Cross roads

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It is strange feeling of dullness. Some actions need to be taken, some threads need to be broken and some one needs to be hurt. But who am I to decide ?

How people come into your lives and get attached to you in ways you can never imagine. How you wish you could locate the exact nature of the entanglement and how on looking for it you get lost in a world long gone by.

Who are we to decide who stays with us and who does not ? Who are we to decide who gets to share our company and who does not ?

Yet, the decision lies with us, with me and with you. Because some things need to be done. Just like that. Because the entwined twigs that seem so meek and indifferent to you now, may grow up to strangle the last breaths out of you. Because a little pain is always better than a lot of pain.

What keeps us from such an action is love. Is it ? Or is it the fear of repercussions ? Fear of facing it ? And so we delay it for ever and after, until it rots within us and becomes a part of us like the moss covered brick wall in your old childhood house.

Because to hurt someone just so that you may not hurt them even more, may make no sense at once. Yet, we all come to a point where we wish things happened on their own and the words to be said were heard on their own and the tears to be shed rolled on their own and the heart to be shattered did so mutely.

Who are we to decide what is to be done ?

We are the ones who make our own destinies. 

Educational Mess -1

Education

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We are all acutely aware of the fact that our educational system is heavily flawed. Of course, no system can be perfect. That's why I said 'heavily', meaning that the downsides are very steep.

Recently when I met a friend who is a graduate in Economics, I came to know that although she wished to pursue Mathematics as her career, her options were very limited. This came as a huge surprise to me. The only paper (of repute) she is eligible for is JAM, whose scores are used by the IIT's and IISC. I am of course, discounting the entire bunch of private universities which are mere machines converting currencies to degrees.

This is what bugged me. If there is a person who has realized that his/her calling is in a subject different from what he/she has been pursuing before (Maths in this case), the educational system should be such that it encourages the person to take up that subject. Isn't that how it is supposed to be ? But it ain't so. Instead, the system discourages you.

It is not like someone is saying -"Okay, listen up, I do not want to do economics and I wish to do my masters in Maths. So Give me seat in the best institute."

Here are people willing to learn a new subject because they enjoy doing it and are ready to face an entrance paper which is given by thousands of others who 'belong' to that domain. Now, WHY WOULD ANYONE DO THAT? Such commitment is possible only for 2 reasons:-

->Either the person really likes that subject matter, in which case it is, i think a CRIME to bar him/her from sitting from the entrance.
->The stream of choice is potentially more paying, in which case the person is least concerned about what he/she is studying and more about what he/she would earn in the future.

The people in the first category is the only concern because instead of being supported by the system, they are being demoralized.

The argument that a person from field X cannot cope with the pressures of field Y is absolutely rubbish. If the institutes are so hard bound on getting the best candidates, why not set a paper accordingly and then let any and everyone sit for it. What are they scared of ? Do they think that their selection procedure is not good enough to weed out those whom they consider incapable of handling the particular field.

It's all rubbish I think. Educational systems should be encouraging, not otherwise.

It is sad to think that due to these illogical practices, many a dedicated students have been forced to face closed doors and resign to a life not half as enjoyable as the one for which they are ready to work their ass off. It is a very sorry state of affairs, methinks.

Solution ?
Every person should be eligible for every God damn paper. The responsibility of creating an unbiased and fair selection procedure should lie with the individual institute. 

That is the only way of having the right people at the right places.

Adios!

Good Riddance !

Remember, Remember , the fifth of November:

The gunpowder, the treason and plot.

I see no reason why gunpowder, treason

Should ever be forgot.

~

I say 'Remember Remember the 15th of September, yet another engineer gets a job' :P

Thank you Universe. Muaaah !

< : -- ))))

Will not make it

Winding the clock 4 years back

I am a confident fool who believes that solving a few questions of mathematics, physics and parroting a few structured algorithms in a computer language makes me a smart person. More misleadingly, a good person. I have no freaking idea of what it means to become an engineer. I never cared to find out either. I was in the race. Goddamn race to the end of the world. A horse with blinders or maybe an ass with blinders and a plump carrot hanging a foot away from its salivating mouth. All i am thinking of is how to get into some bloody engineering college which has proved itself to be good. No clue what good is. Asking people what branch I should take, though i had no freaking clue what I or they were saying. I simply nodded. Disillusioned fool. A sham. A blot in the name of all students of science. All my methods of deduction and inferences where light years away from the methods of science. Indeed, I never was a student of science. I was a blind follower of GOD-KNOWS-WHAT.

