Friday, December 23, 2011

A GREat Experience

I think I will beat the Government in a race of procrastination. Its been quite some time since I have been planning to write this post, about my GRE experience. I believe I have a good few things to say. This post is my advice for preparation for the Graduate Record Examination and also some things I learnt that transcend the gruesomeness of those 5 hours.

The GRE has taught me a lot of things which, otherwise, I am pretty sure would have remained painfully ignorant of. I am normally happy with my planning skills, but somehow I screwed up with GRE. Formally, I prepared for GRE for only 20 days. Now, that I look back, I realize that may be that pressure of less time is what gave me the whack on the side of the head. I might have scored more had I studied for a proper 1-2 months, but then there are a lot of things I should have done and didn't.

Facts

I took the Graduate Record Examination on 7th September, 2011.
I scored 327/340 with 158/170 (84 %ile) in Verbal and 169/170 (96%ile) in Math section.

(Not the best guy to be shelling out advice on preparation for GRE. Yet, I feel the things I learnt are more that just about the exam)

A Few Things You Must Do


Step 1. Any GRE aspirant must lick up the GRE website. Read every single word.
Step 2. Buy a good book. I took Princeton Review and found it totally worth the extra bucks compared to the Barrons version.
Step 3. Decide the field of study for your Graduate Studies. Actually, this step is supposed to be done a couple of years before you take GRE. Spend a couple of years gaining experience.
Step 4. Research into Universities considered excellent in your field of study. Chose 4 most basic ones for ETS  to send the scores to.

What The GRE Really Is


The Graduate Record Examination is NOT an examination of aptitude or intelligence. It is a test of your cognitive abilities pertaining to the English language as a medium. That's it. Do NOT judge yourself based on the scores that you get on GRE, except if you want to pursue English Literature.

The GRE is a gruesome test of how good you are at grasping English. Most people find the verbal section tough and rightly so. I pity the medicos who find the math section giving them goose bumps. The Math Section tests you for lower than 10th grade math.

The GRE deserves a sincere effort. It is a brain-taxing test of your will power. In those 4.5+ hours, your brain will have to read and process a tsunami of information decorated in almost alien like English. There will be words that you have never encountered before and can't make the head or tail of it. There will be words that you will be able to make meaning of only with the context. Most of all, what makes the GRE legit in demanding 1 to 2 months of serious effort is the way it scrutinizes your brain.

If I put it down in a metaphor, think of it as crossing a dessert. On the over view, its only walking. You've been walking since decades. Similarly, you've been absorbing information and processing it in English since decades. Yet, every single thought you think sitting on the chair before that computer is like the molecule of water in a dessert that you cling on to for your dear life.

Thought Energy


I am predominantly talking of the verbal section. The Math is easy and I leave it to you to do Step 2 nicely which will take care of the Math.

Each question in the verbal section is made up of long sentences with multiple subjects and objects. Sometimes, I used to think whether they were grammatically allowed to make such long sentences. Each question, except the text completion ones, will have 5 options each 3-4 sentence long. Unless you've spent the last 5 years in a den lapping up every novel that came your way, you will die keeping track of what each sentence means.

This is where, what I call, Thought Energy becomes important. Preserve your thought energy. Do not waste your precious thought power. Brain time is important. In all your strategies for solving questions, keep brain time a primary resource!

An Important Trick

The best tip I got from Princeton Review was to use the Scratch Paper as much as you can. I used it extensively. Whenever you finish reading the questions, write down A, B, C,D and E in a list on your scratch paper. As you complete reading option A:

put a tick-mark, if you are sure this will be the answer
a similar-to sign, if this can be the answer but want to check other options
a cross, if you know this can't be the answer
a question mark, if you don't have a clue what the option meant.

So, read the option, mark. Read the option, mark. You don't have to look down to the paper while marking. Your hands should be moving while your eyes are reading the options. Then when you have seen all  options, look at your scratch paper. Here are the advantages of this trick:

1. You won't have to now look at the ones with the Cross. Had you not done this, you would have repeatedly read the same option and eliminated it again and again. The amount of thought energy you waste in re-eliminating is stupid wastage.

