IITians: Nerd to cool?

Found this on a Cricinfo blog. Tishani Doshi talks about her experience of teaching 15-17 year old "gifted children" in a summer camp in US.

I learned a lot about human dynamics that summer, watching these teenagers. On day one, when they arrived, every one of them was a bonafide geek. They were from all over the country, each from the top one percentile of their class; and all their lives they had been used to being the smartest kid in class. Suddenly all that was about to change. Even in a congregation of super-smart kids, there can only be one smartest kid. So an interesting thing happened. They were forced to take on different roles in the classroom. Some turned artsy, others rockers, still others even turned jock. They retained their smartness, but it was almost as if in order to dilute the homogeneity of the classroom they had to find ways to reinvent themselves. It was fascinating, especially to see the most uber transformation of all: from nerd to cool.

She might have been teaching IITians! The perfect description of what most of us go through.

I am funny

Suchitra Pillai told me I am "funny...Really funny"

I said I know. And looked down coyly like a new bride.


FUCK!!!!!

Anjan Shrivastav, Mahesh Thakur, Jagmohan Mundhra and Sudhir Dalvi also found me funny. Sudhir Dalvi pointed out that as an Electrical Engineer from IIT Bombay doing theatre, I was following in the footsteps of Jagmohan Mundhra.


Which means, pretty soon I will be churning out pretty high class-B grade-porn. Look out for Pupun Pasha ki Peshkash - Vol 1 on your LAN.

I am forgetting Goa slowly BTW.

The Journey

Trusting Papa to pack all the other necessary things, the group stuffed just about enough clothes to last them 2 days (for the 4 day trip. They were IITians after all). Tourist decided that even underwear was unnecessary luggage and had to buy new ones after he asked Papa whether he had packed that for him too.

After all the extensive planning, the group had still not thought through one minor detail - they had no tickets to get them on the train to Goa. Except Chutiya, that is. As with Major Major Major Major, some faulty anode in an inefficient piece of hardware in the Railway Pranali had decided to bestow on Chutiya the Defence Quota and had confirmed his Sleeper coach berth and another along with him, while the rest of the 6 had to be content with general tickets. After dumping all their luggage with Chutiya and DukhiLund, and ensuring that they were safely seated, they decided to step into the general compartment.

But the people in the general compartment thought otherwise. It was only thanks to their small frames and GujjuPahalwan's threats that they could get a foothold inside. During a traumatic trip from CST to Thane, in which most of them stood either on one limb or on somebody else's shoulder, the group faced it's first enemy in the form of a Bully who asked everyone around to clear off proclaiming 'Hawa Ane de'. Tourist, Bhand and ChhotaPatakha nearly peed in their pants, wept inside with unspoken anger for bullies all over and promptly followed his instructions. GujjuPahalwan however decided to confront him and refused to budge, thus winning Tourist and himself a little more space. The 6, after racking their JEE-honed analytic skills, had decided to move into the adjoining general compartment in Thane, but realized that they couldn't do so as the doors to their own compartment were never opened. The Bully then decided to befriend GujjuPahalwan and Tourist and taught them a very important chapter in life, something they had missed in MA103 - 'How to travel ticketless in Indian trains'.

Inspired by the new-found wisdom, Tourist and GujjuPahalwan exited at Panvel from the compartment through the door opposite to the platform (the only one that was allowed to be opened), to find themselves in the middle of a urine smelling jungle in pitch-black darkness. They raced to the adjoining sleeper compartment, only to find it as jam-packed as the general one with no way to get in. They raced to the next, and the next, and the next and realized that they faced a train that was going to leave them in the middle of the urine smelling jungle in pitch-black darkness in exactly 56 seconds. GujjuPahalwan then shouted out to Gujju Gods and decided to force his way in and Tourist followed meekly in his wake only to realize that they still had another 11 overpopulated compartments to walk through.

In the meantime, WiseGuy, Papa, ChhotaPatakha and Bhand had all discovered new measures of flexibility in their bodies. Tourist and GujjuPahalwan, after a treacherous trek joined Chutiya and DukhiLund, who were peacefully eating sugar coated bread-butter and playing Chutiya's version of Poker (which involved some sort of finger pullling and pinching). The hungry and thirsty refugees tore on the remaining pieces of bread like, well, refugees. GujjuPahalwan immediately brought out his towel, laid it over the only remaining 4 by 2 space on the floor and went to sleep, to the amusement of the lone foreigner awake in their compartment. Before going to sleep though, he did manage to SMS to the remaining prisoners the story of their great escape.

It was only in the morning that GujjuPahalwan got to know of the rest of their stories. Papa and WiseGuy had followed their example and had jumped off at the next stop an hour after reading the message. ChhotaPatakha and Bhand, however, stood on bravely until a kind soul stood up to give ChhotaPatakha his seat. Sworn enemies for much of their previous lives, this one experience proved cathartic and love bloomed. ChhotaPatakha gave up his seat for Bhand and they shared the seat for the next 3 hours after which the train stopped and they too, jumped.

DukhiLund kept photographing every single thing that he thought held Ullas, even tourist's feet, which hadn't been washed since the beginning of Kalyug. Tourist used his compact mode to allow 3 people to sleep in a single berth. And after taking turns and pushing other people, the group finally slept a little until they reached the quaint sounding Thivim station.

