Recollections of Life - Engineering (Part 1)

Hi there readers...good to see that at least some people are reading my blog!!...that too without my telling them...hehehe...keep it up!!

Anyway, back to my recollections...the next ones are about my stint with engineering. After my 12th boards and an agonisingly long wait of 7 months, our college, MIT Pune, started on the 17th of Sept. 2003!!...For me, it started with a bang...literally. My bike (i had a Scooty back then) helped me a lot in creating the bang!! As i was going to college, a nail went straight through the front tyre, causing a really loud bang! Thats how my engineering started with a bang. After half an hour of waiting i finally reached college...just in time for the Principals address (i realized after the whole thing was over that it was called 'PRINCIPAL's ADDRESS' but everyone else spoke waaaay more than what the principal said).

Looking around, i saw quite a few familiar faces..but that was the problem. I only remembered their faces and not their names. I had always been proud of the fact that i don't forget names and faces, but that confidence had obviously left me when i needed it the most. It was scary. I went through a series of visions in which people came up to me and said "Hi, how are you?? Long time..." and then the most dreaded of all statements "Remember me!!??"...and then my face became red with embarrassment. But nothing of the sort happened...thankfully.

The first day was nothing great...some boring speeches, some prof saying "...the mighty MIT....", something being said about some 'WHALE IN THE OCEAN OF STUDENTS...' (or something like that...clearly i was not paying attention!!...but there was some whale somewhere...)

Then, college began in all earnest the next day. Finding my roll number in a list that spanned the whole blackboard and one more was a challenge. I thought "Is this the challenge they were talking about in the inaugural speech??"...but i was assigned to FE IV...nothing of any significance then. But when i went in the class, i saw 3-4 friends of mine. I was happy to meet them (and to remember their names). That day onwards began a journey that i'll never be able to forget.

Some people have a knack to be comedians, some to be leaders, some to be great at studies, some to make friends instantly. I had none of them. And no one in our class had all these qualities. But, together our class was great. We had our share of jesters, the goons, the reticent studious ones, the comment-passers etc etc. One thing we lacked was our share of girls. There were about 4 girls in our class...and 70 boys!!...it was going to be tough for the poor girls. 1:17.5 is hardly a ratio to be comfortable with. And more than the girls, it was going to be tough for us...and boy was it tough!!...

To be continued in the next blog...