2. Three [Similar-to] and One [Tick] and you won't have to think 1 sec more. The tick is your answer.

3. You will have read all the options and not worry about missing anything.

4. No silly mistakes. Save tons of Thought Energy.


Auxiliary Preparations

Here's how I prepared for the GRE. I had only 20 days. Working smart was a compulsion for me, not a choice. Now when I look back, I sometimes think maybe I wouldn't have done things so nicely had I not been under so much pressure.

I left everything for those 20 days. I did not attend lectures, did no homework, no assignments, quit on projects, did not go home, quit Cricket, no dinner / lunch outings. For those 20 days, my life was Library-room-Library.

Understand your body cycles. I am a day-bird. I never tried to stretch the night. The GRE preparation is NOT a time to be doing major decisions / changes in life like Job joining, Break-up, tours etc. Let things be normal. I doze off very early in the night if I eat heavy dinner, so a lot of times I used to eat fruits or skip dinner. Yet, I understood that nutrition is important if my brain has to function 14-15 hours a day and so I used to have heavy breakfast and lunch and a moderate evening snack. Planning your body is as important as planning your study.

Please keep in mind I had 20 days. You will have more, so you may not take so serious measures, yet don't live a roller-coaster life in those 1-2 months.

All Smart Work And No Play Can Help Jack Do Decent On GRE

A good English background helps. If you are a novel reader since childhood, you are probably safer than the rest. If you are still 6 months or a year away from giving GRE, start reading novels. 2 news papers daily, 1 novel per month. If you are not already good at vocabulary, keeping a pocket dictionary will be a life-saver.

Although the pattern has changed. I find doing the word - lists still important. There's no point in answering if you don't have a fleeting clue of what the question means.

While you are doing the practice questions in the book, time them. I used to do the practice questions as half hour tests. It helped me to implement my strategies and also time myself. This way, ideally you should be able to complete 2-3 books. I did Princeton Review and Barrons. You can complete Kaplan too.

A week before the GRE is mock exam time. Give atleast 5 mock tests. Leave the ETS test in the CD-ROM for the last. Get comfortable with the UI. Don't panic if you scored bad on your last mock test. I scored 1050-1150 on my last mock test :P

A huge goal can be easily achieved if broken into smaller reachable goals.

Out of the 3500 words, an average English taught person will know 1200 and won't have to do them again. I divided the words into 350 words per day. I saw that reading from the book wasn't helping as there are too many words on a single page. So I decided to make my own flash-cards. I used to read the word from the book, if I did not know it or felt uncomfortable in remembering the meaning, write it down on a small paper piece with its meaning behind it along with a sentence using the word. I also wrote down words I had encountered previously that were similar in meaning to this one. This helped me revise all the words meaning the same thing!

Hierarchical Architecture At Its Best


A cumulative hierarchical approach worked wonders for me. Trust me, this is the coolest bit of practical psychological engineering I have every done. I am proud of it!

Make 8 flash cards. Memorize them. (keep them in your hands, like a pack of cards)
Make 8 new flash cards. Memorize them. Mix them with the previous 8. Memorize all the 16.
Make 8 new flash cards. Memorize them. Mix them with the previous 16. Memorize all the 24.
..
..
After you have done 64, keep this stack of 64 separate.

Start afresh.
Make a new separate pile of 64. Memorize them in the previous fashion. Mix them with the previous 64. Do the 128 together. Keep them aside.

Make another separate pile of 128 and mix them with the previous ones.
Continue to do so.

I chose 8 cards to do at one time. There are two reasons. Human mind can do things in chunk of 7 and remember at once easily, not more than that. Secondly, when I tore a page of paper, making 8 pieces out of one page gave me a comfortable size for each piece to be held in my hand. Important! Remember, you are going to be holding 128-256 of these in your hand. While cumulatively going from 64 to 128 to 256, you are going to be flipping these cards like mad. Holding them comfortably in your hand will increase your speed and cognitive abilities.

Make Your Own Fuckin' Awesome Plan


Malcolm Gladwell put his 10,000 hour rule. Sit back for a while and try to think, how many times do you think about yourselves? A lot. From 'liking chocolate' to 'hating Himesh Reshammiya', from walking to clothing. You think about what suits you extensively. Making choices also is exercising your knowledge about yourself. In other words, you have easily spent 10,000 hours analyzing yourself. That makes 'you' the best person to know about 'you'!!

So, what worked for me, might not work for you. Know what works for you. I analyzed my efficiency and devised my own ways. Do that for yourself.

