The Motor, the lioness and the herd of buffaloes in my bedroom

Though not a devout Christian (no way I can be one....am neither devout nor Christian) it was with a considerable amount of eagerness that I was looking forward to the Christmas holidays, the idea being to spend 5 whole days at my cousin's place free from all records, observations, classes and all such kinds of brain-degrading toxic issues, that plague the life of an engineering student. So on Thursday evening, with happiness and sunshine...er...wait, there wasn't any sunshine...actually it was raining like hell. The point, anyway, is this: in spite of all the thundering clouds and heavy precipitation, my spirit wasn't dampened in the slightest (though my clothes were), as I set out to my cousin's place. After the hour and half long bus journey and a quarter hour's travel by auto-rickshaw, I was standing at the doorstep of my aunt's house (which is the same as my cousin's place, the aunt in question being the cousin's mother).

Hence it was with a bit of annoyance that I learnt that my fool of a cousin had decided to spend her time 'usefully' by doing some 'in-plant training' during the holidays. So there I was, left to myself and my cronies (my laptop and books) all day. And it was during this 5 day period that strange things began to happen...at night.

The motor started running at rated speed. We began to vary the position of the field rheostat of the generator to bring it to rated voltage. Suddenly the tachometer reading began to soar upwards all of its own. We started looking around frantically. The ammeter inched towards 24.6, 24.7, and 24. 8...the fuse blew up.

I woke up panting heavily. The time was 3 in the morning and I was in my bedroom at my cousin's place. Wiping my forehead, I returned to bed. Suddenly I realised I could still hear some kind of motor running...somewhere downstairs. I was too sleepy to check and dozed off. I forgot all about this incident the next day.

The cubs were playing with each other and the mom was looking at her kids play. The dad, His Majesty king Lion was lazily yawning. I took out my camera to get a picture of the happy family. Momma lioness wasn't very pleased and she started growling. And all of a sudden with a ferocious roar, she pounced...and I woke up again. Realising this was again a nightmare, I returned to bed, though I could still hear the growling inside my head...

Two days passed uneventfully and beginning to get bored, I decided to return to college the next day.

I was running like I've never done in my life. The herd of buffaloes were chasing me like I was a threat to their entire clan. It was an open ground that I was running about, with nowhere to hide. The buffaloes were gaining on me...closing up on me real fast. I tried ploughing through my memory, wondering if I had in the past, made any insulting statement about Laloo. I could feel the hot breath of the foremost of my pursuers on my back. At this point something told me that I had no business being chased by herds of buffaloes in the middle of the night in some open ground. And presto! I woke up. The door was unlocked and slightly ajar...I could still hear something that sounded like a buffalo snorting in disgust. Deciding to investigate, I descended down the stairs...

...

...

...

to find my cousin let out a snore that sounded like a 5KW DC motor, a growling lioness and a herd of buffaloes taking it in turns to huff, puff and snort in disgust, all combined.

Girl in Red

The Beautiful Girl In Red was staring at me with her beautiful wide eyes, which had in them a dreamy look, as if filled by mist. And then suddenly, it was this pair of ugly small eyes that I found glaring at me, which certainly did not belong to the Beautiful Girl In Red. It was at this point that a few interesting revelations that dawned upon me:

1. It was Monday afternoon and I was sitting in my lecture hall, which was definitely not the disco hall I had been dreaming about.

2. It, being the 3^rd hour, our classroom was inhabited by an extremely hostile being called the Solid State Devices lecturer.

3. And the ugly pair of eyes belonged to him.

4. He had caught me sleeping for the 4^th time that hour.

By reflex, I adopted the standard measures followed in such situations of emergency. My face twisted into an intelligent, concentrating frown, and my head started nodding in the most understanding manner, as though I was aware of, and empathised with the lecturer’s innermost thoughts and feelings.

And the inevitable happened.

Fifteen seconds later I found myself walking along the corridor towards the toilet to wash my face, as ordered. It was during that brief interval from the boredom and dreariness of class that I started musing on how things had been turning out all day.

It all began that morning when I woke up with horror at having overslept. I opened my record file to find that I still had 3 graphs to complete before the lab session in the morning. Bathing in mornings had become a long forgotten habit. Still having one more graph to go, I rushed to class early enough so that I could reserve myself a seat in the coveted back rows. Having settled myself into one, I resumed work on the graph when my phone started buzzing and to my horror I realised it wasn’t in silent mode. I thanked God class hadn’t still started and took it out. It was my roommate no.1 (roommate nos.2,3,4,5 and 6 being the lizard, 3 spiders and the upper floor chappie who perpetually hangs out in our room) calling from the neighbouring room guy’s phone. He had left his key above the door while leaving to take a bath (dirty habit, as I call it). Five minutes later, he’s finished with the bathing thing and he returns only to find that the Door With The Room Key Above It isn’t quite the Door With The Room Key Above It as much as it is the Door Without The Room Key Above It. So now what we have is a Door Without A Room Key Above It, But With A Completely Baffled Guy Wrapped In A Towel in front of it.

