Five point someone

Late night yesterday, I finished this hilarious and wonderful book Five Point Someone. Every incident has been described in such lucid language that you immediately identify with these 3 students. This story is being made into a film and throughout the story I could see Kunal Kapoor (of RDB fame) as Ryan. I think he would perfectly fit the bill.

Just want to say 'Thank you Chetan Bhagat' for letting me "live" a memorable college life via this book. Although the memories Hari has are very scary and a bit too stretched to be called fun. I mean your best friend attempting suicide is not fun in anyway. Its ok to live such a life via a book not in reality.

Unfortunately, the college life I lived, had nothing memorable in it. I forgot my college the day I left it. There is nothing in my college life that I want to cherish, because nothing ever exciting or grave ever happened in my life. Neither did I study nor did I enjoy. Looking back I feel I should have done at least one of the two. College life is synonymous to friends, movies, college events, "days", birthday parties and night outs - by nightouts, I mean spending an entire night completing/copying/GTing your assignments with your bunch of friends by staying awake at someones place.

I had always wanted to live my life in a hostel, always wanted to get into IIT. Well a far fetched dream. No, not because I am a duffard or anything like that, its just that my marks do not support this claim of mine HAHAHA! I was never a topper in my school nor have I won any scholarships. I barely got into engineering and I also managed to get out of it as well. The point here is that this was not impossible for me. I just never tried. I never knew the way to do it. I hate people who are laid back. I hate when they dont make anything out of their lives. I therefore hate myself.

All is not so bad in this picture. Yeah, God knew my secret ambition and so he decided one day that I should also get a glimpse if not the entire picture into the life of IIT. This glimpse was even shorter than the trailor and lasted for a few days. After my bakwas days in engineering, I had an opportunity knocking at my door. Well, I got my first my job. All I knew about my job was that some big MNC was launching a computer institute and I was supposed to be teaching there. Now what has that got to do with IIT. Wait I'll get there.

Me - a teacher. Leave the others, I myself was not able to digest this. I mean how can a girl who is sort of a loner, who doesn't like to speak much and who doesn't know her subjects herself, be a teacher. I graduated in electronics and I was to teach computer science. But I took up the job for multiple reasons.
1. I needed the money and I was offered 2 times more than what my friends were getting doing some great stuff in the electronics industry. Yeah this was the year of a major slowdown.
2. This was my second offer in a row in the teaching line. Both offers came riding to my doorstep. I had never applied. Its just that people who knew me and belonged to this field had got them for me. May be they saw something in me (and today I'm sorry if I've let them down). I had refused the first offer. Like everyone else, I had my dreams of getting into the actual industry rather than teach. When I got it the second time I thought I was destined to become a teacher.

It was later that I understood that the MNC in question was IBM and the courseware I was supposed to be teaching, was designed by IIT Kanpur.

There was one condition in my job, put by IBM. If you want to teach a subject you have to be a certified teacher, certified by IIT Kanpur. Next, I found myself sitting in a classroom learning computer science subjects from some profs in IIT Kanpur. IBM had started 15 centres simultaneously in India and all "would be" faculty was present in the class room with 4 of us from Pune. For all the studying which I did not do in my college days, I compensated for it by studying twice here to clear these exams. My colleagues were experienced than me so I thought it would be a cakewalk for them. I was the underdog. Finally it was the day for our first C exam results. I was the only one from Pune team to clear them. These classes were held at various location in India and after six months of starting my job, the day arrived when I was actually inside the campus of IIT, for getting trained on advanced courses.

It was a different feeling. Yes I was thrilled to occupy one of the benches in the classroom or be in the hostel but deep somewhere I knew I didn't deserve to be here. I had not worked my way in here. Nevertheless, those 10 days are the best days in my life. The past six months had been to tiring for me. Studying day in and day out was not something I was accustomed to. To top it, I was facing students everyday delivering lectures on the subjects I had so far cleared. I knew my subject well but I guess I was still far away from being called a good teacher. The training in IIT was a break from work and I was really not feeling like studying for the upcoming exams. I was forcing myself into it. The top three were to get some surprise gifts. There was no doubt who would top the exam, Rajkumar from Coimbatore team. Raj, as we called him, was a genius and a true teacher at heart. He loved teaching and that was the only reason why he didn't enter the software industry. Later we heard Raj was offered a scholarship or something similar in IIT. I was surprised to hear that I was sharing the 6th position with someone. It really didn't matter since any rank above 5 was not announced officially. I was satisfied with what I got. That was the best my efforts in my academics could give me. It was then that Raj mentioned that he saw a bright future in me and that I should take my academics seriously. He was of the opinion that I should try for getting into IIT. Sorry Raj, you are amongst the few more whom I have let down.

Very few people know of my tryst with IIT. You must be thinking why suddenly am I boasting of something that cannot be called an achievement. Well, I guess it is the effect of this book which I read and also my recent Ladakh trip which reminded me of my dream, which never came true. All my friends in the Ladakh trip were IITians. IITians have this very special bonding in them and an extreme sense of pride. Let me say, the nation is also proud of this great institute.

As for me, yeah I slogged for my career and my dream of enjoying (as done in college ) was also fulfilled later after I joined Ruksun. Pranks, ragging, parties and friends you can trust, I got everything in Ruksun. So no regrets.