The Exam


I took the examination at Ahmadabad center. I chose the 13:00 slot. I find the morning one too early, your brain isn't warmed up enough. The evening slot is too late.

All great events have countdowns. The countdowns are not fancy publicity stunts. There is a meaning to it. There are set-up procedures that will take a stipulated time before the event starts. Hypothetically, may be the fuels of rockets have to be left reacting for enough time to be able to burn efficiently, so they start that clock before the rocket takes off. Similarly, I had the 13:00 hours test, so my countdown consisted of a sequence of tasks to be completed in time. From sleeping early, to waking up, to breakfast. Even the time to 'brush teeth' was planned and had a time slot!

Don't eat too heavy before the exam, yet have enough to get your through the 4.5 hours. You will need your passport and Examination confirmation letter ONLY. Take your eyes off the computer whenever you can. It'll help GREATLY. Don't forget to ask the invigilators for ear-muffs, sometimes the neighbor typing frantically will disturb you!

Hope this helps!

Wishing you luck,
Dunce



Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Of Brain Waves and Acute Observations



All my time in DA-IICT, I've noticed this phenomenon. Its intriguing because I encountered it the first time in my life. Not that I'm Hugh hefner to call upon my long and illustrious life to judge, yet in the last 10 years of my life that I can remember, I've never been a part of something like this. Here it is:


People in DA-IICT smile at each other as they cross!

I do it. I've seen my seniors do it. I've seen my batch mates do it. WHY?Everytime you pass someone whom you know on first name basis, you smile! So, I decided to analyze the dynamics of it!


Why So Serious?

You've had a good night's sleep, a good bath and while walking down to the cafe you notice this junior walking in the opposite direction. At first, you're just pre-occupied in your thoughts. You're walking calmly. Looking here and there, mostly down, but never straight. Then when you are about 3 meters away, you look up. He does the same thing. You both make eye contact and SMILE!Any reason? Did you share a telepathic joke?

No. Good manners probably. You know, good citizens are supposed to spread smiles. You are in a good mood, the sky is sunny, why not smile?

Most of us use it as an acknowledgement: 'Yeah, I noticed you'. Some of us might reason with it saying "Respect! Dude!". WHY? Does he have a history of killing people who don't notice him?


Our Social Access Structure Follows Inverse Square Law

There's a theory of circles. Google+ tried to explore it. There are a class of people who have access to deeper things than others, the people whom we trust. Call them the first hop nodes, best friends, soul mates, 'love guru@91.1fm' or The Bar-tender. These are people who you would stop and talk to, 'Hey, Whats up?', maybe give a hug if you encountered in the park. 

Then there is the second circle. These are the people whom you've just talked once or twice. You know them on first name basis. You might have, at best, shared infrequent hang outs. These are the people you will smile at! The people whom you have to acknowledge presence!


To Smile Or Not To Smile 

The reason why Google+ has not been able to uproot facebook is, i feel, the theory is flawed. Yes, we do concentric circles, but the boundaries are very hazy. You're not always sure whether to smile at the other person or not. Am I that close to him / her ? Then there's the awkward moment. When you come close, look up to each other and each one is checking whether the other smiles or not. You make eye contact, wait for the other person to smile. If he / she does smile, means its safe for you to do so, otherwise - 'Damn, i'm a potato. How can I ever smile at Jessica Alba'! 

If you dig deeper, you start realizing a lot of aspects of it. See, the watchman forgot to lock the doors! One push and it all opens. 

Did you realize something similar? Something you know you do but don't know why?
  

Monday, September 26, 2011

E-Gossip

Apart from the pan-galla, McDonalds and the kitty parties, there is a new breed of interesting hang-outs cropping up on the scene: A connector's facebook wall!

I would like to call upon the evolution tree of the gossip places:

(Caves-by-the-seaside) -> Under the Banyan Tree beside the pond -> Besides the water-pump, around the fireplace -> The galla -> The connector's Facebook Wall -> (in the queue for all-day-nutrition-pills! )


All these places, except the wall, are places where humans have been coming in contact with each other. Where the body language, the eye contact, the breathing pattern, the delivery of the joke mattered! All these factors, even though not articulated and spoken openly, are parameters that the unconscious takes into account. Imagine, if 'wtf' was sung in a Bbollywood tune! This is what i mean by the delivery of the joke! An alteration or inconsistency in any of the factors will ruin the essence of the joke and hence the gossip.

