This too shall pass.

“This too shall pass.” Is a Hebrew saying and is my favourite quote. They say that legends say things and its fools who repeat them but then who said I am not foolish. Let me first get to the origin of this saying. Though there are many sources to its origin, the one that I like to believe (because it has that grip to it) is as follows:


One day Solomon decided to humble Benaiah Ben Yehoyada, his most trusted minister. He said to him, "Benaiah, there is a certain ring that I want you to bring to me. I wish to wear it for Sukkot which gives you six months to find it." "If it exists anywhere on earth, your majesty," replied Benaiah, "I will find it and bring it to you, but what makes the ring so special?" "It has magic powers," answered the king. "If a happy man looks at it, he becomes sad, and if a sad man looks at it, he becomes happy." Solomon knew that no such ring existed in the world, but he wished to give his minister a little taste of humility. Spring passed and then summer, and still Benaiah had no idea where he could find the ring. On the night before Sukkot, he decided to take a walk in one of the poorest quarters of Jerusalem. He passed by a merchant who had begun to set out the day's wares on a shabby carpet. "Have you by any chance heard of a magic ring that makes the happy wearer forget his joy and the broken-hearted wearer forget his sorrows?" asked Benaiah. He watched the grandfather take a plain gold ring from his carpet and engrave something on it. When Benaiah read the words on the ring, his face broke out in a wide smile. That night the entire city welcomed in the holiday of Sukkot with great festivity. "Well, my friend," said Solomon, "have you found what I sent you after?" All the ministers laughed and Solomon himself smiled. To everyone's surprise, Benaiah held up a small gold ring and declared, "Here it is, your majesty!" As soon as Solomon read the inscription, the smile vanished from his face. The jeweler had written three Hebrew letters on the gold band: _gimel, zayin, yud_, which began the words "_Gam zeh ya'avor_" -- "This too shall pass." At that moment Solomon realized that all his wisdom and fabulous wealth and tremendous power were but fleeting things, for one day he would be nothing but dust.


Just like Solomon, I have also come to the sad realization that all good things come to an end. No this is not a random thought, it’s a sad realization that struck me when I saw the orkut album of one of my seniors at IIT. It was then I remembered that it is my last year at IIT and its gonna end soon. This is the bad things ending and good things beginning side of the story. But when I look around, I see friends, I see people having a laugh about almost anything and just enjoying the life. No I don’t want to leave all this. I don’t want to leave the comfort of the nest that each one of us has slowly built. Why this has to “pass”?

For what its worth, I would like to thank all my friends, batchmates, hostelmates and all the people who have made my life at IITG colorful and enjoyable. Without you I would have never been able to survive 4 years at this place. And now I wish I could stay with you guys forever. But then this too shall pass.

10 ultimate bollywood clichés

1)Kuttey ! Main tera khoon pi jaoonga!

2)Hum gareeb zaroor hain, lekin hamari bhi izzat hai.

3)Apne aap ko kanoon ke haawale kar do.

4)Yeh lo pachchaas hazaar rupiah aur meri beti ko bhool jao. Reply “Aap mujhe khareedna chahcte hain? Mera pyaar bikau nahi hain!”

5)Bhagwan ke liye chhod mujhe! Kuttey, kameeney! “Itni achhi cheez ko bhagwan le liye chhod doon?

6)Injection de diya hai, thodi der mein hosh aa jayega

7)yeh maa Banne waali hai.

8) Maa…!!! Tumhari aakhon mein ansoo..

9) Tamaam sabooton aur gawahon ko madde nazar rakhte huye, mujhrim ko taaze rate hind, dafa 302 ke tahat sazae maut di jaati hai…

10) Bhagwaan mujhe insaf chahiye.

Techniche '07 our final technica quest in IITG

Techniche for me has always been a 3 day work and management and almost zero fun. But this time it was different. This time I had a zing going and participated in many events, I even tried my hand at CS event but as expected, I was not selected. Then I had the chance to launch IIT Radio and became the first IITG RJ. It was total fun and surprisingly people liked me. I got good reviews and enjoyed every bit of it. Though I haven’t heard the complete show myself, I am more than satisfied by the reviews I got. An in between all this, I gave a shot at the par’AD’igm event. It was supposed to be a 4 member team event, but I went in alone and gave the quickest paper of my life. I did about 30 questions in 15 mins and rushed out to complete my radio recording. I got a total of 62 just 2 marks short of the finalists but was happy to defeat 70% of teams present there. so much for the day.

