The summers of 2009, i.e, after spending 2 years of my life in IITD, were expected to be a bit different from the pedestrian one of 08, when I had left for home the day after my exams were over, and waited eagerly to come back to the active life of the campus. Guess why? Because I had to stay here in the campus only to do a SURA project during the summers.
For the uninitiated, SURA is the acronym for Summer Undergraduate Research Award, which was started to dissuade the ambitious 2nd year students from spamming the Profs. abroad for summer internships. Though it was not such a huge success, still it was considered quite prestigious to get a SURA in the initial years, to the extent that one could have his degree extended if the project was not completed on time. But over the years, the relaxed norms didn't help much in retaining the prestige associated with it. Infact, this year, out of the 49 odd 'fully-sponsored-foreign-trip-cum-internship-dreams-shattered' people like me, who had applied for it, 43 managed to get it, illustrating how easy it has become to get it nowadays.
Anyways, this time also, I ran away to home after the exams, and came back after the results were declared, thus saving myself from the anxiety of waiting for the grades. The initial days were spent digesting the fact that while some of our lucky batchmates would be enjoying in some firangi land, lesser mortals like us would have to endure yet another cycle of Indian summers. Adding salt to injury was the excitement of the folks taking French lessons for their exchange programme for the next semester. The only saving grace was the prospect of being able to do a project of my choice freely with none of the tensions of a regular hectic semester.
Thus began yet another chapter of my life here. The first half of that is already gone by now, ending in yet another visit home, to be in time for my dad's birthday and the first ever reunion of our school batch. So, the first half was just as monotonous as last years', except for the fact that this time, I had started going to the sports fields to try to undo some of the damages of the last 2 years. That was just about the only thing I did regularly these 4 weeks. Otherwise, everything was as erratic as it could have gone. As for the SURA project, my project partner would testify happily that he had expected much more efforts from me.
However, I did manage to finish all the seasons of Prison Break, even if it included going to other hostels to find the older seasons. HIMYM, 30 Rock and Seinfeld also got their share. In between, I also read To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. The time spent online on Orkut and Facebook and chatting with folks on gtalk also increased radically, so did my sleeping hours. The only break from this monotony was when me and some Jwala guys decided one Saturday to check out the newly constructed Metro museum. However, it turned out to be a mere exhibition of some facts regarding Delhi Metro at the Patel Chowk station, to give the bored passengers 15 minutes of information. So, we decided to go to a real museum, and ended up in National Museum, where we spent the rest of our day, making the most of our Re. 1 Students' tickets, clicking pics every now and then, for which we had to pay 20 bucks.
So, now that the first half is well behind, I think its time to make the summers more interesting or productive, if I have to ever complete my project. However, only time will tell what's actually gonna happen.
For the uninitiated, SURA is the acronym for Summer Undergraduate Research Award, which was started to dissuade the ambitious 2nd year students from spamming the Profs. abroad for summer internships. Though it was not such a huge success, still it was considered quite prestigious to get a SURA in the initial years, to the extent that one could have his degree extended if the project was not completed on time. But over the years, the relaxed norms didn't help much in retaining the prestige associated with it. Infact, this year, out of the 49 odd 'fully-sponsored-foreign-trip-cum-internship-dreams-shattered' people like me, who had applied for it, 43 managed to get it, illustrating how easy it has become to get it nowadays.
Anyways, this time also, I ran away to home after the exams, and came back after the results were declared, thus saving myself from the anxiety of waiting for the grades. The initial days were spent digesting the fact that while some of our lucky batchmates would be enjoying in some firangi land, lesser mortals like us would have to endure yet another cycle of Indian summers. Adding salt to injury was the excitement of the folks taking French lessons for their exchange programme for the next semester. The only saving grace was the prospect of being able to do a project of my choice freely with none of the tensions of a regular hectic semester.
Thus began yet another chapter of my life here. The first half of that is already gone by now, ending in yet another visit home, to be in time for my dad's birthday and the first ever reunion of our school batch. So, the first half was just as monotonous as last years', except for the fact that this time, I had started going to the sports fields to try to undo some of the damages of the last 2 years. That was just about the only thing I did regularly these 4 weeks. Otherwise, everything was as erratic as it could have gone. As for the SURA project, my project partner would testify happily that he had expected much more efforts from me.
However, I did manage to finish all the seasons of Prison Break, even if it included going to other hostels to find the older seasons. HIMYM, 30 Rock and Seinfeld also got their share. In between, I also read To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. The time spent online on Orkut and Facebook and chatting with folks on gtalk also increased radically, so did my sleeping hours. The only break from this monotony was when me and some Jwala guys decided one Saturday to check out the newly constructed Metro museum. However, it turned out to be a mere exhibition of some facts regarding Delhi Metro at the Patel Chowk station, to give the bored passengers 15 minutes of information. So, we decided to go to a real museum, and ended up in National Museum, where we spent the rest of our day, making the most of our Re. 1 Students' tickets, clicking pics every now and then, for which we had to pay 20 bucks.
So, now that the first half is well behind, I think its time to make the summers more interesting or productive, if I have to ever complete my project. However, only time will tell what's actually gonna happen.
now that's the exact blog i was lookin for.
ReplyDeleteu saved me a lot of hardwork searching for a good iitian blog.
thanks for the blog. keep posting more.
looking for more from you...
so, now even a dumb kid is asking for more :P
ReplyDeletethat was really a fun reading you.. you have a gr8 writer behind u dude.
ReplyDeletekeep it up
thats what happens to every one there in the hostel! its hot as hell in the college and the greenery turns out to be sticking to you like cactus. lucky for you now you have fast net access and you BLOG... ;)
ReplyDeleteNjoy...