Now-a-days, the jesters have a new medium! The web. There are hangouts on google plus, skype and facebook. There are ways to express, crack jokes other than being physically present. A new breed of jesters are coming up, who are very smart on the web. They were non-existent before. These people can create comedy with smart comments and quick wit! But, the body language, the eye contact, the breathing pattern were an obstacle to them. The web has eradicated those obstacles. A new branch in the gossip evolution tree: geeks are the new jesters! Because in reality, the geeks were always more smart than the rest, just that they were lousy with body language. But now, with the home-ground advantage, they rule the roost! ( To all the hunks: ladies love humour! so, learn to be witty on your comments on Facebook)

The point of the blog is now, that when gossip happens on the Facebook walls or in comments on pictures, there is one thing different. In the olden days, the delivery was the jester's! Now, the delivery is the readers. When I read a comment, I read it in my breathing pattern, according to my mood and in my own-funny-style and not the comment-posters. You see, unless you know the jester personally, there is a high chance you are not going to get the gist of the joke. Of course, there are punctuation marks, emoticons invented. But ask the Jester, do those work as efficient as the drop-in-tone? Now, if a person i know to be witty posts something, and my unconscious tells me this is something funny, then I set the frame-work to his while reading the comment. I will then read the post in my mind as if he/she was delivering it. But, otherwise, its still mine!

Unknowingly, we are all victims of this. Not only on the internet. Couples breaking up over sms. heated discussions on email. All of these won't help people! Its simple, because there is a disconnect between your bodies and the signs. An audio connection is still better, but not nearly as good as body language!

People, understand the importance on meeting up! Its much more fun!


Yours Gossipingly,
Dunce


ps: besides, the display pic on the top right corner is not as good as
when your girlfriend is sitting right next to you! :P







Sunday, July 3, 2011

A Mumbai Rain

With all my procrastination about writing about my summer, it is wierd, that I finally get an urge to write hours before my train to Baroda. Perhaps the thought of leaving this beautiful place is the one capable enough to pierce through my screen of laziness. I hope the following few lines, written in haste as always, in fear that I'l forget all that I want to write if I don't pen it down at this second, fill up as a subsitute for the lack of a camera on me.


Let me first tell you about IIT Mumbai. It is, as supposed to be the best college in India. But I found a few chinks in the armour (not counting that the whole college gets into a blackout if it rains heavily). People over here are good. The computer science department has decent, shirt tugged-in students, who sip tea while joking lightly. The snacks stall near the gate is the best break one could get after hours of head banging in front of an electronic screen. The tea is the best i've had anywhere yet. The ones roaming around in tees and shorts are the profs.. Definitely! The hostels are good. They have a HD projector for a TV. Pool tables inside the hostels.


Somehow, still.. I find DA better, warmer.. Its humid here, in Mumbai. Before it rained, I could never use any tee twice before washing. There are no S-benches to sit around. People don't sit on the pavements and the road here. They don't run around in the cafeteria. They don't have an army of plug points to make the electrician go mad, like in DA, so that anybody could sit anywhere and work. I didn't find 10 people sitting closely knit under a single tubelight, contemplating, cursing a particular prof, nor did I see the concept of a campus walk. They have buses here.. and cycles.. agreed, it helps in such a huge campus. And except for a few instances, I did not see a single couple under the shades on one of my many walks back from the lab to the room at 2-3 AM. Well, I would attribute it to the fact that girls are allowed in boys hostels and vice versa..yet!Mumbai, though, has been just like it promised! The moment I entered, I could feel it. Ask a marathi how he feels when he enters into maharashtra, you'l know! I haven't been to as many places as I'd have wanted to be. But the initial week with Rahul Bhaia set things in motion. I cannot thank him enough for the excellent time! More for that fantastic moment when he pointed out to orange-blue machine which showed the rail map of mumbai! I took a good look at it, hung on to it for my dear life! I took to the city easily! Travelling alone from vile parle to powai and back got me familiar with the city very early. Crowded trains don't frighten a lone bachelor! :P Oh by the way, DADAR STATION SUCKS!


