Patiently Hoping for a Degree~~ PhD

I have seen two kinds of people opting for this long term commitment. One, who are highly ambitious and inquisitive to the core, individuals who believe they can change the way certain things are supposed to be. Then there’s the other kind...

People who are most of the time lost in some random thought. Folks who know they wouldn’t be able to survive in the corporate sector, if at all they find a place there, because of their perpetual contemplation in excess. They have always dreaded to make an effort to find out where is their life leading them to, so they chose to avoid the question and thereby sparing themselves the trouble to find any answer to it for a considerable part of their life!

By reading the details of the well analysed group above, one would be easily able to make out the category of the crowd I belong to. The wait isn’t that bad as people think it to be. You are given a fair compensation for mulling over things...for the time you spend figuring out what exactly you want from life (as well as from the costly chemicals that you are pouring down the sink).

Your bank balance might just refuse to grow as compared to people with professional or technical degrees. But then who cares as long as you have just enough to indulge yourself.

People say there is a good chance of being daunted by stagnancy here. But life is quite long and so participating in the rat race as early as one’s twenties would be too tiring. It’s awesome to get hypnotised by the wall clock while you have your lunch..to sink into a short luxurious siesta once in a while..to think more..to try rowing at your own pace to steer your life..to explore things you had always wanted to as a child...to make mistakes..and then may be repeat them again (depends on one’s advisor :P ) before you finally learn and in the mean time Patiently Hope for a Degree. There will always be time to run the race :) . Btw to the people with six or seven digit bank balance..at times I do envy you on the last day of the month!

ThE LiFE Of bActeriA~~

I was asked by one of my very close friends to write something on bacteria... So here I go! Now.. where do I start from! Well I can’t imagine my life without bacteria! Today I am what I am...and in future too I will be what I will be because of them :P ..

Everyone of us as a child has been asked about their preference if given a chance to born again. Answers like bird, tiger, whale, ant etc are the common ones. But did anyone hear bacteria as an answer? Atleast I didn’t. They are the most neglected species on this earth since time immemorial.

Do you prefer test matches over T20?? If your answer is no then why don’t you give bacteria a chance. When you can have a luxurious and contended life in 20mins..then why even think about counting years! Maintaining quality instead of worrying about the quantity would certainly lead you to happiness!

Here are some of the points that might help you taking your decision!

These little creatures are the most pampered ones I have ever seen! How many of us live on a pH maintained diet?? I personally don’t have any specific diet. I eat almost anything that comes my way till I am hungry! But I always make sure I prepare pH maintained food for these little ones, strictly made with RO water and sterilised for a certain fixed amount of time! How many of us get to eat such stringently cooked food everytime!??

Being a bacteria has its own advantage. You can easily have your own production unit of anything you wish for. So this saves a huge amount of your money which you would end up spending on a protein rich shampoo, hair colour, cream, medicines etc. If you need something ..just clone the gene of interest in your DNA and you are good to go! Glow in the dark ( you again have the opportunity to choose your favourite colour here :P ...red, green ,yellow...anything you want),

secrete any protein you want ( use it....throw it if you have excess ), produce any antibiotic you want to keep off your enemies or use it just for your own survival...etc etc...the list goes on.. Do you see the advantage?? You would be spoilt for choice...I can guarantee you that... And what’s more!! You can even pass your acquired traits to your progeny at no extra cost :D ....your legacy continues...generation after generation ;) ..

And the most fascinating thing that I find about bacteria is time travel :D ....Well not that exact kind of time travel that comes to your mind... If you are bored of your life and wish to take a break...flash freeze comes to your rescue :P.

Freeze yourself and stay at -80°C for months! Let people know when you want to continue again. So there you are...Starting a new life, 2k-3k generation time ahead....while your fellow bacteria, in some other vial who had shared the same box with you at some point of time, would have perished long back and lost in the sands of time :P ...

I can go on and on...but one must stop before others start getting bored :D ...So I hope I could change your views on bacteria a bit...there’s no denying that they have a better life than we have. Having a fulfilling life of twenty minutes is certainly better than 100years of slogging. I hope you have made up your mind and wished to God about what you want to be in your next birth ! Just make sure you end up in some lab and not in garbage ..else you might really have a tough times surrounded by all kind of bullies :D ...

