An alien in Singapore! (1)

Well.. The long awaited post by some including me.. coz, thru this i can tell my singapore tale to everyone. :)

It was kind of a relief for me that i had something to do soon after the exams got over. I love being occupied with things and work. I was in all enthusiasm. Once the exams got over, i started planning things. But don’t know why, gradually the interest started declining. Sometimes i feel this. I dont’ call it sixth sense and make fun of myself!! But i wasn’t all that enthusiastic about the Student congress in Singapore. I started feeling like, it wont’ be of my likes and kinds. But then, that immense curiosity was there to know about unknown things about an unseen country. That compensated for the declining interest. :)

We had our flight at 11.05 at night from Bangalore. At the airport i met the other girl who was from our group, Mugdha K Goud. Her mother and her cousin, Anushka were with her. We went to the airport from my uncle’s place in Hebbal , so it dint take us much time to reach airport and we were spared of the hectic traffic jams on airport road at those times! My parents, my cousin and my brother were with me. That was my first travel on air. I had wished the journey to be in the day time for i could’ve seen things outside the window , observe the manoeuvring of the wings and all.. But ours was night journey :( still i could see the things at dawn when we reached Singapore the next day at 6 in the morning. (Local time 6. Flight time was about 4 hours or so. There is a difference of about 2.5 hours between Singapore and India)

Though it was still dawn, the city was full of lights which could be seen from the skies only.. Hmm.. The feeling was one of the first of its kind. coz, i had never been abroad before. What all i knew was through someone else..

I wont describe how the roads were, what kind of cars were there and all.. but one thing i was impressed with was the cleanliness at public places there. From there only, one can't stop comparing things here and there. It's natural. But what i observed in people who had gone there from here was, the first thing they used to say , "it will take another 100 years for India to become like this ." hmm.. may be true. but what i was interested in was what can we do for that! It becomes a fancy for people who return from developed countries to start saying this. How many of them follow rules on road and at public places in India with the same sincerity as they do elsewhere?

The Student congress was to be held at National University of Singapore. A large campus it was. First thing we headed towards that morning after we reached the campus was for breakfast! I was feeling very hungry. One more thing is, it is hot and humid climate there.. I was sweating badly which i usually don't.. I was like, i'l be dehydrated in some time if i sweat like this.. We came to know that there is a cafeteria nearby the registration desk. We found it and went there... It was a nice place to look from outside.. Once we entered it. Devre! a peculiar smell. the whole cafe was smelling like something, which i can't describe in words!!! i later came to know it is because of a different kind of oil they use for cooking.. whatever, from there only i started feeling that my sixth sense was right. This is a place not for my kind! But what to do. had to survive the 5 days to come. I had to return alive coz i was to take up a job after coming back and also i didn't want to die this early in life! :p so, decided will eat something even if i wasn't feeling like.. we searched the place for an Indian food counter. Although there was one, it wasn't open yet. One said, 'Indian Standard Time'!! few of them settled for a cheese parata from one counter and got a curry along with that. I dint feel like experimenting with any food, so took a mixed fruit cup and banana... hmm.. everyone wondered at my diet!! :p I said i can survive with that and survived also! :)

Once we had the break fast, i dont know about others, but i badly wanted to take a cold shower asap. I told no, i was sweating like hell! but then we got the room keys at around 1 in the after noon. Till then we were roaming around the campus.. It was nice.. After we got the room keys, nope. it wasnt a key which is mechanical, it was a transponder= electronic key! I wil desrcibe about that. Whoever not interested in technical stuff, requested to scroll down and continue with the next paragraph :) It was like a car key to look at. it had a button. once we press the button, a light blinks. soon i found out that it actually sends a signal when we press the button. It was like, the building where we were accommodated, the floors were called levels. level 0,1,2.... each room had a unique transponder. i was assigned a room - 22/5/c. it meant, level 22 , cluster 5 and room c. each level had a number of clusters and each cluster had 15 rooms and a shared kitchen as well(well furnished!) for each cluster. With our transponder we could only reach the level we belonged to using the elevator from ground floor. and then in order to enter the cluster also, we need to use the transponder. press the button only then the door for the cluster opens. and for the room also, press the button and open the door. I know it is not that a great technology, just a centralised locking mechanism. But isn't that a great use of technology?? yep. but on the other hand, it reduces human intervention. Which is both good and bad according to me. why? i'll tell later..!

The rooms we were allotted was wonderful. It was well planned. The available space was used intelligently. Anyways, let me not describe the architecture of the place :) i so wanted to rest for some time meaning sleep! all my other friends had planned before only that they would be going to places like Sentosa, songs of the sea and other performances. Students who were organising the student congress and studying at NUS told that one 'should' visit all those places if you have come to singapore. Hmm.. I was not interested . First coz i was tired especially with the breakfast experience! and i dint want to experiment travelling a foreign country of which you dont know anything! I don't mind if people find me 'a slow paced moron'. So i told i wont be coming. I dint feel like, so i dint go. Thought will find out the reasons later! Slept after wards. Had a nice sleep atleast. Then got up at around 4.30. Then decided will see the whole campus once! Set out for the campus expedition :)

To be continued.....

Some things which never change....