Cursing myself and the stupid room key that was conspicuous by its absence, I started on my way back to the hostel with my own room key, with the intention of relieving the Roommate In Distress. On the way, I ran into this Chappie, whom we shall refer to as Chappie 43513 (no particular reason for the number...just a whimJ). Now Chappie 43513 is highly interested in knowing why I am heading in the direction of the hostel with only 5 minutes left for class. I explain the situation to him in as few words as possible.

Blink.

Blink.

The blinking this time was not mine, for a change. It was Chappie 45313’s. Before I could enquire as to the reason, he put his hand inside his pocket with the mystery of a magician about to pull a rabbit out of his hat. And out came not a rabbit, but something far more baffling. The Room Key That Was Supposed To Be Above The Door. He told me that he’d found it above our room door and had attributed it to my absent-mindedness.

I sent Chappie 45313 back with the assignment of reliving The Roommate In Distress and came back to attend to my graphs and tables.

Lab that day wasn’t very eventful, except for the fact that I had to walk between the staff table and my experiment table 23 times, each time with a different correction to be made on my record before it was finally accepted as satisfactory.

And after lunch, here we return, back to class, dreaming about Beautiful Girls In red turtle necks, only to be interrupted by Solid State Lecs with Ugly Eyes. Sigh...have taken long enough to wash my face...better be returning to class...

Hell...art thou rechristened EEE lab?!

If the reader might have enough patience to actually scroll down to one of my pervious posts, titled ‘Blown Fuse’ in which the author(which refers to me) has so accurately portrayed the plight of innocent and angelic(and certain not so innocent or angelic) first year engineering students in the wiring lab, you might find that more than one of the gentlemen who were kind enough to comment had warned him about the impending doom that was called ‘EEE lab’(Pera kettale summa adhirudhilla?!). Whew! That was one long sentence, wasn’t it? Anyway, this post is about the author’s (referring to me, again) experiences in EEE lab, or Machines lab, as we call it.

They say hell is a real unpleasant place. I mean if you want to have a nice mug of cold coffee with a friend and enjoy a nice chat, hell, definitely is not the first place you will consider for venue. I, in fact would have it at the bottom of my ‘List of Places to Have a Nice Chat With a Friend’. The obvious reason being the fact, that hell, being hot, would not keep your cold coffee cold for a very long time. The other more obvious reason would be the fact that you ought to be dead first in order to step into that place. I discovered soon that the above statement need not be necessarily true, i.e. you need not be dead at all in order to enter hell. Oh yes, I was very much alive when I entered EEE lab the first time.

The standard procedure inside EEE lab is as follows:

1. Enter lab with your observation book ready for the day’s experiment and the record for the previous week’s experiment, failing which you are thrown out.
2. Apply the lab’s seal on the last page of the record and observation.
3. Answer the attendance and move over to the table containing the equipment for the day’s experiment.
4. Write the name plate details of the motor/generator/transformer you are going to perform the experiment on, in your observation book. Also calculate the ranges for the various meters and other measuring apparatus you will need to do the experiment. Fill these details in the circuit diagram and in the ‘Apparatus Required’ table.
5. Pick a staff member of your choice and get your circuit diagram valued by him or her. Also finish the viva voce test by answering their questions connected to the day’s experiment. The choice of staff doesn’t matter much unless your preparation is perfect. If one deducts marks for the circuit diagram, the other does the same for viva voce. If you’ve prepared well, you’d be wise to choose the person who deducts marks for viva voce.
6. Fill in a requisition slip for the apparatus you need and get it signed by a staff member. Hand it in and receive the apparatus you need.
7. Give the connections as given in the circuit diagram and have it verified by a staff member. After that, switch on the supply. If you failed to get the connections verified and the fuse blows, you get thrown out of the lab. (If you get the connections verified by a staff member and the fuse STILL BLOWS, they don’t throw the staff member out, though. You get scolded, instead.)
8. Proceed with the experiment.
9. After its done, sit down to do the calculations, if there is still time left.
10. Get the observation corrected within 2 days of completing the experiment.

