Defense of a Nerd? - Not quite

So, finally I decided to pull myself off the slumber and write this post. Notwithstanding the testimonials of several people, I do not quite enjoy the (direct) spotlight, where the steps I take are being watched. Hence, I was dithering because I thought that this post has to be a place where everything I say has to make perfect sense and to get together as a watertight argument and defense of the way I operate. But then I realised that it would amount to me just being dishonest to myself and to anybody who would read this. Rather, I should just let it flow here, whatever I have to say.

First up, a foe-turned-friend remarked a couple of days back about how I was not a 'nerd', but a 'dork'. According to her, a 'nerd' is someone who's totally into technology and is very innovative there. I, according to her, did nothing of that sort and was, at best, academically better than most others. However, I see this argument at two levels. First, the terminology doesn't matter much, does it? For some, 'nerd' is a good thing to be, and to others it isn't. Dork, surely, is a good word to describe me - I'm surely socially inept and quirky. However, about me being 'merely' a bit ahead in the 'race to grades' would be an unfair characterisation. For one, creativity doesn't necessarily need to relate to technology. At the same time when Steve Jobs was changing the way we look at technology, lots of guys were working around the world to change the way we look at finance. 'Innovation' can be with regard to anything. It is true that in India, given the preeminence we give to technology, it is not a surprise that we'd look at the 'uber-nerd' as a tech freak. Nonetheless, I'm hopeful that it will change soon.

Now to more important issues. I see mischaracterizations as cases of misinformation. Hence, just because somebody scores well, doesn't mean that he uses all his time to study. At least I don't (assuming that I score well, which isn't always true). I've always made sure that I should not be like a dog to my academics; that I should always be the master. If you look at my schedule two months before CAT, it read somewhat like this: DreaMerger, GRE, Financial Summit, Rise of Nations, Financial Knights. I missed a lot of 8:40 classes the week before CAT, not because I was studying, but because I had played Rise of Nations till late at night. Two days before my CAT, I was up till 3 playing Rise of Nations. My 'CAT coaching' consisted more of discussing business issues with my teacher, rather than solving math problems. Whatever the CAT result be, I don't have a single regret. I did it my way, and that's what matters to me.

Another instance of doing it 'my way' were my internships. Working at Bandhan was the most amazing experience. It is not everyday that you walk with your leg below your knees in wet mud. It certainly isn't routine (for a Delhi boy) to sit down at the Howrah station at 5 AM and just look at the multitudes. My friends laughed at my second internship at SochYo!. Some of them, worked at big corporations and big banks and big names (note the repeated usage of 'big'). What I did was to follow my heart. Because it was a start-up, I enjoyed the work immensely. There was also greater flexibility around my working hours. The best part was when this internship experience was instrumental in my subsequent job interviews. Because I did what I did with passion, and because I learnt so much about the way people work and think, I was able to internalise all that information. So, I used my summers to do things I might probably never do again - visit villages and work for a start-up. And I was still able to fit them in the broader scheme of things.

Some people think that nerds study (if at all) to achieve some material gain. I can't vouch for everyone, but that certainly is not true for me. The day I topped the boards, so many people asked me what I had got as a gift, and I said nothing. The reason being that whatever I had wanted was already there with me before the results were out. Whatever I have wanted has been made available to me by my parents or my brother, results and marks and all irrespective. My parents hear about my academics only once a year - the day of the university results. Academics is otherwise never a topic of discussion at my place.

In this world today, most of us play to a certain other's tunes. We are all footballs of someone else's opinion. Some dance to the tunes of their peers, some dance for societal acceptance, some dance to the tunes of their friends and some for their careers. To my credit, I set my incentives in such a way that I danced to my own tunes and still ended up achieving what I wanted to do. In a microcosmic way, I solved a problem of incentives, something of a rarity in real world.

For example, if I've always liked Strategy Games - the tycoon games, Age of Empires, Rise of Nations etc. In fact, in one of the few instances of parental pressure, my IITian cousin hid all strategy games on my computer. Such was my craze! But then I saw that my aptitude for strategy games had a much wider application. I used it extensively at the Economics Society of school, and I've continued using it in college. Most recently, solving case studies (at least the interview type of cases) became so easy for me because I could look at the broader picture, just like I had to do in a game of Age of Empires. I did what I enjoyed, and I made sure I did it in the way that maximised returns.

