I adore it..It’s cute!!

I joined Welham in class 6, a time when I could hardly talk in English. Forget about reading a novel, I hadnt even heard of Enid Blytons that all my peers had read. Hadnt heard of Agatha Christie or Nancy Drew or Roald Dahl! English was so elusive to me, be it pronunciation,talking fluently or writing essays. All girls there could talk very well, write amazingly and I used to envy them. I used to love reading though, but only Nandans and Champaks! I just could never pen down my imagination on paper, it just would not happen however hard I tried. My mind would create such adventurous, silly, stupid,funny images and events, but I just could not express my feelings in English! And on the same side, I would win essay writing competitions in Hindi. It troubled me a lot cuz I missed getting a Rank 1 only cuz of this ‘silly’ English twice in a row!  I always scored lowest in English, would just get a 4 on 10 in essays. Grammar though I could study, so there I would cover up! Thankfully, in class 8, I got amazing English teachers, Mrs. Devgan and Mrs. Khambatta and Mrs. Chhabi Hari. Somehow, they all really inspired me to do well. Once, I landed up getting the highest in article writing, a 7.5. I remember exactly what I wrote even till date. That was it! I decided then that no more would English make me miss my Rank 1. I had missed getting MTSE scholarship twice, I just had to get it now! And then, I got it continously for 3 years! Swati daftuar, a voracious reader and my bed neighbour would guide me and we would read under our quilts with torch light.  I soon forgot that I was doing it to improve my English or rather learn it. She used to read weird novels and somehow somewhere I fell in love with her collection of books. Her dad is a writer, writes in Bengali. With every letter her dad sent her, there would be a carton full of novels, and all of us would enjoy the books!!

As a part of our curriculum of class 6, I came across this poem below. I could connect with it really well! Now, I  find it very cute. Please, when u reading this poem, read it in a singsong way as a kid would!

The English Language

Some words have different meanings,and yet they’re spelt the same,

A cricket is an insect, to play it is a game.

On every hand, in every land, its thoroughly agreed,

The English language to explain, is very hard indeed.

Some people say that you’re a dear, yet a dear is far from cheap,

A jumper is a thing you wear, yet a jumper has to leap.

It’s very dear, it’s very queer, and pray who is to blame,

for different meanings to some words pronounced and spelt the same?

A little journey is a trip, a trip is when you fall;

doesn’t mean you have to dance, whenever you hold a ball,

Now, here’s a thing that puzzles me: musicians of good taste,

will very often form a band – I’ve one round my waist.

A door may often be ajar, but give the door a slam,

then your nerves receive a jar – and then there’re jars of jam.

You’ve heard, of course of traffic jams, and jams you give your thumbs,

and adders, too, one is a snake and others add up sums.

You spin a top, go for a spin, or spin a yarn maybe –

Yet every spin’s a different spin as you can plainly see.

On every hand, in every land, it’s thoroughly agreed,

The English language to explain, is very hard indeed

Harry Hamsley

Bored..

Hieeeeeeeee….

I am getting so bored. I’hv been behaving very lazily the entire day! Attended just one lecture,it was a PPT given by one of my profs. The PPT was very redundant, she went on elaborating the same point again and again. I managed to read 3 Ed articles during her jabbering without missing her jabber either! Why can’t PPTs be a lil more interesting and funny??? She tried to make it interesting, but guess how? Asusual geeky methodology…comparing nature with the various embedded platforms available in the market. Yikes! And on top of that, the “students” of my class were making notes and also writing down her stupid nature-platform jokes!! Do u then think I would have the capacity to handle more lectures….??? It must b crazy of u expect so much from me…LOLzz

Since then, the day has been beautiful in a very special way. I have just been reading, sleeping, listening to awesome music, writing down a lil, remembering childhood days,dreaming, making  a card, sketching…just loved the day!! Noone disturbed me, no phone calls to attend for a change.. it was lovely!! Oh wow! bhai calling…This day seems to be getting better! Finally, bhai ko meri yaad aayi.. Its time to hear class 9 school gossip, his Pjs which somehow Akshit finds very funny! Oh I remember now, its Teacher’s Day tomorro. He’d want to tell me which of his silly and dumb classmates (girls) are dancing and on which silly songs! Heeh!!

