‘Twas my B’Day and Life’s just on @the Pinnacle…
Posted by Prashanth | Filed under Birdwatching, Blogging, College, FIITJEE Pinnacle, General, It's My Life, Linux, Photography, Quizzing, School Life, Shutterbugs, Technology
Sorry to intercept your flow of feeds from several blogs around cyberspace with this distantly familiar web page with a forgotten author(s), but well, my blog did miss attention from people everywhere including me. And so did I. Loads of things happened since June, when I last made any kind of an update, (not referring to the blogroll) on the blog. Anyway, its nearly 2 months since then, with a few sharable events.
- Uma Leaves to NIFT B’lore
You people must have read this previously on the blog that Uma is not between us anymore. She left this place on the 24th of July. Anyway, things have been fun there as per what I hear from her these days. I am quite sure things must be very different in an all new place where someone has to get used to not having those family pampers in all it’s bounty amongst many other things. After all, it is kind of impossible to fit eighteen years worth of an eventful lifetime in three suitcases and one tiny little skull! (This line is by Uma herself!) And it isn’t everyday that your bestest friend in the whole world leaves to another place and sudden change in how often you speak or the detail in which you tell things just doesn’t feel right. There is immense nostalgia for so many things in her head for now. Just wish her good luck. She is finally studying what she wanted to, something very few people realize in time. You people MIGHT hear more from her once she gets her PC there.
- My Birthday
Yes, I turned seventeen last Thursday, the 28th of August. Not particularly eventful, except that I almost had my hips and my back broken. Had dinner at Chopstix, an amazing place near Siri Fort Auditorium. More on that later, but then nothing really worth too much mention. Coming to gifts, my parents decided not to buy me anything that could engage me, like for instance books, or new hardware for the PC, etc. I didn’t turn up at Matrix-Ecomm 2008, @ MSM as these days I am more serious about getting into IIT and doing well with my subjects than I ever was before.
- Got a new puppy!
Yes, I now am a proud owner of a month old Pomeranian puppy whose name is still in the beta testing stages. It’s biscuit brown in color and is really small, soft and cuddly. It feels like a lovely toy. When it first entered the house, I thought of naming it on people whom I really consider as dogs, but then eventually I fell in love with it so much that, now I don’t want it to remind me of dogs anymore! It learnt barking just a week ago. Anyway, a few pictures should be enough to have all of you green here…
Suggest me some cute and catchy names please… And, before I forget, its a GUY!
- Had another meet at Basant Lok
Had a really fun meet at Yo! China with Abhishek, Roshan, Ayush, and Uma before Uma left Delhi. The meet was ornamented with PJs and fun talks followed with window shopping at Om Book Shop.
- Upgraded to Ubuntu 8.04.1 LTS 64bit
I used Gutsy(7.10) previously, and upgrading wasn’t really hard and it isn’t as bad as some people claim it to be. Heck, I have even heard of Linux enthusiasts migrating to Windows Vista after using it! On the contrary, it is zippier and the experience really isn’t very different from what I used before. The bug fixes and performance tweaks and other minor changes make it a release with nothing much to be excited about, but then you wouldn’t regret an upgrade. With better hardware support, I finally got my ancient HP 1100 printer working with Ubuntu.
- Movies I saw this Summer
- The Dark Knight - Awesome! A review is scheduled soon. Take my word, it isn’t your normal superhero flick.
- 21 - “Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!” An amazing watch again. really brilliant camera work and direction. The girl was good too. MIT is reason enough for many to watch it.
- The Man from the Earth - An unconventional movie which is nothing more than a gripping discussion between university professors. Simply brilliant. I wish I could write this movie a review.
- Sicko - Micheal Moore. Period.
- Disney’s Mulan - If you liked Pocahontas, you should find this one okay.
- Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dam - Had seen it long time ago, but saw it once more and I still find it just as good.
