Act 3: Convince or Confuse!
November 18,2010
Dept. of Fuel and Mineral Engg.
Well if on Monday I was saved by my room mate, then on Tuesday Fortuna and Tyche themselves helped me out of Mandrake's torture session! I was halfway through the prac-o-mania and things had turned, to say the least, humorously favourable.
Wednesday was a gap day. I did nothing much. I had been doing nothing much for some time then. So, while people were busy studying for the 'Excursion Viva' on Thursday, I was writing a new blog post, chatting on FB, looking up for t-shirts on Myntra's website, pondering over which one's to buy soon.
It wasn't like I didn't want to study. I couldn't. Why? Well, here's the story.
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The 'excursion' on which the Thursday viva was going to be based happened sometime back in February this year,if I remember correctly. And guess what? I didn't go on that excursion! So while the rest of the future mineral engineers were getting to know about the various equipments and stuff at McNally Bharat Engineering, good old Varun lay in his bed, down with a fever which was the direct precursor of the break-up he had the night before!
The HoD was furious at my absence but our CR, Pathak- my sweetheart, controlled the situation. Still the HoD said he wanted a valid certificate from a doctor about my condition (physical, not mental!) or he would not let me sit in the semester exams. I didn't give a damn about the certificate, and the HoD, well he is too old to remember everything that he says!
And at that point I had thought- "Phew!That was a close shave man! Got away easily this time!"
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But the ghosts of the past had come back to haunt me. Imagine being in my situation and sitting in the viva when you never went for the excursion. It's like asking a virgin to write a 500 words essay on his sexual experiences!
I was confident the professors would have forgotten the attendance thingy.The only worry was I had to sit there and bluff! Good thing for me, my room mate came to my rescue again. He had carried a camera on that day and I got to see what MBE actually looked like. My preparation comprised of knowing the place where we went(read, where I never went), a brief of the company operation told to us by the in-charge there ( read , never told to me), what equipments we saw (read, I never saw). That much was enough,I guessed. And I was way better than many other guys, including our very own Pammy-He had been on the trip and now while preparing he looked up for the company's site at Google by typing "Mechanically Bharat Engineering"!!! No wonder we hear so many Sardar jokes everyday! :P
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It was Kalicharan and Jha again! I was relieved to see no Nikkam the HoD. My group comprised of Bhangi, Adi, Baul and me. Adi too had missed out on the excursion and we were both happy that none of us would go to the gallows alone!
But I guess the professors had been bored to death by continuously asking questions about MBE. And so when we went in, they decided to ask some very basic textbook questions. What more could I have asked for! Well, I could have actually. They asked us some trick questions about the difference between Ball mills and Rod mills. All of us bungled up. But the bungling was so synchronized and carried out with such fluidity that the professors didn't notice it. I mean what we all said was correct, it was just not what they wanted to hear. But as soon as they opened their mouth in pride, ready to shower their clouds of knowledge upon us, we took advantage and started parroting the same things, just a second ahead of them! Once we started, it was easy to make out what they were gonna say next. And the effect of it all was that the profs believed we actually knew everything! Poor old chaps! Got fooled by the Gen Y !
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I took a peek into the marking sheet in Kalicharan's hand and I believe a saw a B against my name. For the non-IIT junta, that means 7 on 10. Not bad at all, considering I never went to the excursion!
PS- The only con in this entire episode was that I was taken back to the time of my break-up! Why can't we just erase some memories from our minds?
Continued...
Wednesday was a gap day. I did nothing much. I had been doing nothing much for some time then. So, while people were busy studying for the 'Excursion Viva' on Thursday, I was writing a new blog post, chatting on FB, looking up for t-shirts on Myntra's website, pondering over which one's to buy soon.
It wasn't like I didn't want to study. I couldn't. Why? Well, here's the story.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 'excursion' on which the Thursday viva was going to be based happened sometime back in February this year,if I remember correctly. And guess what? I didn't go on that excursion! So while the rest of the future mineral engineers were getting to know about the various equipments and stuff at McNally Bharat Engineering, good old Varun lay in his bed, down with a fever which was the direct precursor of the break-up he had the night before!
The HoD was furious at my absence but our CR, Pathak- my sweetheart, controlled the situation. Still the HoD said he wanted a valid certificate from a doctor about my condition (physical, not mental!) or he would not let me sit in the semester exams. I didn't give a damn about the certificate, and the HoD, well he is too old to remember everything that he says!
And at that point I had thought- "Phew!That was a close shave man! Got away easily this time!"
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But the ghosts of the past had come back to haunt me. Imagine being in my situation and sitting in the viva when you never went for the excursion. It's like asking a virgin to write a 500 words essay on his sexual experiences!
I was confident the professors would have forgotten the attendance thingy.The only worry was I had to sit there and bluff! Good thing for me, my room mate came to my rescue again. He had carried a camera on that day and I got to see what MBE actually looked like. My preparation comprised of knowing the place where we went(read, where I never went), a brief of the company operation told to us by the in-charge there ( read , never told to me), what equipments we saw (read, I never saw). That much was enough,I guessed. And I was way better than many other guys, including our very own Pammy-He had been on the trip and now while preparing he looked up for the company's site at Google by typing "Mechanically Bharat Engineering"!!! No wonder we hear so many Sardar jokes everyday! :P
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was Kalicharan and Jha again! I was relieved to see no Nikkam the HoD. My group comprised of Bhangi, Adi, Baul and me. Adi too had missed out on the excursion and we were both happy that none of us would go to the gallows alone!
But I guess the professors had been bored to death by continuously asking questions about MBE. And so when we went in, they decided to ask some very basic textbook questions. What more could I have asked for! Well, I could have actually. They asked us some trick questions about the difference between Ball mills and Rod mills. All of us bungled up. But the bungling was so synchronized and carried out with such fluidity that the professors didn't notice it. I mean what we all said was correct, it was just not what they wanted to hear. But as soon as they opened their mouth in pride, ready to shower their clouds of knowledge upon us, we took advantage and started parroting the same things, just a second ahead of them! Once we started, it was easy to make out what they were gonna say next. And the effect of it all was that the profs believed we actually knew everything! Poor old chaps! Got fooled by the Gen Y !
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I took a peek into the marking sheet in Kalicharan's hand and I believe a saw a B against my name. For the non-IIT junta, that means 7 on 10. Not bad at all, considering I never went to the excursion!
PS- The only con in this entire episode was that I was taken back to the time of my break-up! Why can't we just erase some memories from our minds?
Continued...