Now, for the trickiest bit. Why don't I party like crazy, let my guard down for a moment and be lost in joy? I don't quite know. Firstly, the idea of losing control itself doesn't appeal to me. Losing control - to people or to inanimate things - isn't really part of my DNA. Does that make me 'boring'? Well, even if it does, I think I would prefer being boring.

Hmmm .... this didn't quite come out like I wanted it to. Maybe this will continue some other day, or maybe I would have moved on.

The Dreadfully Heavy Whites

I thought today evening that I'll write a post titled 'Defense of a Nerd', primarily because of a certain someone's relentless attack on my lack of things to do last night. However, something more pressing came up, something that might go out of my memory unless I put it down here. Here's the deal - this is about me!

A bunch of elderly neighbors came over for an evening gossip to my place. Then they got talking to my parents about me. This is fairly regular conversation when people who've not met me before - they get talking about the boards and all. Then, my dad took out a bunch of those newspaper clippings and showed those to them. In one of them, I'd talked about how I washed my own clothes. Honestly, I didn't remember till I got reminded today.

But when I was reminded, I could almost feel that dreadfully heavy whites (the DPS, RK Puram trousers) in my hands. I can remember waking up really early morning at 5 in the winter to go to school from Ghaziabad. But all that feels distinct. However, it gives me a sense of pride and a sense of self-esteem.

Now, success and failure come and go. Often, we sit down more with the failures than we do with the successes in life. But that bit of harsh living back in class 12th made me a bit resistant to failures. Yes, I do fail very often. But my entire response to failures has changed. I'm able to pick up the pieces and rather than move on, get back harder to the tast. Now, that might not be the best thing to do. Sometimes, it's just better to move on and let bygones be bygones. But these days, this is what I do and I'm happy doing it. Some day, I might realise that this is wrong and then I'll change myself accordingly. As I wrote in my last post, I'm not attached - even to my behaviour.

As a postscript, the earliest instances of this 'rising from failures' were my quizzing escapades in school. There have simply been too many quizzes that Kritika and I went for, and in each one of them we failed (to Kritika's credit, she won three quizzes - three times when she went without me in her team). But there was this 'big thing' lying in the future that kept making me get back to quizzing. I think that is why extra-curricular and co-curricular competitions are important. They teach you to deal with failures.

After this 'brief' thought, I'll get back to 'Defense of a Nerd' the next time.

My Greatest Journey

One of the few quotes that I remember is this one from The Namesake - "The greatest journeys are those that bring you home." At first, I found it very typical of a pravasi bangali, especially given the author's ethnicity. It was after the class 10th boards that I watched the movie, having read the novel a couple of years earlier. Now that I come to think of it, the quote reflects the deep significance that is attached to the act of returning home.

However, in life I have carried around a slight burden of rootlessness. My father's job in the navy prevented me from calling any one place 'home'. Where is my home? Is it where my parents reside, a place where I have not stayed for more than two months of my life in all? Or is it Delhi, where I have spent most of my life, but where I don't have any permanent residence? Even if it were Delhi, will it be Luytens' Delhi, where I spent almost all my childhood, but where I know I can never return? Or will I make a new home in the other parts of Delhi?

Yet, every time I cross the area around Chanakyapuri, an area I grew to love and admire, there is always a slight heartache that grips me. There is a feeling of a 'lost childhood', not in the sense of a childhood that I didn't enjoy, but which I can barely revisit. It is like a relic - it has been so strongly cast in stone that it now seems totally surreal. Every time I go towards Dhaula Kuan, I sit up excitedly to look at DSOI and S P Marg. Today as I go to the airport to board a flight back to Kolkata, I would be waiting for when the Airport Express Line crosses DSOI. The last time I stayed at DSOI for a couple of days, I went around the S P Marg area and revisited the temple I used to go to, the shops I used to buy from and the lively buildings that were once part of a 'home' - the only place I call 'home'.

Indeed, going to those areas is the greatest time of my life. It gives me a sense of relief - that even though I may have passed that extremely pleasant time, there are others growing up there who would enjoy what I enjoyed, who would play where I once used to play and who would probably face similar curiosities as I once did. My journey wasn't unique - in fact, a lot of Army kids probably have an even more rootless existence - and in those numbers I find comfort.

The good thing about this rootlessness is the objectivity it brings to me. Once you do not have a 'home' to be attached to, there are very few things you can be attached to. Friends, success, failures - nothing inspires attachment because the greatest attachments have been broken down before. It is truly my biggest weakness and my greatest strength. It is my raison-de-etre and that is how I will now look upon it.

One last time?