- Pulp Fiction - I guess I would be the only person on the planet to hate it. Before you hurl curses and other vegetables on my taste in movies, just know that I really love South Park, Friends and even Simpsons. I just hated this movie. Even with the subtitles!
- Goodbye Lenin - Another recommendation by Uma, just like many others in this list. Was fun.
- Stranger than Fiction - Fabulous. Really witty and engaging. Suttle yet a powerful comic storyline. Amazing direction! This was Roshan’s recommendation.
- Following - Christopher Nolan zindabad!
- Sarkar Raj - Copied storyline or not, the movie is a refreshing watch. Brilliant camera work. Wonderful dialogues!
- Khuda Ke Liye - Angering plot. Makes you wonder - just how many problems could you put on one family? It might frustrate you a lot. But nice music scores, especially those in the background. Good camera work and filled with appealing/pleasing colors.
Would love to go on in this list, but there are other events to cover.
- Photography Expedition at JNU
Or perhaps a get-together that Uma, Roshan and I had planned in JNU with our cameras. Had a fun time laughing, throwing lame PJs, bickering, birdwatching, trailing in the woods, getting caught in the rain, eating canteen food, and even watching a movie in the end. Will dedicate a post on this. ‘Twas a memorable time spent there.
- Columban Open Quiz 2008
Went with an all new team consisting of two ex-DPS Damanjodi students and Sourabh from the previous team. Reached the semis, and were tanked out after that. Wasn’t really good as I heard that many questions were rip offs from other quizzing events. Too bad I couldn’t take advantage of the situation. Was kind of boring this time. I don’t think I would dedicate a post on it now.
- @the Pinnacle
Our JEE syllabus is almost complete now. really gearing up for 2-2.5 months of review sessions. Solving the entire 25 year IIT-JEE archive end to end making sure that everything is crystal clear. CBSE based exams are bugging in the middle of all this and to my surprise (read: shock!) it isn’t seeming as easy as swatting a fly this time. Nonetheless, the situation seems to be in control, but then I do need to take a long term Sanyaas or a penance to the sins committed against IIT-JEE prep last year. This year, I plan to waste very little of my time in the least no. of competitive events. Delhi students need not start celebrating yet, as I might surprise you! 
Tons of changes at school. Will write a lot about it too. Also, upgraded to Wordpress 2.6…
For now, please don’t unsubscribe to the feeds or don’t get rid of my blog’s link yet. I would keep it active for a very long time for now.
Another RANT: The Story of Indian Students
Posted by Prashanth | Filed under Education, FIITJEE Pinnacle, Headshot, School Life
Really, the present happenings across my (older) peers’ lives sends jolts of electricity making all hair on my rise up, and has all the hairless parts goosebumped! In another few months, fate would get me close to something like this. It really makes me uncomfortable looking at people whom I thought were of the deserving kind in a helpless state. Really, Indian Education system makes beggars out of the brightest minds in the country.
Caution: You might see this post the same way you usually see rants on most other Indian blogs, especially on those run by students who are going through the toughest examinations in the world… Or you might see it as another perspective, another unique opinion, or perhaps something a degree lesser than a consolation to all those who have gone crazy in ranting so vehemently not just on their blogs, but in those phone calls better used as ventilators, those conversations which could more or less be addressed as punches on a rice sack or maybe those moments spent in Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt…
Here it goes…
Thinking in depth about everything, education in India lacks the 3 big M(s)… Money, Mindset and Modernisation. These things are barely enough to bring out just a few hundred successful professionals each year with a potential of several million. lack of money is a big problem in itself. Lack of money means so many things… lack of good colleges, lack of sufficient infrastructure in those colleges, or even lack of good teaching faculty in the colleges. The few institutes which DO get money don’t stand up anywhere when compared to the international institutes. Honestly speaking, it is just the maddening admission intake ratio or you might say the filtering process with the least porous membrane that gets nothing but the best inside. Maybe it is the general intellect of the students which gets IITs in the top 100 ranks of the world.