That was quite a list, whew…! It took me 17 minutes to finish. Well, anyway you can see from the list that you have more ways to get out of the lab than to stay there. But the high levels of strictness is in fact, necessary, I should say. The reason being that people deal with high voltage equipment over there and must be careful with what they do over there. It is too early for me to write anything further about the lab, having attended only two lab sessions. Maybe will have more to write about it when I attend more classes.

Why I like EEE lab:

• Interest…not kidding. Am seriously interested in the stuff.

• They do not spoon-feed people. You are responsible for whatever happens to you or whatever you do in there.

• You learn a lot if you prepare sincerely for each experiment.

• Character building stuff…!!!

Why I do not like EEE lab:

• It can be a real pain in the neck.

• IT IS a real pain in the neck.

• Have been writing EEE record for the past 2 hours…enough to make anyone go crazy.

sisi..vava..sisi..vava..sisi..vava...SIVAJI!!

Sivaji, a Review:
Starring: Rajinikanth, Shriya, Vivek, Suman, Manivannan, Raghuvaran...etc
Director: Shankar
Produced by: AVM

Its been a 2 year gap for both director Shankar(since Anniyan) and superstar Rajini(since Chandramukhi) and I must say they've both made good use of these two years, coming up with a movie like Sivaji. Am not sure about the budget of this movie...various websites are coming up with different values, the average being 80 crores, and wikipedia stating it at 100 crores. Whichever it is, Sivaji definitely is the biggest in the history of tamil movie industry. Most of this seems to have been spent on the fighting and song sequences(and of course, the superstar's salary, from what i learnt from various websites) and they have come out real well, I must say. Well now...on to the movie itself...

Story wise, Sivaji doesn't really have anything new...it differs from a typical Shankar movie* in only 2 ways:

1. There is no 'flashback involving the death of a loved one which causes the hero to rise up against the forces of evil in the society' kind of thing.

2. A bit more of masala than a usual Shankar movie, but this is perfectly understandable, as the movie has the superstar himself in it.

Our hero Sivaji is a 'software systems architect' (as he tells his mom) returning from the US ater amassing loads of wealth which he wants to spend on building colleges and schools to give people free education and hospitals to give free treatment. Quite the thing expected from a wealthy hero. He wants to do things the perfectly legal way, however he soon finds that doing things the perfectly legal way is impossible in our country and that there is a price to be paid(literally) for anything, even if it is social service. After innumerable bribes he gets his dream project 'Sivaji Foundations' up and going. The villain Adi Seshan(played by Suman, who once played Rajini's younger brother in 'Thee') a powerful industrialist owning many colleges and hospitals is quite obviously not pleased with Sivaji's idea. He fears competition to his own colleges and hospitals and wants to stop Sivaji, at any cost.Using all his cunning and devious means(one of which involves changing the government...ahem) he succeeds in ruining our hero completely and bringing down the almost completed 'Sivaji Foundations' to rubble. And the second half sees our Hero on the 'Singa Paathai'(as he calls it) meaning the lion's path, cleaning up the system and achieving his goal.

The first half isn't very serious at all and is filled with humour by Rajini and Vivek, who plays Rajini's uncle in the movie. Yeah Rajini's uncle, you read that right. A fact he himself thinks is simply too much, in the movie("Naan onakku maamava? Idhu konjam overa illa?"). But the dutiful maama he is, trying sincerely to find a bride for his 'nephew'. After they zero in on TamizhSelvi(Shriya), its a laugh riot, the way Sivaji and his family try to what they call 'socialise' with the heroine and family. At a point Rajini even tries turning white(!) and he even succeds temporarily(!!). The heroine and her family eventually give in. In between come a couple of hero-heroine duets. I must make a special mention of the songs. They are a real treat to watch. The sets are exquisite and filled with grandeur. Anyway the first half ends with our hero on the street sans all money and property, with just one rupee in his hand which the villain gives him, suggesting that he try begging as a career option. And it is this one rupee that our hero uses to get back at the people who brought him to the street and to achieve his ultimate goal. How? Well, go watch the movie people...am not here to tell you the entire story!

The issue Shankar deals with in this movie is black money and free education (it was free education in Gentleman, bribery in Indian, corrupt politics in Mudhalvan and the irresponsible citizen in Anniyan). It is the second half of the movie that absolutely rocks, though. The movie is a bit long, but there's loads of stuff for the hero to do, so I think it's quite justified. There's quite a bit of matrix style fighting in there(running on walls and some fancy flying kicks and cool martial arts moves). A lot of the whole movie is unbelievable, but hey...this is kollywood, ain't it? And it's the superstar himself, man...so one can't really complain about it being unrealistic...Personally I think there's no problem with masala movies, as long as things don't get too stupid like bullets bouncing back from archanai plates(which they do in certain movies). As for the music...it is ARR, isn't it? What more could one want? The songs, as most of ARR's grow on you the more you listen to them. The background score is quite good, too.