It's been nearly seven months since I was last at home. This is by far the longest I've been away. The previous highest must have been a measly three-four months. However, what matters more is that it has been seven months since I have closed my eyes and found myself free. Yes, I've been in a race, and now that I am coming to the fag end of the race, I'm exhausted.

It's been a long time - over a year maybe - of running with multiple things on the plate. But now is when I have begun to feel it. Have I reached the limits of my existence? Can I carry no more? Well, even if that's true, the way ahead is just to expand what I can do. What's the fun in merely identifying your limits, nay?

What struck me after the rejection at Monitor was - whatever I do at college, does it come to zero once I begin my job? Honestly, I am not in a position to answer that. I can argue that the 'spirit' and 'ambition' matters, but then there is nothing in particular that I did in college that resulted in these, it was more a relic of my school days.

So, heading into CAT, it is all a bit muddled up. More importantly, I can't think right now, because my brain is quite exhausted. One thing is for sure - it is the last time, so I'm going to pick up the ball and I'm going to run, run as fast as I can. Whether I reach where I want to is now clearly immaterial. What matters is to run the last mile.

I don't know how to write

It's been such a long time I don't know how it feels to write, what to write and how to write ... it feels numb, honestly, to be typing away at the keyboard after all these days. The last post was on June 18, 2011. It must have been right in the beginning of the summer break. Things have changed dramatically since then - I have cut off a cancerous part of my life, have moved a few steps in my career, have come back to college and made new friends, had a wonderful DreaMerger ... the list keeps going on.

At the beginning, change was difficult. When you get used to someone or something being an integral part of your life, and when that someone isn't there - there is an emptiness in life. But sometimes, it is just necessary to cut off that 'something' for your own well-being. People ask me 'why did it happen?', and I don't say anything. Maybe one day I will, maybe that day will be before college is over - but not right now. Have I moved on? I think, yes. I don't think about it much now; I simply don't have the time. I've found a new thing to love, a new emotion to feel. At the beginning of each day, I feel like a new person.

Something at the top of my mind right now is the movie 'Titanic'. Something about that movie holds me spell-bound. Perhaps it is the cinematic genius, but I suspect that it is my fascination with the real Titanic. The idea of a 'watery grave' is as enticing as it is enigmatic. It is a part of time one can't reach, but whose gravity escapes no one. It is like time which 'used to be', which isn't, but which is still there with us somehow.

I've been out of practice, but I'll try to get used to this soon.

P.s. thanks for your wishes, folks. That you believe in me is what matters more than anything else.

Returning

A few days back, a thought occurred to me - why should I write a blog? Does anybody really care about what happens in my life? No. Does anybody care what my views on any subject are? Of course not. Then what is my audience, and what does it expect of me? In what way can I do justice to myself and to whoever reads this?

Every view I have will quite certainly not be unique, and every experience I have will also have been experienced by several before me. But the probability of somebody having the exact same sequences of experiences as me would be hopelessly low, and hence my views on these experiences are likely to be quite different from most other people. Hence, I write on how every experience of my life is shaping me - guiding me, and being guided by me, towards a future that appears as hopeless as the past has appeared distant.

The last few months, starting from October last year, have been extremely taxing emotionally. I have heard of emotional breakdowns - but this was just so much different. There were issues in friendships, which unfortunately got intricately linked to societies in college. So fragile was this system of interdependence that I had been party to weaving, that once one fell, everything else also seemed to fall out of place.

Today, I see myself in a very different light. Sometimes I feel I do not recognise myself, that these past nine months have forever changed me. For one, I do not think I will ever fall in love. Because I did. Love that was more generic than just interactions between two individuals, love that has known only complete devotion and submission. A broken heart, and more so a broken heart that knew pure love, is hard, maybe impossible to repair. Now, I do not believe that that is necessarily a bad thing. Maybe not being ready to love people so easily is infact a good thing!

The only thing that I feel upset about is that it all had to end this way. My conception of success had always been one which I shared with people around me whom I love. Probably I so desperately wanted it because I have barely ever had people in my life to share my success with. Alas, it does not seem to be meant to be. Probably, the next few successes I have in life, of course with the doses of failure, will be solitary ones. The chalice of success without friends to toast with feels empty, but it is a chalice nonetheless.

On the flipside, I met some people on the way, through this most tumultuous of times, whom I think I can possibly form relationships with. Of course, no longer will I be blind in my faith in friendship and in things good and rosy. But maybe these relations might work. After all, nothing is impossible.