I don’t know if the title above is the suitable one for what i’ll be writing now.. but it is about things that would never ever change.. coz they are ‘in photos’:) “Memories”- This is one of the fewest things which everyone on this earth will have in common.. comes free of cost after all..! Last night i was going through the photos in my comp.. most from college days. Hmm..it feels strange to call them ‘college days’ now.. Fact is, since my house is very near to college, it doesn’t feel so it is over. I don’t know if i will get that nostalgic feeling once i leave Tumkur and go to Bangalore. But i’m very much sure that i miss something these days.. may be it is the routine of getting up early to get ready to college, those labs, lectures or the IEEE or ICHO work. I don’t know exactly....

Photos for every occasion. If not for these, may be it would’ve been on one’s own imagination to recall things and visualise them in mind.. that would’ve been on the creative side and would’ve been a test of memory also..but now that we have photos, that too with digital cameras ruling, there is no chance for these ‘memories’ to take any other form and shape.. But i must say that i’m not one of those photo freaks type who would want to click anything and everything! I just wonder at the very enthusiasm of some people who take so many photos and also pose for soo many! I like photography. Taking snapshots. But not posing for one!(coz i don’t have a photogenic face and it’s difficult for me to smile also when i don’t feel like! )so, it’s natural that not anyone would be pointing at my photo if it’s a group photo coz i’l be having one of those ‘serious’ looks ( i don’t know if it scares some people! ).. I can count the number of photos in my collection in which i’ve smiled properly. :p (this is, taken my sooo many childhood snaps also into account!)
As far as college days at SIT are concerned, the very first photo session we had in our class was on our first ethnic day of engineering.. A new experience.. most of the girls in saree and boys in traditional attire + several other costumes were a thing of curiosity for me.. i have always wanted to know about different cultures in our country and so i had wanted to observe every new kind of traditional dress.. and i did observe also.. and we had the first group photo of our class that day.. Hmm.. looking at that, especially me, i feel both happy and sad at the fact that i’ve not changed much even after four years.. i look the same.. happy coz, people can recognise me even now..sad coz i have to listen to everyone telling me to add weight atleast now! Hmm.. i seriously don’t know when is that going to happen..:)
Once after that, we have had photos for everything.. whether it was in trips and tours or treats or in class room or in labs and even when waiting for our turn for the interview during placements.. and needless to mention once after placed.. as i told, i’ve neither clicked nor am i there in many photos but i’ve seen people taking photos during placements also.. now i feel if i had taken a photo then, i could’ve measured the anxiety on my face and everyone else’s also.. missed it.. anyways, i can describe it vividly so that one can imagine it! That is the topic for a separate blog post..:)
The thing about photos is that, once you look at one, everything associated with the persons in that, the place and the purpose of that very photo taken everything flashes so fast in mind that one can wonder at one’s own capacity to remember things..what must be the capacity of the hard disk of our brain!! Those things never change.. the memories, the feelings will remain forever. It seems as though we relive every moment of that occasion just by looking at those photos.. Thanks to technology..
Hmm... don’t know what everyone who studied with us are doing now. . But if there is one thing that everyone of us would be having in common it would be ‘memories’. Be it a great feeling of being together with everyone or that ill feeling for something gone wrong, be it the results or a small fight with the friend or anything, time fades it all..but the memories would never fade.. once in a while look at the photos, would remind us of all that.. the days gone by...... It did remind me.. and so this write up..:)

Being a GF/BF!

These days, having nothing to do, i just browse thru net reading my friends' blogs and searching for some new interesting blogs so that i can pass time.. have been doing that since a time now.. Some blogs i find interesting , some funny and some 'educative'.. but of all , why i chose to write on this topic is because this is the most famous topic of all. atleast every 8 out of 10 blogs i happen to visit have a post related to this. If it were a guy, on his girl friend or if a girl on her boyfriend or some thing or the other related to this.. hmm. quite interesting though, some things i dont agree with.. whenever there is this discussion of a girl friend or boy friend, i think why make a distinction with friends as to 'boy' or a 'girl' . why attach a special meaning to the very relationship if it is just friendship? i dont know if it is a fancy among guys and girls these days to have that one special 'girl friend' (here upon referred to as GF) or a 'boy friend' (BF). Once in a while i used to listen to discussions related to this whenever i happened to be in a group. Some even asking me if i had a BF. Even though i thought many a time asking what it means to call a friend who happens to be a boy, a BF?! But i kept quiet saying no! (just coz i didn't want them to think of me a dumb :p ) .. But then, now that i happen to read so much on this stuff, i thought why not i put my thoughts on my blog... so here they are..

No doubt most of the relationships are made materialistic in today's world. Be it our own celebrations such as Raksha Bandhan or other celebrations which reserve a day for everyone, father, mother , friend , valentine, and who not? once i happen to hear a guy commenting on girls and him gifting something to a girl. so cheap the comment was, i thought why should after all guys want the girls to fall for them just by giving something and then comment on them? and why should any girl go after that? more than that, is it necessary in any relationship to exchange gifts to show how 'sincere' you are? i dont think so. atleast when you are a student and that you are depending on your parents' money for everything. Moreover, a gift given, be it to a brother, sister or anyone, it is to be token of love and care, but not a reason just to impress.

And on how serious these kind of BF / GF relationships would be, i am at my wits end! how can one be committed at an age of 17 or 18? life has just begun then. It's not a great thing to start a relationship but also matters is how is it going to end? Of course, i'm not totally against this. It is one's own decision. But what i am interested in is how successful these things are? how many of them would make a model couple who would inspire the next generation?

Keeping aside my views on this matter, one thing i want to say is, reading about such things on the blogs really feels interesting and i enjoy that .. :) as always, anything said, gives food for my thought.. And somethings , are really fanciful as in a story or a movie, leave me wondering what can be true and what not!