How does this effect India? Due to the lack of quality institutes, the success or the money making tendency of students is concentrated in just a few camps. Because opportunities are so few, and everyone in the populous of a billion odd people have big dreams, especially most literate ones, attachment towards studies is totally lost. Actually, studying is something someone OUGHT to do in order to earn enough to meet the family standards, which disproportionately grows with the country’s average income. The result - desperation,hunger and a famine like state with people craving for drops of those few seats which can mean the difference between owning a 100cc bike and luxury car in India.
There is this trend in India that makes money vending machines to placed in just certain fields. Like for instance, this particular hour has the management guys making the most out of the lot. A few years ago, it was the rapidly growing software engineering industry (which are mostly test centers or menial job sites for the world’s largest software MNCs) that got maximum professionals. All this leads to narrowing down what a student might want to do. Now everyone I know wants to go for the management side after the COMPULSORY engineering course. After all, everyone worries about FUD. With an Engg. degree in hand, he is ready to mint quite a bit, just in case management, which requires any damned degree as a pre-requisite doesn’t work out. The slightly under-exposed or the innocent sort speak what they have in mind… “It would give me better placement!”. The smarter ones, who know people or critics like me are around, fake or artificially create interest towards management. In reality, it is that very interest that the Indian students have lost. Money can actually buy everything, even interest. If a child confesses that he is not interested in Engg., the family and the brigade of relatives have him hypnotized into being interested in that subject.
Really, I know so many people, even upcoming software engg., who don’t have a crumb of interest towards their subject finally ending up as professionals for Indian counter-parts of well-known corporations really complacent about getting a job that pays them a tenth of a million rupees. People fail to realize that it might be a lot when seen in Indian standards, but then it is cheap labour for companies like MS, which would get those drudging jobs else where at a higher rate. Indians have lost choice, taste and the will to opt for what they really desire. Socio-economic conditions keep true interests confined inside, and the worst part being that the student never even realizes that he inside a fake world world which he didn’t actually desired to design. He has a fake illusion of happiness and satisfaction which finally removes feelings like - “Am I going to do this for the next 30 years of my life?” nurturing similar mentality in the next generation as well. The children of the so-called big professionals in India grow up to be in a similar race for trophie made up of anti-matter called success. Its a vicious loop that has to be stopped, and it is not really impossible to accomplish that.
Solutions can be many -
*Availability of greater number of universities
*Larger allocation of budget for higher education
*Competence amongst Indian colleges to go ahead of others in the world
*More diverse corporations basing themselves in India
*Corporations giving out large scale projects amidst Indian minds which are more than capable to create things, provided aptitude is generated at an early age
Aptitude comes during high school, when the student dreams. Dreams can be closer to reality than anyone might think. Dreaming, pondering is an activity that can lead students to dig and know more about what they might be doing in the future. Here, immature kids at the age of 18, who know just a little more than the placement opportunities in different fields decide what they could be doing for the next 42 years of their life. Coming to think about it, how much does an average student know about what exactly happens in in any stream of engineering that he might enroll himself in? How does he know that he is interested in it? Actually, Indians don’t need to know that. It’s almost like choosing what pays the most here. Finally, what you get to see here is brainy kids turning into menially productive mugpots, in time-lapse cinematography. And frankly speaking, I really don’t enjoy any bit of that show…
@the Pinnacle #1: The Transition…
Posted by Prashanth | Filed under FIITJEE Pinnacle, It's My Life, School Life, Technology
Quite a few things have been changing in life for me lately. The biggest one being an year old fact which is yet to be documented properly. The recent one being that I managed to pass class XI and I am in class 12th since 2 weeks… 
What I actually want to talk about here is this huge turn over that happened to me approximately an year ago on the 7th of April, 2007. I officially became a student of FIITJEE Pinnacle, which I did mention in bits and pieces in my posts, as well as in a vague post here.