So i walk into my college to become an electrical engineer. No clue what that means. Never tried to find out either. Keep complaining how all these stuffs were not my cup of tea, yet preparing alongside to attempt to get into a better engineering college. Heights of hypocracy!

Seconds turn to minutes, minutes to hours, hours to days, days to weeks, weeks to months, months to semesters, semesters to entire years and finally years to almost a degree.

Back to today

I am wondering how I can get the degree that is scheduled to be handed over to me in less than a year. I wonder if I want that degree ? Or more precisely, if I deserve it? I am of course, blissfully ignoring the more probable occurrence of me never getting the degree.

It's not like I have a mountain of back papers to clear. I just have 2. Indeed, one of them I got today. Hence the post. :) . However, I simply do not understand how I can get myself to clear 14-15 more papers in the coming exams. There is no motivation, no drive, nothing to fuel me. I guess this is what giving up feels like.

Maybe I could just run away from all of this. I am not completely dumb. I am by the standards of our educational system, which keeps percentages and marks in high esteem, a distinguished student. Can't I get a job without this degree ? I can make tea, I could probable sweep the roads or take a few tuition here and there (I would of course have to lie that I have completed my degree, but I guess that is acceptable)

I am not a highly ambitious person. Not someone who would go and start my own setup etc. I am a mild lame lamb. So I figure I could make my ends meet somehow. Yes, I may have to sleep on the roads or starve alone in cold nights. But then don't most people do so in our country ? What difference would one make. Maybe I could help someone by teaching him/her a few things that the educational system has put inside me. Maybe ? Who knows.

The educational system is not entirely to be blamed however. Just about 99% I would say. The rest 1% was purely my fault, that instead of trying to find my taste in something worthwhile, I found my tastes in the darkest of dungeons and plumaged  head first into it.

So what happens now? I want to fail all my papers henceforth. I want to be sent away from my university and banned forever. That's the only way i can save myself from this scourge. Or , I could quietly run away to some far away exotic land (a.k.a some street in some city). But then, that would hurt my parents a lot. And they would make the police search for me. So I should put on a disguise. A good beard, mustache, mole below the left eye, a new spectacle frame, a few torn clothes and a fake accent would do good to send the non-performing sleuths of our democracy sniffing thin air and leaving my file to rot in the cabinets with millions of others !

Is it so bad? Sometimes it is. Today it is. Right now it is. Had I not been so physically inactive right now, I would probably have killed myself already. Probably. I am not however so gallant or nonchalant about my non existence. At times maybe. Not this time though.

This time I just want to be ridiculed and laughed at and looked down upon, maybe slapped and kicked and spit upon and jeered at. Wherever I go.

A very funny scene ensues when you try to kick or slap yourself. Remember fight club ? That close.

You know if genie came to right now at this moment and gave me infinite wishes, I would probably tell him to shove the golden lamp us his a**.

My cherished distant future that I cling to, like the imaginary creeper that is coiling over your computer screen right now. 

I am travelling. Nowhere exotic. Simply travelling. Meeting strangers and talking to them. Sharing stories and cracking jokes. Nothing to carry, nothing to worry about.

I am in a classroom. And I am teaching. I am talking to young people who have new ideas and are eager to be given an opportunity to try them. People who are just in need of someone to tell them it is very good to be wrong. That 20/20 deserves less good than a 0/20.

I am telling them about the beauty of mathematics. How it transcends all boundaries. How it should be a religion. I am telling them how to waste there time pondering over stupid ideas. Because, as Tom Hanks says  as Forest Gump-'Stupid is as stupid gets.' I am learning from them to question new things, to look at things from a different perspective. I am learning from them to not be bound in traditions. I am learning from them how to live.

I am listening to music and feeling it resound through me like the breath through a flute. As Rabindranath Tagore put it - ' ..lifting me like the reed and playing through it your eternally beautiful song...'

But what are these but stupid imaginations of the mind to induce pleasure and a sense of satisfaction. Bloody games! Escaping from the reality of 9 to 5 jobs and a thick pay package, good car, a house and a spouse.

My point being that Either I die knowing the fact that I have to some degree achieved my dream or I die knowing the fact that If I do not I have no more chance of achieving even a fraction of my dream.

Die, we all must though.

As for dreams, the same old cliche goes - 'Live your dream' b.l.a.h. If not, make your life your dream b.l.a.h

Summing up with another quote that makes me momentarily buoyant before sinking and settling like the anchor of a 2 tonne ship- 'Listen to everybody, nod, smile, agree but in the end, do whatever the f**k you were anyways going to do'- Robert Downey Jr. (a.k.a Tony stark, the Iron man)

Adios !