I end this post with a word of caution for the reader. Never try to stretch yourself for somebody else, it just ends up tearing you.

Good luck!

Stephania - really?

Enough has been said about 'Stephania' by people more experienced than me. My first introduction to the hoopla around 'Stephania' was an article by Shashi Tharoor for Delhi Times where he wrote about what made Stephens special. Among things he said was the fact that in St. Stephen's, religion and region did not matter and the pursuit of knowledge and intellect was given precedence over scoring marks, rote-learning and the like. The merits and demerits of his arguments, and whether they are valid over a quarter century after he left college, is something I do not find myself qualified enough to comment on. Instead, what I can comment on is what difference I see in St. Stephen's today from other colleges of Delhi University.

The idea of teaching in St. Stephen's going beyond the textbooks and examinations is slowly, and surely, dying out. Not to say that the blame can be rested on the faculty of St. Stephen's College - it would be more appropriate to blame the suffocating nature of the DU syllabus since it leaves colleges with little time to pursue their own charters. Education in DU is being turned into a McAloo tikki burger - you get the same taste wherever you go. Whether that's a good thing or not (I think it's abominable) is kept for later discussions.

What I argue in this piece is that what is unique to St. Stephen's College is its small size - 1200 students - studying a large number of courses - 10 in total - across a variety of disciplines. What this results in is greater interaction between different ideas, and this is where I believe our college has the most to benefit from. I hence believe that expanding the number of seats might diminish, if not demolish, this unique advantage that we have.

The difference between previous evocations of Stephania and what I propose is that what I propose is tangible - it can very well be replicated by other colleges. I do not pin-point Stephania on intangibles such as the 'spirit', which is impossible to judge anyway. To conclude this point, I think we have a lot to gain by acknowledging that in a fast-changing world, wherein St. Stephen's is no longer considered the undisputed best arts college in India, we have a lot to gain by foregoing the old connotations of 'Stephania' and recognise what we actually have and then create fora for us to exploit it to the fullest.

As an aside, it is true that the pursuit of innovation in St. Stephen's College has been vanishing. In this context, there would be much merit in arguing that being associated with DU is harming St. Stephen's. There has to be greater room for the college to manage its own syllabus and evaluation parameters.

The importance of taking it easy

It is after quite a while that I write in my blog, and what a time it has been! My lost post on 14th Feb corresponds to the times immediately after the F&I fest, and it is actually somewhat sad that I I consider these society events landmarks in my life. And this is where I come to my next thought - that very often, we take life too seriously and give it much more attention than what it actually deserves.

Very often, what we consider as 'life' is a set of discrete points, these 'landmarks'. For example, in my case this would correspond to my topping the boards, COQ experience, coming to St. Stephen's and the like. However, what I now believe is that what is a better way of evaluating life is to view it not as a discrete set of points, but as a continuum of moments and experiences.

What is the marginal benefit of one over the one? Discrete points, of course, are far fewer than a continous range. Hence, there is a greater probability of 'failure', and there is much more scope for disappointment. In contrast, a life viewed as a continuum of experiences is very unlikely to suffer from disappointment, primarily because every moment becomes so trivial in the larger scheme of things, and the law of large numbers ensures that every moment is lost.

The logic that exemplifies this is Robin Sharma, the writer of The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari. He writes that the problem with walking on a path with one eye on the goal is that you have only one eye looking down on the path. Is it not better to first look at the goal, make judgements of which path to take, and then immerse yourself completely in the pursuit of the path? This way, firstly you would be able to enjoy the path completely and also probably do better in pursuit of the goal.

Of course, this all comes with the warning that I haven't tried it myself, and only now do I embark on this path. Hence, try at your own risk!

Banana Republic?

After attending a rather interesting talk by Ms. Elina Singh, wife of imprisoned Dr. Binayak Sen, organised by the Informal Discussion Group (IDG) in college, I was left pondering on essentially two questions - has our judicial system failed us, and if yes, then what can we do about it?

Coming to the first, it is a well-accepted fact, even by members of the judiciary, that the integrity of the lower judiciary has indeed been compromised. Judges at lower courts are known to be prone of both bribery and intimidation. Does this rot reach the higher levels? While there have been cases of corruption in the higher judiciary, I would like to continue to believe that the judiciary High Court onwards is rather unbiased and honest. That said, how many of India's cases are actually heard in High Courts? Do we want to clog our high courts so that everybody gets justice? Well, if we are to make our judicial system work, we need to clear the clutter at the bottom.