So this post is all about my transition to FIITJEE Pinnacle, a fairly new concept of education in this part of India as I see it. What this means is that now instead of going to school, I would be going to a full time coaching center. But then before I analyze that part, there was another transition with greater implications that I want to talk about. That is, my transition from class X to class XI. I have had a talk with quite a few of my seniors in class X and before when they moved from class X to XI. Many people I know felt really really nostalgic about class X and IX which I used to then hate and things ironically haven’t changed much even now… The same people said that I would prey pray to get back to class X again and would not have a good time at all. I have little idea about what made them say that, perhaps might be the school, pressures of coaching classes, or just the feeling of change or most probably the loss of easy-ness. Things have been a little different in my case may be because I am @the Pinnacle!
For once, let me make it very clear to you that I am very far away from even thinking about my class X forget missing it. I do miss my class classmates and my old school Ramjas, but not the academics. I wanted to get out of the mess of general studies way back in class VIII itself when Sansshit Sanskrit was first introduced to me. Social Sciences seemed pointless albiet interesting as I had decided to make my career in the science stream. But then lots of factors, especially those pertaining bad teaching and menial jobs such as copying stuff from the text book and submitting notes just for the heck of it, my interest in Social Sciences which included Geography, History and Economics faded big time. I had to be the happiest person on earth on the day when my Social Sciences bored exam got over. Coming to sciences, I had problems with the way CBSE narrowed down on the whole syllabus and literally showed no flexibility in the nature of problems. I was disgusted to find students mugging up methods to solve say - Problems of type #1, and then the next and actually scoring a lot! Understanding and analytical abilities played little role in the class X bored exam scores. All my score card of a so-called embarrassing 86.4% says is that I could just mug up that much portion of the syllabus. But then in reality, I mugged very little writing almost entirely correct answers (in my opinion atleast) only to get beaten in other stupid stuff like formatting the paper, maintaining order and presentation, etc. I used to and still feel pissed of the unnecessary emphasis CBSE puts on such criteria instead of core concepts.
Enough of CBSE bashing for now (will dedicate another post for this!) but then class XI at FIITJEE Pinnacle felt just great! For the first time in my 12 years of so-called education, I was actually tested for how much I understood stuff. Problems were far more elastic and flexible than many rubber bands and hence my mind was opened up to think, form new techniques of my own, develop short cuts and understand the concept in a much broader scope. That was something no plain CBSE student might have got a privilege to do. CBSE restricts a persons aptitude by limiting the methods you could use in the exam hall. Now all that mattered is how effectively I could think. This freedom of thought wasn’t just good for me, but also for the entire batch of extremely brilliant students who study along with me. It feels great when almost every student in the class is thinking and aiming to come up with something neat in the class. And finally, I have the same quality of classmates that I once dreamt of having earlier. No more nonsensical stuff that waste time and piss everyone off. Stiff competition constantly keeps filtering out ensuring that the quality of the batch remains.
But then, as the old saying says… there is another side to this coin. And another reason to post again…
Speaking of transition, I just shifted to Wordpress 2.5 and I am facing a few problems as I even migrated to Firefox 3 beta 5. The fluidity factor for the WYSIWYG editor seems to be working only till 1024*768 resolution for me. But otherwise, I guess I do see some neat changes. The AJAXed-WP plugin doesn’t work with version 2.5, or atleast my installation as yet.
Also, notice the change of template? I guess I needed some emphasis on typography and readability.
Some globally acclaimed (chuckles!) web designers suggested me that the images on the sidebar (especially the one on the left!) and the bright header images along with prominent sidebar text made reading the blog a difficult task. So well, we both have now gone down to the ‘widgetized’ footer where the pics seem to be better placed than those sidebars. Speaking of sidebars, the text is greyed out a bit to increase prominance on the main content part… I am totally open for improvement suggestions and would love to hear more of them in the form of comments… for now, since I have even moved to class XII, books seems to be missing me more than they did a few weeks before!