And about whether if it was a Shankar movie or a Rajini movie...well...can't say for sure. Let me put it this way: It's a Shankar movie told Rajini's way.

Why you must watch the movie:
1.Shankar, Rajini and A.R.Rahman...think you'll ever see them together again?
2.Beautifully shot song sequences...worth watching only on the large screen.
3.A really cool and gripping second half...it really rocks.
4.Vivek: Definitely his best performance since Anniyan...playing sidekick to Rajini in all his ventures...like Goundamani was to Arjun in Gentleman. He also gets the best lines in the movie.

Why you may not see the movie:
If you are a really hardcore masala movie hater, stay away. Don't see the movie and complain that is isn't realistic...a film can be good even if it isn't realistic.

My favourite scenes:
1. The scene where Rajini negotiates with Suman, outside the tea stall.
2. Where Rajini tries to turn white for Shriya.

My favourite lines:

1. Chittoor thandina Kaatpadi, Sivaji adichcha dead body...!!-Vivek
2. Whoever agrees to my conditions may stay here. The rest of you please wait in the 'Office room'-Rajini.
3. Villain(over phone): Who is this?
Sivaji: Paraasakthi hero, da!
4. Summa adhiruthilla?!!-Rajini

If you want to know more about the 'office room', go watch the movie. And my humble request to all fans is this. Please watch this movie in a theater...it is really worth it. Watching it on a pirated video would be like having apple pie without the apple in it.

Trivia:

• Shivaji is the name of Rajnikanth's character. Rajnikanth's birth name is Shivaji Rao Gaekwad.
• Was set to be released in April 14th 2007, was postponed to May and finally to June 15th 2007. The continuous change in the release date of the film has caused a confusion in the Tamil film industry. Many other big films stayed away because they don't want to clash with Shivaji, in the end there were no big release for the months of April and May. For the first time in the history of Tamil commercial cinema since the 50's there was no big summer release.
• This is 168th film for AVM, the production company and the 100th Tamil film (not counting his other language films) for Rajinikanth.
• The movie is releasing with 4600 prints worldwide and has created a record in India as the only movie to be screened with more than 700 shows on a single day. Chennai alone constitutes 140 shows on the opening day.

Source for trivia: IMDB

*Typical Shankar movie: A typical shankar movie is defined as one in which the hero is a single man fighting certain evil forces in the society that hinder the development of our country, usually resorting to means that are quite frowned upon by the law (stealing and killing people, for example). This phenomenon is due to certain traumatic events in the hero's past which is shown in the flashback, usually involving the death of a loved one, caused by the 'evil forces in the society' that our hero is fighting against.

I'm Going Mad...SERIOUSLY!

I'm going mad. I really am. Let me tell you why I think so.

Why I Think I'm Going Mad:

1.I'm an engineering student.
2.I'm an Electrical and Electronic Engineering student.
3.I'm in second year of college.
4.I have EEE lab.
5.Our maths teacher is giving people short names(She's probably too dumb to read out their full names).
6.She expects people to attend tutorial hours.
7.She actually expects us to solve problems in tutorial hours.
8.We have to attend tutorial classes for DC Machines too.
9.Our DC Machines lecturer expects us to believe that the weird looking enlarged eyeball she drew on the board was a DC Motor.
10.Solid State Devices.


Sigh...
It all started on my first day in second year. That was five days ago. I woke up at 6.30 on the day mentioned above and dressed like I was about to attend an interview. As for the thing one calls bathing that is usually done between waking up and dresssing for class...grow up people..!! What are deo-sprays for?!! Washed my face and actually smeared some sacred ash on my forehead...or at least, that's what I wanted people to believe. A wiser person would've asked me if it was Ponds sandal talc or Cinthol deo talc (it was Ponds, by the way ). The point is, the final result produced was an image of Ultimate Studiousness. That combined with my 'sincerely listening and occassional nodding' act, and the lecs would've taken me to be the most studious person in the college.

Anyways, I entered the class with a kind of bad feeling...and left it with a worser one. This was what happened in between:

Two hours of Field Theory: I fell into coma right on the first class of the year...have nothing against the subject or the lec, though...

An Hour of Solid State Devices: Solid State Devices drew liquid from my eyes...was afraid ppl might think I was weeping...was yawning that much.