Btw did you know that there are slow growing bacteria as well.. who take weeks to double. And life isn’t that easy in a 100mm dia petri plate :P ...Nevermind, theres always a second chance ;)

The Ordeal

Durga Puja....the most important festival for a Bengali! No matter in which corner of the world you are...if you are a Bengali, you would definitely yearn to come back to Kolkata during this time of the year! The decked up streets bustling with people equally decked up...in tune with the festive feel....children walking enthusiastically ignoring their shoe bites....the music on every corner of the road...food stalls...rides and yess the pandals! All of a sudden the city seems so lively...

I have never missed a Puja in Kolkata since the last 10 years of the life. Specially in the last two years....I skipped classes, did all I could do to prepone or postpone tests....stood in the line for tatkal tickets...travelled in sleeper class with a RAC ticket during the hot and humid month of October....everything seemed worth those 4-5days of joy!

This time it was a complete disaster though. I had booked my tickets well in advance. But because of the schedule of my exams had to cancel them...Then I decided to book another set of tickets after I realised I could do nothing much to change the dates of the exams.. By then the tickets were no longer available from Bangalore. I booked tickets to home via Chennai... waitlist though! I have an uncle who has VIP reservation quota in the railways. So there was my only chance to go home.

I wrote exams on Panchami and Soshti here at the institute. On Soshti night I took a train to Chennai. I reached early in the morning. Chennai central is quite a familiar station to me. During my M.Sc. days I used to travel to my home via Central. Anyway so after reaching there, I went to the ‘PNR status checking’ kiosk. The chart hadn’t been prepared by then. I sat for two hours in the station watching the local advertisements shown on the television in the station and waiting for the chart to be prepared. I had seen most of them in the last two years but it didn’t matter much.  At around 6:30am the chart was out and I came to know that my ticket was still in the waitlist. I didn’t know what to do. I sat in a chair and cried for 15-20mins. It seemed to be the best option. Flight fare by then was too much to be afforded by me. However I was determined to go home. I went to a “reservation after chart preparation” counter but was turned down.... caught hold of some random TTE in the station. I even thought of getting a general ticket to get on to the train and then pay the fine later. But my father just asked me to return back to hostel.

I so wanted to go home. I didn’t know whom to blame...my profs for jeopardizing my puja plans or my uncle or the unaffordable flight fare or that person in the “reservation after chart preparation” counter. The next train to Bangalore was after 20mins. I had to locate the ticket counter for local trains...which was in a different building. I finally got a ticket for myself 10mins before the train would leave for Bangalore. And then after 7hours I was back to the station from where I had happily started the night before! So I spent my Maha Saptami in travelling to Chennai and then coming back. And here I am today sitting in my room sulking on Ashtami morning. I might go out in the evening to some nearby pandals here with my friends. But then home is where the heart is. I wish September had never ended!

A MuNdAnE LifE

I am a very boring person. Well...it might not be a very appropriate sentence to start your post with but couldn’t think of anything else that would suit better. I sleep at 12 o’clock at night and wake up at 7:30 in the morning....do all sorts of boring chores which regular people do and then rush to my morning classes.

I don’t follow much in the classes though. Sometimes I would just stare blankly at the board (mostly because I am too lazy to either blink or look somewhere else :P).... sometimes I would be lost in the thoughts of people who are ignorant about the spectrum produced by a compound or are oblivious to the fact so as to what would happen if a particular amino acid is replaced by something else in the alpha helix!! Is life too tough for them? Obviously the answer is no. Then why it isn’t the same for me? Why do these facts seem so indispensable to me? It seems my life would stall without the answers! Frustrated and dejected, I decide to pack my bag and leave for some place unknown..away from the people I know. Just then, the instructor pulls me back to this earthly world by asking a question or enquiring if I am still there in the class!

I really wish I could go home..to my city. Not that I have been forced to stay here. But I have always wished for it ever since I had to stay away .... right from my postgraduate days. I feel a connection with Kolkata, which I have failed to make with any other city I have lived in. It has a charm of its own which draws you towards it. Anyways, you will find a lot of articles about Kolkata but not on my life :P ..the sole reason why I started writing on it this evening.

Well, nothing seems too interesting to me to hold back my attention for long. Change seems to be the only key to hold me back to this world. But then again I hate changes. So you see the problem ;).

Anyway, it’s almost time for my dinner. I have spent more than two years of my life living in hostel, still I have not become comfortable with the timely meals. The strict schedule seems to encroach on my freedom!! Thanks for reading this to the end! The most mundane thing on my blog! For a change I thought writing gibberish would help me get away with my boredom!

WhEn... tO CeleBRaTe, Or nOt To CeLEbRaTe, iS tHE qUesTIoN!!

