The art of Advising

If giving advices is an art, then I am definitely that science student who writes a five page answer for a two marks question. Lots of words but very little sense.

Growing up, I had tons of people to advise me on things ranging from career choices to the choice of pickle one should ideally have. And now that I have grown up [citation required], I take immense pleasure and feel thoroughly responsible in guiding the young ones. In short, its my turn to bullshit now!

I've always seen 'ad' standing for advertisement in advice. Self advertisement to be more precise. "I never got married because I never found the right guy. Right guys are nearly extinct. I'm happy I made that decision. Tum bhi shaadi mat hi karo. Yes, I'm that stupid."

People always want others to do things the way they did because their way is the only right way. Also making sure not to mention the consequences, advising is like Facebook, you upload nothing but the best part. Imagine a cropped DP of a pretty girl and then think of the bigger i.e. cropped part of the picture.

 An illustration:

Uncle: When I was in 12th standard, I'd study Chemistry every day. Remembering organic reactions isn't easy. So should you.

Kid: But I'm a commerce student.

Uncle: I don't see a reason why you still shouldn't study Chemistry, son.

Not just uncles, one has always come across that college senior who keeps advising his juniors about the nitty gritty's of the 'college to corporate culture'. I have too. And I always wondered if all that bullshit is because he wants to feel important. Or just wanting to be listened to. Whether he actually used those skills to procure a job. Whether he's thinking 'LOL, fuck you too.'

 For some strange reasons, every second aunty you meet has her own unique solution to skin/hair problems. I don't think there's a single thing in our kitchens left which isn't a part of an armchair grandma/aunty's 'nuskha'.

Another illustration:

Aunty: Why don't you use my remedies? Apply honey and banana puree. Bilkul mere jaise baal ho jaayenge

Girl: That's exactly my point.

Taking advises isn't s much of art as giving it is. As Robert Downey Jr puts it, 'Listen to everyone and then do the fuck you want to'.

Forgive and forget?

So a couple of days back I overheard a conversation between two men about the Godhra riots. One of them said that the victims of the riots should forget what happened and move on now. No point in whining about it. As it is their departed loved ones are not going to come back. Anyway its going to take ages with all the court cases. They should rather celebrate the fact that Gujarat has seen such astonishing development economy and infrastructure wise. The CM has done so much for the state and blah blah blah. (I stopped listening after "state")

Apparently, its not just some middle-aged men, but many of whom I know (mostly students of my age) have the same opinion. I usually avoid arguing with them. There's no particular reason but just that I'm too lazy to prove them wrong by coming up with a spontaneous witty comeback. But not enough lazy to write a blog post.

Whoever thinks the victims of the Godhra riots should forget about the justice seeking affair(Justice? LOL) and join the "All hail the holy Gujjuland development" bandwagon, I just have one thing to say. Let me snatch away your blackberrys and iphones, smash them into pieces in front of your eyes. Buy you a dinner and ask you to forget about it since the damage is irreparable anyway. Let me see if you'd love to forgive me and forget about your phone.

Sketch: Led Zeppelin

Sketch: The Beatles!

I wanted to add a description to the picture but then I thought, the picture doesn't need any. :)

You and I

You: So, what's happening in...
I: Life? Well, its treating me well these days. What about you?
You: Everything's okay. But I'm still confused about.....
I: Career? Relationships? Life, in general?
You: That. And a lot more.
I: I'm hungry.
You: What do you want to eat?
I: Garlic bread. Remember our first date?
You: uumm, yea.
I: We went to that Pizza place. I ordered....
You: I remember, you ordered one portion of Garlic bread.
I: I want to tell you sooo much stuff.
You: Yes please.
I: That day in college......
You: About placement? I read your post.
I: You still.....
You: Read your blogs? Yes I do.
I: Do you want to go out for a walk?
You: Sure. I'd love to.
I: But you never liked walking.
You: I do now. I now totally understand why you love walks.
You: Whatever happened between the two of us has definitely...
I: Changed us? For the better I suppose.
I: Its okay, you know. Relationships don't always have to.....
You: Work out? Yes. No regretting the time we spent...
I: The memories we shared. I'll always....
You: Cherish the good times? Yes, me too.
You: I'm really sorry for everything. I was confused then. Didn't know how to.....
I: Deal with it? Its okay. I had problems too.
I: We should meet more often and....
You: And?
I: Just talk.

CATing the Bell

Because I blogged about the placement day too.