And in the night came the big and the most interesting event. It was the Virtual Stock Market (VSM) time and I went in alone with my official partner lying in comfort of his bed. Well the show started in total chaos with nobody having even the slightest idea of what was going around. We started arbit bidding and I was successful in striking a few good deals. Then came the biggest turn around of the event. It was the entry of my friend Ankit Nagori (Anna) and from here on it was a fish-market, with two of us speaking at the top of our voice and making some pretty awesome deals. Just to give you an idea we bought CCE shares at 1000 and 5 minutes later sold them for 3500. Man it was all crazy. We made like 20 such deals and were leading the over-all standings despite a few SOB’s trying hard to pull us down. I mean why are people jealous of seeing others win. They don’t have the guts to present themselves and take up the challenge. All they can do is to pull others down. Its really frustrating to realize that such people study with us. The back stabbing bastards will spread all sorts of wrong information about you and then come to your room at party time. Well their efforts to make us fall didn’t work and they themselves fell head first. By the morning official results were declared and we were declared as winners. It was good to finally win something in techniche.

However all this was to come to a sour end. Our dream of ending the techniche with a award on-stage was not to be. We were refused to get on stage for our prize and were told “ki bakwaas mat karo, humien bahut kaam hai”. Well thats’ an ironic end to our Techniche careers, when we worked our ass out for 3 years just to see that everything went on smoothly. Its not about the prize, its about respect. What pains me even more is that Anna who started this even 2 years back and has worked more than anybody else in making Techniche ’06 and Techniche ’07 a success was denied a much deserved appreciation. It would have been a befitting to end his techniche on-stage as a winner. Well prize or no prize, on-stage or off-stage Anna will always be the man who made techniche a success. Despite all these highs and lows I would remember Techniche ’07 as my favourite Techniche.

Good Bye Techniche We loved you!!

My Shelf

Do we appreciate anything or anybody?

"Appreciate" as per oxford dictionary is : "recognize the full worth of" but today it seems that we have forgotten this word. We are so much interested in our own selfish needs that we are never grateful for anything that comes our way. The mindset that:people are supposed to help me, i should get this/that, its my right to claim this, is certainly making us rude. There is this overwhelming sense of entitlement. We take things for granted and thats where all goes wrong. We don't care for what others do for us, we just think that they are supposed to help. But this is not the case. Everybody deserves some thanks and gratitude for helping us.

With people getting richer, we are forgetting the virtues of gratitude and have started to believe that money has the power to get anything done. Well it sure does have the power to get you materialistic things but what about relationships? How much do we interact with our subordinates, our colleagues or our friends. We just think that these people are there for us. If somebody makes a mistake, we are all guns over him forgetting that its human to make mistakes. But then we are divine and we don't make mistakes.

So next time your friend helps you, somebody offers you his support or you buy something from a general store remember to say 'please' and 'thank you' coz it is all that is needed to make things work.
So please say please. [:P]

what have i learnt from IIT

IITs may be among the most coveted colleges in India but is it really the mecca of education? Is the best research centre in the country? What do students in IITs really learn, why are they seen as some of the best brains in the world? Well to the common man the answers to these question may be immaterial because after all you want is a good job after graduation which come as a guarantee with IIT admission. But are IITs really worth it.

According to me IITs are the toughest colleges to get in but the easiest to get out (of course wid a degree) of. All the hard work, determination, number crunching stops when you enter IIT. People here have a laid back attitude in general and will do everything and anything to avoid an assignment. Copying assignment, getting profs to postpone deadlines is everyday affair. The real education starts a week before exam but that is forgotten once the exams are over. After three years of studying in a branch of the so called best engineering colleges in India I now wonder what really have i learnt. I am certainly not the master of any subject and not even a jack of most. What really have i learnt????