It was getting cloudy all right.. and the wind had also started blowing, this I knew because I had come down to take a coffee break around 5:15 PM. My place at the SYNERG( SYstems and NEtworks Research Group) lab is on the 4th and the topmost floor. I could hear the wind gushing on the windows. And in moments.. i knew it was there.. Mumbai Rains. I do this, call me calculative, but i debated quickly whether should I go or not, the pending lab.. SCREW IT.. I was out. And it was Magnificent.. get the feeling still! The first rains were like planting magnets on your cheeks so that HAD to smile.. Everybody was, the guy next to me shouted "Brilliant". I shouted back, "Absolutely Brilliant!!!!". It lasted for half an hour. But the grey, black clouds through the maze of branches of gulmohar, with orange flowers sticking out is too good to forget!


The campus is more like a controled jungle than a designed landscape! Thank god for the wealthy doctor. Hiranandani was one place that never dissapointed me! Loads and loads of greenery! :D Enough instances to make the boys back at the F Wing Top Floor jealous off, It was fun! People said, try Bandra Bandstand if you want some of that.. That i did! Hiranandani was one get-away. Good food. Subway, Mad Over Doughnuts.. the rest were too much out of aukat! For a lad spending the night for the first time in dream city, the high rise buildings, the flaunting young ( wonderful :D ) ladies, the hours in the local trains, the sea, the late hours in the lab, the richness, the glitter.. were all moments! Moments that I shall miss.


I was probably lucky to end up in Mumbai when it is the most beautiful, before July (after which everything is underwater, thats what I'm told). The sea, is new to me. I've been inland most of my life. Except for rare enounters with the Narmada, never seen so much water, all at one place! Beaches and the sea sides are all fantastic Mental Washing Machines! They'l take away everything.. Somehow, you're a lot more calm and clear in the head everytime you come off the sea side! Food being what I always die for, tasting MOD for the first time was heaven! But I think Gujarat still has it! Nothing is better than Manekchowk.. Maybe I haven't tried all that much yet, but a quick look will tell you that!


Now, its time to leave. I have all my documents signed. The thought of wanting to see how things work outside, has been a success! The things i saw, expereinced, llearnt on internship are a different thing, they are lessons still, however they are! I have my bad packed. I'l go for my last Double Trouble at MOD, Hiranandani!

ps: Khushboo Tekchandani, Thank you! I wouldn't have been able to live all of this without you!

ps2: The title is what I fumbled up in my diary, when I was thinking of something cool, and I thought

why does it have to be gramatically correct all the time!

Saturday, April 23, 2011

iNetwork

*Note: All views expressed in this article are abstract and the author's own. The author is not (and am sure the publishers also wouldn't want to be) responsible for any neural damage that occurs.

This blog was meant as an outlet for me to steam out all the crap that gets the barometer sky rocketing in my brain. I am doing that. (read: Beware..this might be a waste of time, energy, bandwidth, neurons, .. .. ..)
Lets take a fleeting look at the number of networks you are a part of :
  1. Facebook- Accept it, thats all I am counting for 'Internet'.
  2. Organization- Your boss, your colleagues, the peon, the dabbawala, the girl on the desk diagonal to you
  3. Family- your wife, her peers, your peers, your son's peers, his girlfriends peers, Your girlfriends peers etc
and many more.. All these, I call them networks, cause of they fit into the definition of network. A connected/disconnected collection of distinct nodes that can/can't interact. Consider yourself as a node ( a red dot, take blue if you hate red) and other entities that i mentioned as other nodes. These are all distinct, because our friends in the forensic department say, everybody is distinct from everyone else, atleast by fingerprint. These distinct nodes interact on periodic/ non-periodic time intervals. Or to put it more discretely, they have means of communication. You and the Whale in the arctic ocean eating the seal are not considered to be 'interacting'.

Now, if I have conveyed the picture clear (if it hasn't, please wake your lazy ass neurons). Imagine yourself as one of the nodes connected via different means like love, friendship, Mark Zuckerburg, money etc to different other nodes mentioned above. You are a part of the network as much as each of them are. You interact with them and exchange information, money, feelings etc. These are nothing but the mediums of your respective networks. Now, if you just normalize all of them ( meaning, remove the feelings behind the words information, money, love and use only one word - 'medium' for them ) there exists a transfer of medium between you and other people/computers/extra-terrestrials( :P if you've seen Paul, you'l know). This scene is very similar to a network. For geeks, a computer network where computers interact with each other and information is the medium. For Dumbledore, you and other people interact because you are an incredible human being capable of 'love'. In short, you are a part of more networks you can imagine. Mind you, these are some quite complex networks.

