When Time Stands Still

There are some moments in our lives when Time slows into a stand still. When you want to arrest its advance. When you want the moments to live forever. When you want to archive every thought, every feeling, every word said and heard. When you want to document all you did. When you know that the sempiternal emotions are the best you have ever felt. When you want the sanguine mood to survive all your life. When you are in a delirium because your deepest desires turn into reality. When your endorphins get you into a high and you want to stay intoxicated. When you know you climbed the mountain and instead of beginning the downward journey, you jumped up and touched the clouds. When you know that the soaring has only begun and you can only go higher. When you know a new and exciting journey has just started. When you know you will forever remember how it all began. When it is all so precious you want to write everything down in letters of gold.

But at the same time, you begin to wonder at its speed - how fast it has flown. When you realize that it was not long ago when you were a completely different person. When you had braced yourself for years of effort. When it turns out to be only a matter of days. When it only takes one moment to change everything, one moment which comes out of the blue could hold power to steer your life in a new direction.

And, re-assured in the strength of time, you decide to let time take its own course, for you are so high on Pollyannaism that you know that nothing can go wrong. And what is destined will happen.

One with Nature

I always tell people that one of the greatest advantages of living in a bucolic sleepy town like Kharagpur is that you learn to be one with nature. Sample of the reasons why:

• I have this great lizard friend of mine, who shares my room. Even though I had always wanted a single room for myself (and thankfully got one), I really don't mind my lizard room mate around. We have shared good and bad times together and tried to help each other in times of difficulty - I keep my room dirty just so that my lizard friend can get lots of mosquitoes to eat, and my lizard friend binges on them (she is pretty corporeal) so that they don't suck my own blood - now that is what is called a symbiotic relationship! [I haven't exactly tried to check her gender around but it feels good to be sharing a room with a female ;-)]
• I have been very generous to a lot of ants and have let them make a nest in my keyboard. Needless to say that my keyboard proved to be a very fertile mating ground for them, and there are umpteen numbers of ants always trying to crawl out of my keyboard. Of course, there is some amount of selfish interest involved because it helps me closely observe the intricacies of Ant Colony Optimization. Strangely, my own lassitude in buying a new keyboard is more a manifestation of my concern for the poor ant families than anything else [read: empty wallets] :-D
  
• I was talking to this very senior researchers from one of the top CS Research labs in the country, and happened to ask him how his trip had been. He said that it had been great except for these two frogs who had been sitting in a corner of the room of his associate only to pounce on him in the dead of the night. Poor guy could not sleep all night! I could only wish he had stayed in Kharagpur for some more time. He probably wished it away when another guy casually remarked that this frog friend of his had shared his room all of his first year, and they lived happily, each occupying their share of the room and not bothering the other.
  
• I still remember when I had to descend the stairs in my first year (for lack of water in my first floor bathroom) for my ablutions. I remember sitting on the toilet seat (there not being any newspaper to enjoy) once in a while only to find a frog staring at me! And we would just keep staring at each other, until I finished and went away and he waited for his next guest!
  
• The researcher asked me about bigger animals we can find here and the conversation happened to come to snakes. Now, Kharagpur has lots of snakes and once in a while you can see them ambling around in their typical serpentine fashion. We explained to him that here in Kharagpur, snakes have the right of way, just as pedestrians do in America. When you see a snake crossing the road in front of you, you just wait till it goes away. Fair enough!
• Not to speak of the umpteen number of dogs who have made out hostels their kennels. In their mating season, one can often see them howling around trying to find a mate, and then you see this huge litter of small little puppies, who will serve another generation of students as their faithful pet dogs.
• Then again, in the mess, we can often feel our very own kittens juggling around under our feet.
  
• The numerous number of bovines who graze our lawns (is that the right word?) and bless our pavements with their ... erm... well... blessings!
• The love-owls flying around the campus at night (you really can't call them birds, aren't they supposed to sleep at night?) strictly in pairs.
  
• And who can forget our very own IITians, the wierdest species of men (and a handful fo women) present in the world!
  

If you can think of any more, let me know, I will add to the list.

UPDATE:
On popular demand, I am adding a few more which I had overlooked:

• In case of most Kgpians, only the bottom six-and-a-half feet of their room is theirs - the upper half is arachnid territory. Most of us probably do not even look at at their ceilings, or even if they do, they don't get a very clear view of it, hidden as it is behind a nebula of spider-web. Well, we find our own use of it - it helps our very own house lizard to keep our room clear of all mosquitoes. [All-Out and Goodnight manufacturers would probably call for censorship of this post.]
• Then we have our very own special breed of insects - little green bastards, or LGBs as we call them. They come every year when they are least wanted, cover all lights with their menace for a few weeks, and finally go away with Diwali. Apart from illumination, the one reason we celebrate Diwali in this part of the country is that we are finally saved from the torture caused by the LGBs; it is not very common to find a couple of them making a beeling for your mouth, year, nose, or even your food.
• Before I forget, we have these wonderful friends of ours from the insect family, which makes us really reflective when we see Men In Black - bugs. I will not talk about them, but rather direct you to a very well written piece about their utility, courtesy Sunny.
  