Of late there has been a string of days dedicated to things and people. Fathers’ day, Mothers’ day, Music day, Widows’ day and what not!!

The day is not far when there would be more than 365 different things fighting with one another for a unique day demanding celebration. I am sure there is some economic aspect to it. The greeting card industry must be the one benefiting the most. No wonder there has been a sudden burst of websites selling cards, flowers, mementos, etc.

Anyway.... what I find interesting is that, associated with every special day are largely two groups of people. One which doesn’t mind celebrating Valentine's to Aids day! And the other which mostly does the work of criticizing the first group!

I often see people posting pictures of them with their mother, sister, brother or guitar on ‘World respective day’. Most of them I guess had been waiting for the appropriate time to post the relevant photo.  The pictures are often beautifully edited. Some even make wonderful collages with photos chosen after a great amount of thought. Then comes another subgroup of people who believe in celebrating the spirit of every occasion by wishing everyone. It hardly matters to them that their dog doesn’t have an account (most probably :P)  in that networking site. According to them, wishing it online is what the aim should be!! And now the second group of people comes into the picture.

For these people celebrating a particular day is a sin! They take it for granted that the people belonging to the first group never ever respect their parents or siblings all the year round and then one fine day they show PDA in social networking sites!

They find these people too nyaka and will go on commenting how silly and naive these people are. Who is right would be a very tricky and dangerous question to answer and I wouldn’t dare to think about it.

Personally speaking, even I don’t celebrate the different relevant unique 'DAYS'. The reason being sometimes I become too much occupied with my other unimportant jobs to celebrate or sometimes I don’t have enough money to spare and the rest of the time just because of the circumstances. But people who always manage their time wonderfully and sometimes even their finances beforehand to save something for the special day, hats off to you all. After all, theres no one in this world who doesn’t like to pampered :) .

The encounter

Posting something in my blog after a very very long time. As such I perpetually feel too lazy. And after I have started to stay in the hostel I don’t have anything better to do but  to daydream about going back home. But the incident which happened yesterday made me so ‘excited’ that I couldn’t resist myself to share it with you all and make my dormant blog a little active :) …..

Previous night I went to one of my friend’s room. It was around 11o’clock when I stepped out of her room.

As I got ready to descend the stairs I heard some footsteps coming from the  terrace against the background noise of a tin door banging tirelessly. I just casually looked up to see who was coming down. And what did I see???? A headless lady in a flowing white dress walking slowly.

Now the lenses of my thick framed glasses, which can endure my weight even when I accidentally sit on it, have unfortunately become scratched beyond vision. So I thought maybe I was facing some kind of a technical glitch :D !! I decided to look more closely as the lady descended but in vain. But still I could not see any head! It naturally scared the hell out of me.

I panicked and at once turned back and began to hurry down the stairs.

In the meantime the lady starting shouting from back ….. “Don’t run….This is just a face pack”. I felt a little relieved but still was a little apprehensive of turning back. My heart had forgotten how to beat for that fraction of secs.. More so because even after deciding to fulfill the exercise of finding the head for the second time, I had failed. Anyways I looked back and was extremely happy to locate her head at last. I think it was the happiest moment of my life :D

What I’m thinking is that what would have happened if the girl hadn’t called me from back. I would have thought all my life that I had really seen a headless ghost that night…..

OPPOSITE aTtRacTSSSSSS

I just don't know what's so special about the north pole which the south pole finds so attractive and vice versa. Personally I don't have any problem with their preferences as long as the magnets on my refrigerator's door are able to defy gravity.

But when we begin to apply the theories of physics to our lives, I think there's unnecessary 'complication'.By a perfect match do we really mean "Oh!He/She is so not like you"??
Or when we comfort someone saying you will find someone better, we actually mean the more diametrically different person you come across next time,the better it is?? Do People look for photocopies then?? Ooopss...that would be like spending time with one's twin!!

How about a mix of like and unlike characters??Someone who is contrasting enough to complement us and fit into our lives like those missing pieces in an incomplete jigsaw puzzle. And at the same time who has more or less a similar thought process like ours.
Someone who would understand us completely. Less differences in ideas would probably mean an enjoyable walk in the journey of life.

"Opposite attracts" now seems so passé!! Instead how is "the perfect ratio of opposite and similar characters attracts (the ratio varying from person to person and from time to time)"??Phew!!No wonder humans are the most evolved ones on this planet (way ahead of magnets that is) :P