Being drastically under-prepared, 29th october seemed like a fairly normal day. Dad kept asking me to prepare as hard as I can for CAT. I said I was having problems certain kind of questions in quant section. On insisting, I showed some to dad for he was always an ace at math. He came, he saw, he tried and then said "theek hai, jitna hota hai utna solve karke aana."

I thought I was possibly the most unprepared CAT aspirant, until Nitin called. We both agreed on "strong beer peekar sabhi sections strong ho jaate hai." The test center was located at possibly the most interior corner of Ahmedabad. Suddenly, I felt good about the location of my college. A minute or two past the reporting time, we were split according to our respective exam center codes. What happened next was a series of secutrity checks, just one less than me saying "aunty, please stop groping me". We were then escorted to our respective computers by a bunch of not-so-pretty looking invigilators. I understand the prometric ID card, but what was up with the horrendous waist coat like jackets? Most of them spoke english in a made up accent. I looked at the system clock there was another one hour to kill before we could start the test. And azeetees, we were having difficulties logging into the system. The invigilator (ohbtw, there were around 10 of them in our room) tried multiple times but wouldn't happen. I looked to my left and saw a guy who was kind of staring at my computer screen. On striking up a conversation, I came to know that the guy was also an engineering student who got placed in the same company as I was. Normally, you'd go 'OMGWTF' at the chances of something like this happening. But then, 80% of the CAT aspirants are either engineers or engineering students and TCS recruits fuck loads of people. (if you're a true CAT aspirant, you'd be thinking about the actualy the probability of the event right now) But still, for a moment I OMG'd. To kill time, we talked and talked and talked a little more. Till one of the invigilator politely asked us to keep quiet. I'm pretty sure in her mind she'd be going "Shut the fuck up, bitches!". I observed some students in the room and wondered if they were as unprepared as me. I saw a guy who was constantly yawning. Didn't care to think why. A girl who was sleeping on the keyboard. After which I thought I should stop. Panic set in when I realised my phone is with dad. I almost imagined him going through my inbox which to be honest made me slightly uncomfortable. But then he's Dad! He wouldn't even care. Test started. We were first shown a 15 min test tutorial. A somewhat intense moment for me and as always a foolish song got stuck in my head. This time it was 'ooh la la ooh la la' from The Dirty Picture and just when I was about to click "start test" I went in my mind "Dude, vidya balan is actually busty!". test started. test ended before I could know it. All in all, I was pretty happy with the performance I'd put up. (no pun)
I waved Avanit a goodbye and saw my Dad waiting for me. Normal exchange of words happened. While returning back home, I kept thinking about the replies I was going to give to my relatives who'd ask "Beta, CAT kaisa raha?"
I haz a sad because a cat picture on a CAT blogpost is so fucking obvious.

Faking News: Questions on Ra.One included in CAT-2011

Since everyone on the internet has their own views on the movie and a blogpost dedicated exclusively to the expressions(or the lack of it) of Arjun Rampal, I thought the obligatory Ra.One blogpost is obligatory.Also, I've been wanting to do a FakingNews for quite some time now. So why not!

Ministry Of Human resources and Development has confirmed that Shah Rukh Khan has convinced them to include the questions based on Ra.One as a part of their marketing strategy.

On contacting Shah Rukh Khan, he stated that his strategy behing getting questions on Ra.One was to market the movie to the IIT/NIT nerds preparing for CAT relentlessly for months. "Hey R.S. Agarwal, Who's your daddy now?", a proud dimple faced Shah rukh khan.

"Kya aap paanchvi pass se tez hain? Oops, wrong question."



Stutdents leaving the exam hall looked not only surprised but also half-amused. "Instead of Reading Comprehension, we had a video of Ra.One trailer, I played the video thrice to see if Arindam Chaudhari videobombed"- a -taking-CAT-only-for-the-heck-of-it-student.

Some disappointed students' reaction was not so welcoming "Firstly, I happen to be a Salman Khan fan. Watching Shah Rukh Khan humping cars was disturbing. They left us completely baffled at questions on Akon. I mean, asking us the lyrics of the song Chammak Challo was a little too much. Seriously! And they seriously lost me when a question in the quantitative section included LIC G.One suraksha plan. "- NIT student, Jigar Sharma.

One of the questions asked in the exam was "Calculate the average number of Reality Shows per day in which Shah Rukh Khan has made an appearance. On considering the advertisements too, what is the percentage change?"

Overall, it was noticed that most of the students made their way to the nearest tea stall and were heard yelling expletives at the paper setter which was not so different from any other year. The rest of them took to facebook and twitter to post "FFUUUUU SRK!!!!111111"