The plan

Papa kept reminding the group that they ought to be planning a Goa trip throughout the semester. But what with the group's sad grades, bad exams and even worse appetite for any sort of planning and work, Papa had to go it all alone and plan the trip for the group, eventually buying tickets and announcing it on a mailing list. Disillusioned by grades which were falling faster than the rate at which Bhand's Nabad levels rose, and facing the prospect of a whole month with nothing more to do other than taking care of illegitimate babies of labs they were going to face the next semester, the group united as never before. WiseGuy ditched Basky Camp (after 4 days on the benches, a bruised ego, and a brand new jersey). Bhand and Tourist ditched Ghar Jana (promising their parents that they were still taking care of 'project work'), Chutiya ditched his Bhai Ki Shadi (Ka ring ceremony ka ladies sangeet ka pre function) and DukhiLund overcame generaal DukhiLundPanaa to agree for the trip. Even terrorists threatening Goa coouldn't stop them now. Tourist reminded everybody that it was their duty to fill up the deficit in the tourism revenue for the government.

Goa

There was this group of friends who went to Goa. There was Papa, who planned, organised and generally kicked asses during the trip, ChhotaPatakha, who along with Papa, charted out the routes, drove everyone around, and got drunk occasionally (not necessarily in order). There was the WiseGuy, who was busy most of the time looking for those opportune moments when he could drop his pearls of wisdom on the company around, occasionally helping papa decide with his wise ideas. There was DukhiLund, who spent most of the trip searching every place for the elusive Ullas, mostly in WiseGuy's pants. There was GujjuPahalwan, who courted Scandinavian babes, protected the group from any other similar, but more manly groups, and showered Goa Roads with Gujju expletives while driving. There was Chutiya. who decided to try out the '101 Ways Not To Drive' manual, and added several new chapters in the process. There was Bhand, who along with Chutiya, took upon the immense responsibility of entertaining the group, albeit at the cost of several very precious Frootis, and headbanged Dev Anand style at every place playing music. There was Tourist who arbitly chodofied Netagiri, drove Papa into ditches and made drunk love phone calls, while promising to chronicle the whole thing on that place on the web - the Blog..

More Chats

Rahul's chat got me thinking. I had several such chats, back in my witty-tatti days. (I would have loved to have a wikipedia link here, but sadly it is not to be).

Here are a few with Kalyan -

Kalyan: kya fart hai

me: haan shah 3 din se nahin huga hai

Kalyan: kya?

:)

10 minutes

8:08 PM Kalyan: pupun

pupun

dekh tera gpo nahi khul raha hai

me: dekha

Kalyan: ok....

mene tera password change kar diya

isliye

8:09 PM srry

me: ohh

maine tera chng kar diya hai

isliye tera bhi nahin khul raha hai'

lekin main dani hun

Kalyan: mera password bata to sahi

me: tera naya password hai mainrozmachudaoon

13 minutes

8:23 PM Kalyan: pupn chal

me: kalyan chal

Kalyan: time ho gay

me: khane

han bahut hi gay time hai

Kalyan: nahi som chal

me: birju bhi chadh raha hai

me: hi

Kalyan: :)

11:12 PM Kalyan: ma gia /*oriya cuss word*/

me: OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PARTY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

YE KAUNA??????????????? /*ye kya?*/

Kalyan: hau hau ma gia

me: yeh bihari traces kyon aa gaye oriya mein?

11:13 PM Kalyan: jaha bhi heu tu ma .....

me: tu bihari hai ki gurjar ki gujju jain ghati?

kyunki tu oriya to nahin hai

11:14 PM Kalyan: sala mu jahabi hue tu ma. gia

11:15 PM me: party use oriya mein batana band kar\

kya ek fellow oriya hone ke nate tera yeh farz nahin banta ki tu oriya gods ko gali na de?

11:16 PM Kalyan: oriya ka ma gia

11:22 PM Kalyan: abe tu kar kya raha hai?

me: ML

:D

Master in Lukkhagiri

ML

Kalyan: k....

par tune BL pass karliya kya?

11:23 PM me: pichle sem hi clear kiya AP ke saath

7:32 PM Kalyan: the grass was never green

wat say u?

7:33 PM me: so fucking what?

Kalyan: padhai karna chod do..jan bachao aab..cyclone aa raha hai

7:34 PM me: oct 29, 1999 /*This was on oct 29. oct 29 refers to The Orissa cyclone*/

Kalyan: she is revisitin

me: was she a she?

you fucked her last time?

7:35 PM Kalyan: u got it d wrong way.she made me fuck her

me: so u say she's a whore?

7:36 PM SO U SAY THAT GOD"S ACTS ARE WHORES?????

7:37 PM U THINK HEAVEN"S A BROTHEL???????

Kalyan: yup i do

me: AND GOD A PIMP????

you motherfuckin innocent sonofabloodybitch

7:38 PM Kalyan: k.aur bol

me: who are you to say so?

7:39 PM if u got guts why dont you go fuck em mini cyclones that come out on lamington road

Kalyan: oh no.u r makin me confess sth dat i don't want to

7:40 PM me: now go flush your head down the toilet

and shove the hand shower up your ass

Kalyan: i have done nothin wrong.so y so?

me: and mail me a photo of thar

bitch

7:41 PM Kalyan: i will definitely but of shah.abhi so raha hai

woh

y me?

7:42 PM khane chale?

Tasty Avial

I recently heard Avial. I had heard about Avial a long time back in 2006, when searching for it turned up recipes for some mallu dish. But only arbit net pe lukkhagiri resulting from endsem made me rediscover it.

Even as I listened to to some of the best produced Indian rock/music I had ever heard, the only thing I could think of, was how they could twist such unpalatable sounding malayalam words into syllables they could mouth. And sing.

Have a look at the lyrics.














Do those words even look like they can be sung?