैलाना चाहता हूँ,

वो सोचते हैं कि मैं अकेला हूँ उनके बिना..
तनहाई साथ है मेरे, इतना बताना चाहता हूँ..

ए खुदा, तमन्ना बस इतनी सी है.. कबूल करना..
मुस्कुराते हुए ही तेरे पास आना चाहता हूँ,

बस खुशी हो हर पल, और महकें येह गुलशन सारा “अभी”..
हर किसी के गम को, अपना बनाना चाहता हूँ,

एक ऐसा गीत गाना चाहता हूँ,
खुशी हो या गम, बस मुस्कुराना चाहता हूँ |

P.S. It will be back on the place where it deserves the most!

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Brain Drain

As the name suggests it is on IIT Brain Drain from India to US. I wrote it 2.5 years back during my internship. It was certainly more relevant at that time.
----------------------------------------------------------

Date: Mon, 13 Jun 2005 06:11:12 -0700 (PDT)
From: mitesh agrawal mits_mitesh@yahoo.co.in

To: "eurotrip05@yahoogroups.co.in"
Subject: Time to Think

Hi all,

Here is a little incident happened with me, kindly
spare some time on it.

But before that I would like to tell you something
that you people might already know and that struck my
mind as well after the incident.

There had been great discussions at many places in
India, including IITs about the so called "Brain
Drain" from India to specially US and specially from
IITs.

People have been putting forward many arguments in
favour and against of the above fact. They say
students get well educated in India (use the resources
here) and then they go to US and make their career and
never come back to India (work for US and thus make
the future of US). And the people who never come back
say that why should we go back, if we are getting
higher status of life, earning much more and having
better social security, day – today things are more
easily accessible with lesser effort.

I am sure this mail could be little out of interest
for many of us. But I request you to please go ahead.

The incident is as follows:

On last Thursday, 9th June 2005, I went to the boat
race competition in my town, Tuebingen. It is some
sort of a yearly festival happening in Tuebingen.
There I happen to interact with an elderly lady (a
resident of Tuebingen), her brother and his French
wife who came to visit her and at present are settled
in USA.
After asking few other things such as where do I work,
how long would I be here; they asked me, “Do you have
to study further or work after you finish your current
studies?”
I said, “Yes, I can work.”
“Where would you like to work?”, they asked me next
with curiosity.
“….U.S…”, I replied with a question in my mind that
why were those people so curious to know it.
And they immediately, before I could even finish,
replied with a little anger and desperation in their
voice, “Why do you want to go to US? You people take
higher education outside, make money outside and then
you don’t go back to your country. You should go back
and work for your country and serve your country
people.”
And I was sure any one could make out that there
statement were just not sarcastic or were intended to
insult some educational system or some intellectual
community, but was having a clear intonation of
worries for the development of our country (!!!Haan
Hamara Desh = Mera Bharat Mahan!!!).
One elderly German man and his aged French wife,
settled in USA have so many worries and thoughts for
Our Country.

“We have a family doctor, who is an Indian.” they
added, “When we asked him, “Will you go back to India?
He said, “What is remained there in India, there is
nothing, why shall I go back to India.” Then, he said,
“I have all kinds of comfort in USA, the standard of
living is much higher here and it is very easy to make
money here.””

Though I tried to defend myself saying, “I would like
to came back to India after working there for a few
years.”

They said, “Your country needs you. It is okay if you
go out to make money or to gain some experience for
some time, but then you should come back and help in
developing your country. Instead you people actually
work for US and develop it further“, to end the
discussion.

This discussion left me in my deep thoughts…and in a
need of another discussion…

We say proudly that there are 35% doctors in US are
indian, nasa scientist and silicon valley. I don't say
you don't go out to make money or to make career but
come back to make future of India and then no time we
will be equivalent to the so called super power
"UNITED STATES OF AMERICA". Well…this sounds like an
idealistic theory but it can be practiced only if the
intellectual mass of India like will make an effort to
this.

Of course, decision is yours, but give it a thought.

I don’t want to extend the discussion further, but
before ending it I would like to give an example for
the people saying, “No one actually comes back, above
ideas are only good to think and talk about.”
There is an Indian Post Doc in my lab. He has done his
PhD at EPFL, Switzerland (not a part of European Union
only because people there think that their standard of
living is too high to be the part of EU) and
currently, he is doing his Post Doc research for past
three year at Max-Planck Institute for Developmental
Biology at Tuebingen, Germany. He is planning his way
back to India. So after a total duration of 6-7 years
in Europe he is moving back to India.

I don’t need to say anything more in these regards.

People are invited to put forward their views and
criticism on the lines but don't expect me to reply
them all.

Hope you are all enjoying your happy EURO TRIP.

Wishes and Cheers,
Mitesh Agrawal
3rd Year, Dual Degree Student at
Indian Institute of Technology Madras,
Chennai, India.



P.S. I regret if above mail takes you out from a good
mood.

Message: 10
Date: Mon, 13 Jun 2005 15:26:44 +0100 (BST)
From: SANDEEP LAXMAN
Subject: Re: Time to Think

hi all,
i think mitesh has put up a very good point. During my
exchange program here in france i was granted the
wonderful ooportunity to go look not only into the
life and habits of the people here and understand them
but also reflect upon the life and needs back home.

One thing i realised i europeans are very patriotic to
their country, culture and tradition. When i came here
i saw the felt both a great sense of pride for the
deep and rich culture of our country and also at the
same time felt pain in knowing the fact tht we do not
value it as much as we should. Europeans do not value
America much. I know this might come as a shock to
most but its true. ( I do not intend to hurt the
sentiments of pro-Americans but i am just stating the
facts i have learnt in the past 1 year. For them the
only culture America has is earn money and shop till u
drop.

But y i am i saying all this?? becoz all this made me
closer to India. We all know tht iitians are by far
the best brains in the county - so called the cream of
the country. but if we ourselves are goin to desert
our land, who is goin to take up the charge?? the only
ppl remaining will be the corrupt politicians...

But again we get a much better life in europe or the
US. So, the final question tht remains to be asked to
ourselves is whether we are more important or our
nation???

Countries like Taiwan, Korea and Japan were in the same
state tht India are today, 50 years ago. But they had
a generation of hard working people who have made
their countries "developed"....

I apologise if this hurts somebody's sentiments but I
think this is a very relevant question becoz we are
the next driving force for our country/ world. Please
feel free express your views...

Sandeep

PS:thnx Mitesh, i had this thing on mind too long...

3rd Year Elec.
IIT Delhi/INSA Lyon