The only thing that I can safely say about my college is that it makes you an all-round personality. Interacting with people who have such unique talents teaches a lot. Its the people, my friends, my classmates that have taught me the best lessons of life. Everybody here is skillful in one or the other thing and gyaan-dhara never stops. Everybody is always bubbling with new ideas, new information that is how we learn what we learn. From politics to cultural fest, from technical quest to daaru-party, from night-outs to complete bunks, from four-star to dhaba, from pub to hostel terrace, from campus lake to brahmaputra, from hostel field to hilltop, IIT has taught me all.

I thank my friends, my seniors, my juniors and everybody else for teaching me all the important things in life. No matter how much I hate our college for its shortcoming but my Heart, my Soul, my Love will still be with IITG.

luv u all.......

We indians are all rapists.....

Fueled by the anger of reading repeated cases of rape, sexual assault etc I began to think if we Indians will ever come to terms with open mind when sex is in question. The more thought i put into it, the more i realized that 90% of indians are rapists in one way or the other. Yes this may be disturbing for you but i think this way. Apart from the numerous cases of unreported rapes and sexual harassments, there is another category that I consider rape. Its the legal rape. This is surprising but yes in india there is a license available to rape and this license is called arranged marriage or generally marriage in which neither the broom nor the bride has a say. How much do the bride and the groom know about each other before they get married. Two months or at max six months, this is the time between engagement and marriage. Within this short period of time I personally don't think its possible to know the complete personality of anybody. With intercaste weddings a big taboo in our country, either the bride or groom or even both are left to wonder about their future. This is the category of legal rape and this isn't gonna stop till we do something about our "Dharam ke Thekedars".

When will we grow up? When will lovebirds of meerut and places alike feel free to sit in a park and enjoy their talks? When will these ever increasing rape cases stop? Its time the youth put a brave step in front of their parents and let the world know that we live in an open era with no restrictions. And for God's sake please provide some sex education at school level. Its better to talk about than to rape somebody to get to know about sex. Kick the bastard politicians in their balls and beat the hell out of those who seek a ban on sex education.

The above are my personal thoughts and I welcome any comments that you have. So next time you read a newspaper article about rape ask yourself if you are in some way or the other responsible for it....

Top Ten Reasons for Upgrading to a PC instead of a Mac:

• 1. You enjoy reading computer manuals
• 2. Buying parts 'not included' is your idea of being patriotic
• 3. Blaming it on the PC is a great excuse... for anything
• 4. Tech support is your idea of telephone dating
• 5. Your favorite computer game is figuring out where your files are
• 6. You look forward to today's new virus (or worm, or both)
• 7. You like listening to telephone support hold-button music
• 8. Letting the kids play on the Mac next door frees your time (eliminates after-school kid sitters)
• 9. You think Bill Gates deserves the money
• 10. You have nothing better to do with all the extra time

iitians who we really are...

Iitians in India are a famous and respected breed. Wherever you go and tell people that you are in IIT or u are an iitian, there will surely be some moms and dads coming upto you asking some advice for their children. Common perception is that we are complete nerds who are really good at understanding things and studying hard. We are seen as descendants of goddess Saraswati (the goddess of knowledge). but little do the people know that beneath this aura of geekdom we are people with very rare and mostly unacceptable qualities.

let me tell the world what we really are. Every iitian has two sides to him, the one he maintains at home and with other non-iitian (no hard-feelings) friends and one tht he has in college. They say that things come into their best when they are in congenial surroundings. And iit campus is the best place for us to come into our own and live the real insane side of our life.
Every iitian loves pink-floyd coz it is the best music that has ever been played. We call it the psychedelic music and as the saying goes:

To fathom Hell or soar angelic,

just take a pinch of psychedelic.

But we being from the Satan side need a little more than that so its elixir of Satan (usually rum, vodka, whiskey, smoke n sometimes dope) combined with Pink Floyd that takes us higher. Almost all the discoveries (there aren't many to boast about) are made in this phase and this is the time that we actually do something other than watching movie, tv-soaps or playing games.

About the movies and tv-soaps thing, you will always find an iitian who has seen whtever movie u think off and who knows every episode of FRIENDS by heart. The gaming (SOF n AOE in my campus) is another religion here. Late nite gaming is just another chore that most of the iitians have to do. Its the only way to get you frustration out, u cant kill a prof, atleast kill another player who plays by your prof's name.

