Brain Freeze

Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Eyesight?

That concludes Drishti-2K5! Yo, man.. Good riddance, or what?!

Day1
"Get here by 7:30!" So, I am in CET at 7:45... empty lobby, and here I am lugging a big plastic cover full of 80 (the number is significant!) question papers. Plonking it down on the nearest available bench (set up for better reception), I sat down too, to wait for all the hell to break loose. One by one, other PC members showed up (First the girls, I must add) and we swapped notes. My sub-committee entered the scene at times ranging from 8:30 to 9:15... Reshmi and I started cooking up GD and Turncoat topics! By then, people were signing up for various programs in droves/flocks/herds. I was keeping a tab on the people signing up... It was getting dangerously close to the 80 mark.. So, I summoned (err beseeched) Flyboy Jeryn to take some 25 copies... "Damn he's taking too long.." So , I trotted off to see what (the hell) he was doing! Got him to come up (on a bike for 500 m)! Then, i realised the list had gone WAY beyond 105.... "25 more copies!" Amid all the running around yelling for "Copies! MORE copies!" there cropped up a fresh ... (you guessed it!!!) PROBLEM!
Everything had got shifted, because the ceremony was late to start. So, Best Manager, scheduled to start at 10:30 was to start at 11:15 and clashed with EVERY DESIGN AND DEBUGGING CONTEST! So, in came every Committee head for a talk with the poor little soul in charge (or so she likes to think!) "Could you make it 11:30? Some of my contestants want to participate too!"
Brick Bond, Unscrew (nothing vulgar!), Circuit Debugging and CAD Design prelims were all adjusted.. so we just had to submit papers and let people in according to when they came in... NOTHING to it!! :P
Then, we ran into another snag... Total number of registrants= 170, total number of question papers= 155.. You know the refrain...
I actually had to admit (albeit sheepishly) to about 60 Circuit Debugging-Best Manager participants... "We are sorry, please wait for a while... papers are on the way!" Meanwhile, tech Quiz prelims started clashing with a vengeance too... so there was a redistribution of papers! I just refrained from pulling my hair. In the middle of all this, the first batch completed their hour long paper and lurched out of the room, clutching their head and groaning. Correction started.. I had THE nicest committee members! Love you all!!!
The second batch commenced on the papers! Those were the true-blue CAT aspirants and CAT-Toppers.. After 2 gruelling hours of managing an hour-long paper, we were correcting some 170-odd papers.. At 1:30 sharp there arrived our judges : Mr KK, Mr. Ajit Antony and Rohit (no Mr. because he SPECIFICALLY asked me not to call him sir)
KK flipped through the paper and delivered the verdict "Very hard!" (I almost danced with joy) but since Vivek (of the 99.98%) had said "It's easy!", I knew whom to believe!
Meanwhile, my superb and wonderful Committee- Vimitha, Divya, Reshmi, Pooja, Jeryn & Eric were still correcting along with a volunteer and Atul (VC Quest head and one of the most helpful guys around!) and the results were out in a matter of just half an hour... Like I said, love them all!! I was feeling slightly guilty because most of my work entailed running up and down and doing bits on the mike asking people to show up... But damn! WAS it exhausting!
The scene shifted to the CGPU for the GDs.. Vivek had topped the written round with 168/300, Gowri was second with 162. (S6 Electronics ki shaan!) Vivek didn't show up along with Roy, though.. he had circuit debugging finals to worry about!
So there we were, with 2 GDs to go and the judges champing at the bit...
First topic "The 4th estate and the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse"... the blank stares were PRICELESS! I like to call it the "What have we got ourselves into?" face... So I explained the concept from Revelation and beat a hasty retreat for my own health and well-being. Karthick had started explaining about Dakar and Iraq, while Virendra mumbled "good topic" and started scribbling. It was hilarious... but the best was yet to come.
Second GD.. (devious topic by Reshmi) "That's the way the money goes, Pop goes the weasel." 7 minutes into the GD, Nikhil got up and left.. the others followed suit..
KK came up with the 6 finalists names... 5 were from the first GD (BIG surprise!) and then, it was time for the FINALS
First up, Turncoat.. the topics ranged from "Management is the amalgamation of the science of the obvious and the art of the improbable" (which Virendra screwed up) to "Mary had a little pug." (which Srijit ruled) by way of "Winners don't Quit and Quitters shouldn't whine", "Mangers are seldom visible, but always present" and "Leaders do the right thing, Managers do things right."
Biz Quiz time... It was easy to score.. Auster (or Buster) 10 and others zero! Govind nearly broke the ceiling with his Amaron answer (very good, Govind!) and finally Stress Interview... Pooja, Atul, Hari, Renjith, Reshmi and I were behind the contestants, sniggering away to glory.. But it was quite fun...
After some scrambling to get the mementoes and files and badges of the judges, it was ALL done.. I was bushed... I dragged myself to the lobby, heard Anand's tall ideas for tomorrow and went home to sleep!
The day wasn't over yet! Not by a long shot. At night, there was a gala Yahoo session with SCTian friends.. And finally, a powerpoint delivered to VC Quest organisers Atul Mathur and Virendra Bhushan.. Moi slept at 2 am! I was afraid Day 2 was not going to be sunny!
The Best Managers! Srijith Vijayan: TKM, Virendra Bhushan: CET, Karthick PH: CET! Kudos, people!

Day 2
Call me an overachiever.. you can't be too wrong! It was time for VC Quest finals in the Electronics Seminar Hall... Partners: Anand MS & Shruti Susan George, S6, Electronics..
Product: Port2Port Teleporter
We had to present our product before a distinguished panel of venture capitalists.. Distinguished, as in, "We have to listen to a bunch of kids present some dumb product and leave for lunch"
I got out of home at 8:30, reached college at 9:15 because of a procession (Kavadi) and THEN broke my shoes.. (what a day already!).. By the time I got a replacement and reached the lobby, it was 9:45 and Anand and I had NEVER done the presentation...
Of course, since our product was SO blatantly fictitious, we had VERY original ideas! Scanning using U-Lead scanners and Sigma Rays *snort* Anand, Arjun and I sat down in the CCF for some last minute brushing up and giggling. Anand's theories were.. err.. MIND boggling!
The pair before was were Karthick and Rishi and their presentation blew everyone away... I kept mumbling "I don't want to do this... we're going to be fools..." Anyway H-hour came and off we went to "do our pathetic thing"
First question "This is all imaginary. Is there any part of it that is true?" I proceeded to explain about Photon and Laser teleportation, Anand interjected with "In MIT, they teleported a 2 cubic cm object successfully (During dry runs it had been 4 cubic metres till we pointed out he could be teleported within that twice) I chanced a glance at the audience, Arjun was grinning as widely as I was, while the others (poor souls) thought it was true. As fast as it got over, both of us fled in opposite directions. I headed off to see the Tech Quiz finals, which was fun and we got chocs for right answers!
Slowly, we found our way back to the Hall and Atul gave me some VERY surprising news "Third prize!"... We looked completely dazed! Anand suddenly became cocky (typical guy thing). Arjun brought him down to earth by saying "Nee Avide poi enthuva da pirupirathethu?" (What did you go and mumble there, dude?) :D Anand wanted to prove his point, viz. everyone believed his tall stories, so he buttonholed Atul and asked him about the MIT teleportation.. Atul said "Sure I believed you" *long pause* "Dude, I didn't believe ANYTHING you said!"
Anyways... I got a lunch from Anand for the trouble and next time, we promised, no fictional ideas!


Copy-write Shrutz :: 8:27 AM :: 4 Sneaky Remarks:

What would you like to do?

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