An hour of Math: I DON'T want to say anything about this...too traumatic...lady actually expects ppl to attend tutorials...simply outrageous..!

An hour of DC Machines: Its gotta be pretty good I think, if you can atleast determine the language the lecturer speaks in. I've so far been successful in translating 'Nembers' to 'Numbers'.



Bottomline: Om textbookaya namaha..!

Blown fuse!!!

“I want that, when you leeve this lab, you know sometheeng about circoots and gain baseec knowlege about wireeng…”

I still remember those words our wiring instructor told us on our very first wiring class, in his funny English. I thought then,”He seems to be really dedicated though his english is funny…I really must learn something when I complete this lab.” That was 2 months and 3 days ago. A lot happens in 2 months and 3 days. It is now my heartfelt opinion that wiring instructors ought to be electrocuted in their own wiring labs for causing unbearable mental agony and tension to innocent first year engineering students. No, its not like I didn’t learn anything…here’s a list of what I learnt from attending wiring classes:

1. One sweats like a pig in wiring lab. There is only one table fan and it is focused on to the instructor’s table.
2. The ‘drinking’ water in the container there ought to be labeled ‘liquid chlorine’.
3. You ought to get your observation notebook signed within one week of doing the experiment.
4. A lot of people don’t do that.
5. You are asked to get a letter signed by the chairman tutor for mass bunking wiring.
6. Only over-sincere specimens do that.
7. The chairman tutor’s signature is easy to forge.
8. The best way to escape writing the wiring test is by not completing your ‘project report’. The wiring guy usually sends you out in that case.
9. Sometimes, as in my case, he scolds you heavily and makes you write the test if you don’t submit the ‘project report’.
10. If you’ve lost your wiring observation, the best thing to do is pinch someone else’s.
11. Be careful, lest someone pinches yours (mine got pinched).
12. And again, it’s easy to forge the instructor’s sign.
13. If you intend commit any kind of fraud with wiring observation, do it when he’s most busy.

Those were the things I learnt in wiring lab. Well, yeah, I concede that readers might have expected me to mention something about wiring somewhere in the previous statements. After all, wiring lab is meant to teach people wiring. Unfortunately I would be deceiving the readers if I said that.

Why?

Because, the focus was more on completing the observation and record, the assignments, and the project, that we got very little chance to learn something at all. At the end of the wiring lab sessions, these are the skills I’ve acquired:

· Forging the wiring instructor’s signature.

· Manipulating observation notebooks.

· Enhanced creativity in inventing excuses.

Indeed, the workload was so heavy that we didn’t give a damn about understanding why the tube lights and bulbs glowed, as long as they did glow.

But then, if you come to think about it, why do we need to know how it works? Agreed, we’re ‘engineering’ students, but let’s face it; we really aren’t going to do much of engineering, are we? I mean, about 80% of us are going to sit in some 4”x4” cubicle staring at a monitor and typing away on a keyboard for 9 hours a day at the end of 4 years, earning 40k a month, approximately, aren’t we? Maybe on one odd day, the tube light glowing above our head will stop working…and as we’re waiting for the electrician to show up, we might think,” maybe if I’d had shown more interest in wiring workshop, I might have repaired it myself…sigh”

Deviating…again…well, I’d better sign off before I get too preachy…

P.S. Whoever’s reading this please do scribble a few comments, even if all you have to say is how you hate this blog…

The tale of the Trolls...

Its rather weird. Have been looking for something to write about for 2 weeks, but couldn't think of anything. But one class...one class of basic civil engineering and my creativity soared to hitherto unknown levels...



4/4/07 Basic Civil Engineering

Faced Walls:

Faced walls are walls which have faces. Oh yes indeed, they have faces. Infact, they have faces so ugly that even Grosby the troll looks sexier. This is no mean fact as Grosby the troll has been the winner of the 'Bumpler's ugliest troll award' for the past six years in a row. Though this year it is rumoured that Grosby might face serious competition from Fiqowd the Despicable one, an up and coming ugly troll. Fiqowd is rumoured to have caused the death of 82 humans, 45 cows and buffaloes and 32 stray dogs till date by displaying his face in close quarters. Troll land police are still investigating the deaths, but so far no evidence has been found pointing to Fiqowd. Fiquowd refused to comment on the issue. He is busy with his preparation for this year's 'Bumpler's ugliest troll' showdown which is to take place tomorrow. He is confident of winning the same. Ad offers are already beginning to pour in, he says...

2 days later:
Results of the annual 'Bumpler's ugliest troll' have been announced!