Even though what I am going to say is a well-kown national fact but for the records i have to repeat it. "Iitians are sex-starved." Yes it is as true as any other theorem in the world and is perhaps the easiest to prove. We people will approach anything which even remotely resembles the female side of human life. Even though we may maintain a high taste amongst ourselves but the truth is that we are always looking for a glimpse of some female counterpart. We might be the most eligible bachelor education wise, money-wise but beware of the wild side.

Lastly I may have degraded my fellow mates by my harsh comments so to even out things let me enlighten some good things about us. Yes we are workaholic but only when its a day or two before the deadline. We can work for 4 days in a row and yet show no signs of tiredness of sleep. And the very next day we can sit in an exam and still perform better than most people on earth. Yes we are geeks, but geeks who know how to study and how much to study and most importantly when to study. Yes we can work like an ass but only when it comes to organising cult-fest, rock-nites and tech-fest.

The most important thing is that we don't live our lives as the world wants us to do, we just live it the way we want to. We dont care if people idolize us our despise us, we don't care for any dams thing on earth coz thts the way we are.

IIT SUCKS but I LOVE it STILL.........

how will i ever say goodbye

this is that time of the year when every college in India bids farewell to graduating batch and gears up to welcome a new generation. For the materialistic stuff its just the passing of the resources to the future generations but for we all juniors its like the end of an era. For some its just a time to move on but for me its like letting go the support system that guides you, helps you, kick you to get you working and make you a complete person.

People move on but leave behind a way of life, expectations to live upto, a legacy and a gap that not even time can fill. And seniors in IITG have been the best that one can expect. The way they are always able to put a smiling face, no matter how grieve the matter is, taking out fun in small things of life and enjoying it to the fullest, showing unrelenting strength in the time of need are some things that i can never forget. It gives me immense pride to say that i studied in a college where people were special in their own ways and each one was an institution in himself.
Being a kapilite i was witness to the most diverse kind of people one can ever meet. The ragiing gaints Homo and Keeki, the ever bubbling Fido, the fanatic JAT, no tension TAU, the creative Shaiz and the list goes on.
Here is something that i will always remember about these guys:

TAU aka Lakshya Malhotra: Defy system but never let it kick you back
Micks aka Mayank Singla: Downloading champ ( i hope i can continue his legacy)
Shaiz : Ultimate creativity and his ever cute abuses
CP aka Chander Prakash: Fundae dene aate ho to kaam nahi karna padta
Tuggi aka Tushar Garg: I am the boss and i can give the best fundae
Vivek Inder Sharma: I dont try and yet i perform
ponker aka Depankar Garg: Management champ
Keeda aka gundeep: I am what I am
etc etc

Guys you have been great seniors and in next sem the life wont be same without you guys and there really is gonna be a hole in my soul.
Thanks for being there and Will miss you guys forever.......

I Walk Alone

No this is not the Greenday song its just some basic facts about what life has taught me over the years. This is all about what life means to me right now.
Well I walk alone. This has been the story of my life. Like everybody's school life, my life had all the fun, studies and friends that one has in school life. And then come the great Indian competitive life of getting into IIT's AIIMS and your life starts to shape in ways you didnt imagine before. You come across people who are so very different from what you expect of them.

This cruel world is waiting to bite you, always ready to pull your leg, the moment you trust them.
you meet people who pretend to be nice to you, who pretend to care for you but when the time comes they ditch you and behave as if they dont have anything to do with you. People you trust say things behind your back, they ridicule you, they despise you but the moment you are in front of them, they are these sweet-faced, ever-smiling fellows.

My experience of hostel and college life (about 5 Years) has taught me that there are very few people who accept you the way you come. Most friendships have strings attached to them. Very few people give you space and understand your feelings. Its in the company of these friends that you feel secure and relax otherwise you just keep on walking alone. Every eye that watches you, cuts through you as if it is blaming you for something, asking you for something and you pretend that it doesnt bothers you but deep down you hate all this. This is where I have come to realize that you just have to walk alone, keep your few good friends close and take the world as it comes. Dont worry what people have to say, dont think too much about what you should do to make people happy, because in the end it all comes down to you and just you.

Walk alone friends for it is the only way you can achieve your goal.