If you have followed me so far, I'l introduce to the concept I wanted to convey in this article. If you agree to your being a part of gigantic inter-connection of networks comprising of, but not limited to networks of which mediums are love, hatred, money, information etc ( Doesn't Internet seem small now ? ), then you must be able to imagine a vast network of nodes, connect pipes in between nodes, have different colored for different mediums if you want. Coming to the crux, consider you and your girlfriend/wife. As you stay together more and more, one tends to learn from the other. There is a definite impact of the other person on you. You may start relying on him/her , expecting from him/her etc These in turn make definite changes in your behavior, your life, your thinking.

There is a concept in psychology, referring to the cognitive psychology of memory, more like collective memory, which says one starts depending on others for memory. One does not worry, sub-consciously about a lot of things accepting the fact that someone else, that you have grown to trust will take care of it. Like in a family, the children and the father rarely worry about the cleanliness, clothes being washed, house being cleaned because they leave it to the mother. Thus, that part of cleanliness is taken care of as a collective memory. Same reason is cited as an explanation to why it hurts so much after a break-up. Your brain relies on the other person for a lot of things which you now have to do on your own. These might not be mundane things like day to day work or memory but also feelings like happiness, being made to feel special etc.

The point of going deep into this was not to deviate from the topic at hand but to state the importance of the interactions one has when in a network with a single node. There is a lot that changes in you, because you are a part of the network. You do not remain you, when you enter a network. Your characteristic, your behaviour, your reactions to certain things change. ( how do you look at a mini-skirt before and after having a girlfriend ?). Your mere presence in a network is going to change you.

There lies my point. Its like, there is no recongnition of your own self without the others. Semiotics has support for what I say in the concept called 'pity', that one is incomplete without the other. I believe, its the network that changes you. Could the same go for computers? Now, if we accept that we are in a network and that causes a lot of mayhem, should we not take advantage of the knowledge? For example, next time you're telling a secret to someone, know that the other person is also in a network and you are not the only person influencing him/her.

A course on graph theory, ( which I haven't passed yet :P ), coupled with my COD of curiosity, pushes me to think more. Is there a meaning to the term 'connectivity', 'degree of a network', 'diameter- maximum distance between two nodes in a network '), 'path' - a list of nodes that will take you to another node desired. For example, just to demonstrate one, imagine a network with N nodes. There are a certain class of people whom Malcom Gladwell (The Tipping Point) calls - The Connectors. These are people, to fit in the context, with the highest degree in the network , i.e. the highest number of direct connections to other people. Extending the concept that Gladwell gives, would it not be beneficial for you , if you want to reach out to people, that you connect with these connectors? ( Marketing pros, political campaigners etc already deploy this method). So, next time, you are searching for a method to reach to your secret crush, analyze the networks she is in, join it, changes in it will affect her too :D

Yours Networkingly,
Dunce

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Why Make The Youth Run ?

I know this comes a bit late and the golden morning of 20th February, 2011 is a fading memory already. It is for that reason more so, that this article is important. This article, just like the phenomenon it explains, is an attempt to fight an aggregation of problems rooted at what I call 'dousing-of-fire'. Half a year has already passed and I can see the blue eagle on white cotton fading. Though every instance of it still makes me skip a beat; the heart enjoys a silent gaze at the symbol.

Youth Run, has NO inspiring moment of truth when it suddenly dawned upon us.. the need for change. Perhaps, another of those fitting coincidence.(It'l get clear as you read on). It got developed along the way, though the idea did stem in one of the meetings we had with a branding consultant in Ahmadabad. Full credit then goes to the team for developing it further, attaching sentiments to it, which kept us going throughout. Somehow people, including the organizers, miss the Youth Campaign which was the real 'cause' behind the Youth Run. I mean this article to serve for two things. a) To express the structure and future of the Youth Run as I imagined it. b) To express a deeper layer-2 'cause' (for the want of a better word) of the event so that in the future, there is room for 'necessary changes' in the layer-1 structure.