Gotta go,

Cheers,

Shruti.

Overthinking is poisonous!

Heyyaaa…

I came across this question “Merge two BSTs”. It sounds simple,know? First solution that comes to ur mind is O(n^2) in time complexity and then when u decide to tweak ur solution, u suddenly start visualizing arrays cuz using knuthers method, its easy to convert an array into a BST(via recursion). Now, this uses O(n+m+(n+m) ) space, creating 3 arrays! Then, as “IT” students, this seems to be too much space for our cache. Now, while we were on this mission to save this linear space, we decided to flatten the 2 BSTs into 2 linked lists. Wow, finally saved half the space. Merging also became simple! Only step 4 remained: convert the linked list (sorted) into a BST. I had not done the concept of rotation until then, so as a ‘child’, started thinking of various options. My classmate gave a very complex method to do that…involving counters, recursion,pre-deciding the structure of the tree n blah blah. After a lot of hassles, I understood that method! Finally! Algo samajh aaaya tha but CODE???….Implementation seemed out of reach! Finally, I planned to convert the LL into arrays so that BST could b created.  God!! reached arrays again!!!!

Imagine,how much time gone? 3 hours! They r precious dude!! I cud hv finished DBMS in 3 hours. But u know what? Surprisingly, I am not frustrated! It was fun doin it and one very important lesson learnt, stick to basics and try breaking the problem into similar concpet done before with a ‘smaller’ Data Structure!

Ahh..

Nice break! Gotta return to some more DS. Till then adiosss!!

Just recalled…

In the evening, I got a call from a junior of mine. She wanted to join an institute to prepare for CAT 2010 and as always, the confusion prevailed in her mind. I told her that the obvious choice is Tathagat. I obviously had to back up my opinion with REASONS to asnwer her ‘WHY’. While talking to her, I asked myself why had I joined Tathagat? U wanna know why??

Okay.. As U wish. There were 2 things I had heard from our seniors.

1. Kumar sir asks u to read a novel every week.

As a kid, I was never allowed to read at home. I was expected to solve only Math questions and study science. I used to get myself a copy of champak and a nandan in class 2 and 3. But I did not do well in class 3 exams, n ever since my champaks n nandans were taken away 4m me. Used to get them only during vacations. Once I was in Welham, there was no such restriction but during holidays, I cud not read. I remember, Goblet of Fire was released during my vacations. I got a copy of it from my friend n used to hide it in my lap n read. On the table, RD sharma used to b kept just in case sumone peeped to keep a check on me.  When I joint TG, reading novels in one freedom I hv got. My dad seriously believes that reading is such a waste of time n nonsense, but now Im always like ” Kumar sir will kill me if I dont read! ”

2. This is a ridiculous reason, but dont laugh at me. I heard that Kumar sir chuks u out of the class if u r not on time. I am kind of crazy abt punctuality and I thought that since Tathagat wilb a such a discipline-oriented place, I will enjoy it. I think somewhere I missed discipline in NSIT, where U can enter the clas 5 minutes bfr it finishes just to get yourself ‘1 attendance’. LOlzz

Oh Lord! Its 5:31 A. M. I should be sleeping, I can hear the peacocks screeching n my roomiez alarm is ringing. God! Goodnight. No more talking…

Change..

Hi all,
You guys must have heard of “There is nothing as permanent as change.” Very true! Esp. in my life. The moment I feel I have settled down in a place, there rings a bell “SHIFT OUT”!! I agree, it’s very adventurous, different but believe you me, it isn’t all that great a feeling initially. It’s been over a decade since I have been away from home and yet I am to learn not to feel homesick;I guess I’l never learn!! This weekend I ,once again, have to go through all the silly, sick, tiring, nerve cracking business of shifting out to a new place of abode 😦 😦 Yukk!! Am I cribbing? Offcourse Yes! I know I should not be. At such times, the insane and horrendous memory of 28th March,1999 comes frantically running to mind  when I ,a 10 year old, was left  inside the Welham bounds… I do not know how many more times will I need to go through this exercise again in my life!! It’s not about packing and settling down, it’s about the entire emotional stress!! Whatever!!
No wonder, I am listening to Jagjit Singh and Rahat Fateh Ali Khan at the moment!!