Intent and Expressions

Expressions are a certificate of what you intend to do (mostly).

I may have all the right intentions but if I give all the wrong signals to somebody, there is no way how that person would take me in the right spirit.

Well meant but not well done is just not good enough!

The Illumination of RK

It was my last Diwali in IIT Kharagpur yesterday. I had enjoyed my Diwalis before coming to IIT and I will probably continue to enjoy my Diwalis after I pass out, but from now on, every Diwali, there would be something missing, a vaccum which can not be filled anywhere else in the world, a void which will always remain. Because every Diwali, my mind is going to delve into its archives and replay a piece of tape, faded but still fresh as ever - for the rest of my life, every year on Diwali I am going to witness RK's Illumination again.

Illumination is something unique to IIT Kharagpur - a bunch of guys coming together to create exquisite patterns on chatais (wireframes made of bamboo skin) made up of diyas (small lamps), all lit up on Diwali night. Last year our hall won the Gold in the competition, and it was the Best Day of my Life, the moment when we danced on the roads with the Victory Cup on our heads, when the matka full of Rossogollas seemed weightless, when you could shout louder than you ever had, and you could hear your heart pumping blood so fast that even after umpteen sleepless nights you had the strength to run that victory lap. This year, however, the results somehow were not commensurate with our efforts, the reasons of which I am still unsure about and probably don't even care.

Because in my eyes, that moment when RK's illumination is lit is a moment of unadulterated ecstacy. I was again a part of the presentation team and probably got one of the best views of illumination. Picture nine huge chatais right in front of you, but you can not see the view because of all those hundreds of your friends standing on stacks upon stacks of tables to light up the diyas. And then the "RK Split" call is given. When the whole structure of hundreds of tables is cleared off in half a minute and you are exposed to the true splendour of Diwali, you only feel numb, you do not want to talk, you do not want to move, you only want to admire and you want the moment to be recorded in your memory forever. I was supposed to explain to the judges everything about our illumination theme, but that one moment I felt weak in my knees. And I went completely mute, lips sealed in admiration. And then realization dawns on you, and you begin to realize that such grandeur is never going to go unrewarded, if a person could not appreciate this, he probably is not human, and can not distinguish true beauty from roadside squalour. And you grow confident - you can recount all those lines you felt you would forget, all nervousness leaves you, and you start talking in a daze, as if your own lips follow not your command, but the command of some supreme being, who holds complete control over your movements through his brilliance reflected by the chatais. You start to feel the Gods themselves have descended in front of you.

And then, there is another moment - the moment when the judges leave. Suddenly the ice breaks, the whole atmosphere is filled by a huge furore - people jumping down from the top of terraces where they had been hiding, in patient anticipation, absolute silence while the judges were there, shouting at the top of their voice. You turn back and run. You hug the first person you meet, and the second, and the third, and you just can't stop doing it. You hug people you have not talked to in years, you hug people you talk to everyday, you lift you friends up in the air, you get lifted by your friends up in the air. You don't care if the other person is bathed in oil or mud, because in this moment of frenzy, in each of those embraces, you begin to find true happiness - finally after going the whole day without wishing, you wish everybody "Happy Diwali".

There is one more moment - when the results are announced. I experienced it last year, but had to face dejection this year. However, when I think back, five or ten years down the line, it is the first two moments which are going to stay with you forever - which you are going to replay all your life. And all the hard work and toil of the last twenty-one days. And all the sleepless nights spent working with friends. The loud music while tying the diyas. The cuts and bruises you get in your hands. The cutters and pliers. The 12mm gauge wires. The chatais being painted. The first diya you tie on the chatais. The number of times you re-open the diyas you just tied moments ago because you feel the curve did not come out well. The umpteen attempts to perfect the horse's backside. The number of times you re-tied Sita's saree, Narasimha's face, Seshnaag's hood, the chariot-driver's face, the lion's mane. The chai breaks. The snacks at 2 AM in the morning. The rickety ladder. The stacks of tables. The chair atop those tables. The huge din all night. The taunting and teasing. The invectives you hurl at your best friends across the hall boundary (and still remain best friends!). The friends you get to make. The friends you will remember forever.

The moments you can not forget ever. The bathing in oil. The lighting of the diyas. The awe-inspiring view. The hugging everybody. The feeling of standing on heaven's door.

The Illumination of RK.