This has been adequately represented in movies, Aakrosh being the latest one that I happened to watch. There is a perception, and correct to a great extent, that the role of the investigating agency / police has started to extend into courtrooms. This is a rather worrisome trend, since this means that the judicial process will always be inclined in favour of the prosecuting agency, and hence likely to be a biased process.

There is hence a need to restore the integrity of this third pillar of our democracy, and we need to not look down upon EU sending observers to our trials as interference. As a responsible international power, we need to be transparent, even with regard to what we might perceive as an 'internal matter', but what the world perceives as something of import.

St. Stephen's as a deemed University

An idea has recently been floated by the St. Stephen's administration that the college strive for a 'deemed university' status by the period 2025-2050. This article is meant to question what value will this tag add to the college, and whether it is of primary import.

a 'deemed university' tag allows a college to set its own syllabus and admission procedures, its own fee structure and some of them are also allowed to give out degrees. Given that St. Stephen's already has a distinct admission procedure from the rest of Delhi University, and that its fees are also significantly higher than most other DU colleges; this move is meant primarily to enable the college to set its own syllabus.

How important is a different syllabus to an institution? India faces a perennial problem that the syllabus is very rote-learning oriented, and hence does not promote innovation. Again, this probably stems from our attempts to impart 'quality education' to all. If, for once, we acknowledge the impossibility of the task, we can impart 'good quality education' to a few (which will also run into millions, by the way), and provide 'life skills' to the rest. We must free not only St. Stephen's college, but other reputed institutions from the shackles of this attempt at mass quality education.

The only thing I am skeptical about is the undue attention that this proposal has received. It is true that this 'deemed university' recognition will give the college a lot of flexibility to do its own thing. However, there are still many ways we can strive to achieve that aim. For once, the societies in college can, for once, attempt to extend knowledge frontiers rather than just function for the sake of function. Of course, that deserves an entire entry by itself.

Trip to the North East

This post has been some time in the coming now. I got my datacard along on this trip to the North East with an intention to make daily post. Of course, like several other teenage intentions, this too failed. However, the least I can do is to post the details on my last day here, before I get carried away in the tsunami called the DU Jan tests.

First, let me get over the itinery quickly. We came to Guwahati on 29th December and the next day left for Shillong. On 31st, we visited Cherrapunji. On 1st, we left for Tezpur, visited Kaziranga on the 2nd and tomorrow, i.e. the 3rd, we return to our respective 'homes' - mom and dad to Kolkata, bhai to Mumbai and me to Delhi.

So, now to the more subjective components of this post. This trip was surprisingly devoid of hills and mountains, as one would expect from the North East. Of course, that primarily owes to the fact that we did not visit any hilly place, but confined ourselves to the valley and plateaus. So, the only uphill drive was from Guwahati to Shillong. Guwahati is like a typical small Indian city. It doesn't have many charms of its own, except for the Brahmaputra flowing through it.

Shillong was the best part of the trip, especially the drive from Shillong to Cherrapunji. Of course, I always knew that Shillong was on a plateau, but I'd never been on a plateau myself, and hence didn't know what to expect once I reach there. Shillong is so surprisingly spacious for a city at its altitude. It resembles (I suppose) the Scottish countryside, and is hence referred to as the 'scotland of the east'. I wish there were such a place closer to Delhi, because it would be an excellent escape from the city.

Cherrapunji is lacklustre, except for the ride. There is an 'eco park', which is nothing but a park on the edge of the plateau, and a cave. But the drive from Shillong more than makes up for it. I could constantly imagine myself driving on those roads on a lazy sunday afternoon. Oh, those roads! Meghalaya's roads were amazing even when going uphill, and were for most parts broader than roads in Kolkata.

Kaziranga was beautiful, and a good experience, except for that the biodiversity seemed to be extremely restricted. Of course, hoping to see a tiger in the wild is like living in fool's paradise, but what we got was one rhinoceros after the other. Even the wild elephants were shy! Hence, Kaziranga cannot, and should not, be the only destination for any traveller, or else you'll be disappointed.

Throughout this trip, something that was missing was the 'authentic' food. Towards the end we got a taste of it en route from Shillong to Tezpur. My brother tried pigeon curry, but I being as squeamish as I am, did not try to experiment. Assamese food hence seems to be rather bland by the standards of the Punjabi and Bengali food that I'm used to.

This is a rather lacklustre travel diary, I suppose. But I also suppose that the mark of a true traveller in life is to not have enough time to turn back and ponder.

Till then !

Subhashish

(in Tezpur)