People spend entire lives, drifting, gliding in their comfortable oblivion. I'm the common man! I do my job, adjust a bit, suffer a bit, succumb a bit and live on! Heck, I'll survive! I'll just do my studies, get a good grade, get a job, live my life! Now, what is a stupid session, a plantation drive, a Youth Run going to do? Its not going to alter my already chartered course, so heck with it, I'll sleep! OR a shade more thoughtful but equally masochist ones, live on in seemingly endless drudgery thinking its only a temporary bad phase, it'll go. These problems are ephemeral, 'my time' will come too. I'll have a nice good vision, something will strike me, like it did to Mother Teresa on that train. It'll come and I'll shine then! Till then, I'll wait.

The motivation for Youth Run, 2011 was to stop people from waiting. Everyone in their lives is waiting for their 'moment of truth', a special 10 seconds of slow motion after which you will shout 'Eureka' and life will suddenly improve. You'll only then be able to do things right and perfect. People, let me warn all you optimists, there is NO moment of truth. It DOES NOT come on waiting for it. I'd sorry to disappoint but you'll just have to drag yourselves to work hard, smart and rack your brains, think, go mad to solve that irritating problem. All those who are waiting for that 'moment of brilliance' to wake them up and make their lives better, you're damned! The naked truth is to start working at it. For all those life-has-a-background-music-for-all-times believers, if you understand it this way, then i'll put it in more 'enlightening' words: That moment of truth, tests you. It wants to see if you have the metal to take it. So, you must start without it. Only when you show your grit that it says "yeah, he's the man!" that it will come and set your blood on fire!

People, i'm not the most experienced person alive nor do I think all of you should agree with me. I do not undermine the importance of inspirations. I know what an adrenaline rush feels and i agree, its the best! But waiting for it to come qualifies only as procrastination. Start working towards a good life. Suffering in any form, does not even qualify to earn a place in your list of things to be tolerated. The point of Youth Run is for people to believe. To believe in what is right, work hard towards it, and achieve it. It is to change the methods of drudgery and learn to live for yourself, to keep yourself happy and fight against entities that stop you from being so.

As I said earlier, Youth Run got developed along the way, it was not an envisioned goal! We constantly questioned ourselves 'why?' and it kept on coming to us. During one of the many nights we spent discussing, we were at the cafe, late night, after a good long meeting and it was slowly dawning on me with months of brain racking and meeting people, Youth Run could be an enclave. A meeting point, an annual hang out joint for people who work on ideas. Ideas that shape the society, the environment and their own lives above all. Typically organizations that work for causes. It could be an annual 'coffee-break' , in software engineering lingo; where people come together, discuss the larger issues that they are facing in their domain. Exchange ideas that motivated them. Think through the problems, produce solutions to vexing labyrinths; be it the rigid administration, corruption or the insipid people at large who are adamant on living the 'chalta hai' life. Youth Run, the way I look at it, resembles more closely to an afternoon nap that you take to recharge yourself; an annual jaunt, to make themselves more effective.

The Run itself is only a symbol. An apt metaphor for the rejuvenation, the shedding of old skin, the adrenalin rush that comes after you've had a splendid realization. The whole weekend is a time for people to come to their fountain of wisdom. The whole idea is for people to iron out solutions, tricks and share anecdotes that might have worked for some in their field. This is why I had imagined a nice whole weekend where organizations like Green Peace, Cry, India Against Corruption, Yuva Unstoppables, CEE etc come in their shorts and tees with a smile on their face, with the intention to have a good bucket of water splashed across the face! People who solve problems of these intensity and consequence, especially, need what Roger Van Oech calls A Whack on the side of the head. It will, i think, only come when people in these attempts come together and have an exchange of ideas.

At the cafe table, in front of the first counter, it was slowing gathering.. perhaps a good Youth Run eve dinner; where organizations who are going to run on the next day get to know each other over a good meal (hopefully better than the 3rd counter :P ). Then, the Youth Run in the morning followed by the youth seminar. The seminar has always been sidelined and I think the biggest lesson for Team Youth Run, 2012 is to focus more on the seminar. The seminar is the place where people recount their experiences, share ideas. It should be a fun event where we need not have people sitting down as audience trying to uproot all the grass off the lawns while somebody drones on the mike. The ideas are still not transparent and they are certainly malleable. They are supple and pliable. But then, I've always thought, the ones that are successful are the most labile.

Finally, there is a secret personal wish I'd like to share. Maybe a decade or two down the line, maybe at the 25th Anniversary of Youth Run, they'll call me and my team, as the chief guests for being the people, who set a legacy , who believed, changed and ran!