Was that your goodbye kiss?

 I have touched upon this subject before, but now I feel I need to bring it up one last time. Today our exams started. As usual the first exam was maths. And I am not so good at maths.

In fact I hate maths.

I hate the ominous looking brackets, I hate the curled up integration signs, I hate fourier transforms, oh Lord, I could go on and on…

But, coming back…

I got into the exam hall and turned over the exam paper. I scanned the paper roughly. Nothing extremely venomous to watch out for. No vipers or adders or cobras. So I started, with my fingers crossed.

Part A. This is where things get dirty. Random process and random variable. Definitions? Come on!!! I barely know how to solve those problems, and now you want a word by word definition? Well, I believe an example is worth a thousand words. Let's just hope they feel the same way too. Anyway, I wrote down my example and a brief explanation.

Question 10. Hey, I finished part A. This didn't get as dirty as I thought.

Part B. The really big fish swim here, by the way. I caught a lot of trout, lets hope I can catch a shark or two here. Module 1, module 2…hey I can actually do this stuff!!!

And BAM!!!

A brick wall was hit. And it is called module 3-Random processes. One of the most despicable things in our syllabus. But whoa, wait one damn second, fellah!! I did this question last night!! And bam!!!

I was done. With half an hour to spare. This had never happened before. I am usually sitting with my head in my hands during this time.

Now, what actually happened? Did I prepare too much? I don't think so. I prepared like I usually do. I did nothing more, and nothing less. Then what?

I can only think of on thing. Maths ends this semester. For being on my back for so long, for making me pull out my hair time and time again, for being a serious pain in the a** for so long, maybe this is your goodbye kiss. Your parting gift. But I shudder to think otherwise. Maybe I avoided the truly venomous adders and vipers and cobras, but were there too many little snakes in the grass? Will they play spoilsport?

You gave me your goodbye kiss, I just hope it doesn't turn out to be a dementor's kiss.

I didn't fail !!!!!!!!

If you've not read my posts Dead Again and Trying to Rise, I strongly advise you to do so before you proceed, but its up to you.

I have been walking on broken glass ever since that day. Every mention of someone failing, someone who didn't make it, any mention of our results, it really got under my skin. In fact, the first couple of months I couldn't even read the microprocessors text book without having to close my eyes and telling myself to relax because it was conveniently littered with references to 74LS138 and 74LS151, all unhappy reminders of the day when my life turned hell. The past couple of months, I have been telling myself it's okay, it's okay to stumble up on this long journey called life, and that it's important to rise every time you fall. But scriptures and proverbs and quotes do not ease a tensed mind. Why?

Because I have never flunked an exam. I always get good marks and I am always at the top.

Quoting Conan O' Brian,

"Success is a lot like a bright, white tuxedo. You feel terrific when you get it, but then you're desperately afraid of getting it dirty, of spoiling it in any way."

I had the tuxedo on.

 I had kept it from getting dirty for so long that I couldn't picture myself in a dirty tuxedo.

And I was out in a marshy swamp.

I could die in this swamp, but even if I didn't die, I most certainly would get my tuxedo dirty.

And I did.

8.81.

Yup that's it. .9.43,9.31 and finally 8.81.

Am I grateful I didn't fail, that I didn't have to die in that swamp? Hell YES!!! Thank God I didn't fail. And I know that God alone saved me from that terrible fate.

Am I disappointed I didn't come out at the top? Yes. Begrudgingly I have to say yes. But that is too much to ask for, especially when you've come out of a near death situation.

I got my tux dirty. And I have nowhere but upwards to go from here. I have been letting my life get bugged down by unnecessary fear, ego and bad habits. I let my impulses guide me. But I need to stop that. I need to garner control of my life back.

I will become a regular in blogging again.

I will balance my life out.

And most importantly, I will never feel pathetic again in my life.

I hope.

:-)

THIS IS AWESOME!!!!!

I break my prolonged silence to bring you the news of something very important, probably the most important thing in my life so far. That, and to let you know that I am still alive.

Now that you know I am alive, let's get to the second part, shall we?

It is Thursday. Around 9:30 in the night. On most nights I am either in front of the TV or reading some book or sleeping at this time. But somehow, that fateful night I was staring at my gmail inbox. And I found something staring back at me.

Microsoft. Naam toh suna hoga…

Yup, Microsoft, the software giant had invited me to Cochin for an internship test!!! I had submitted my resume about 10 days ago and now, I was one of the shortlisted candidates!!!Oh lord…THIS WAS AWESOME!!!

Cutting short the travel details, I ended up in Cochin on Friday night. Everything was ready. The test was scheduled to start on Saturday morning and end by evening, so I was ready to leave by a 4:30 train. Everything was ready. Except I hadn't studied.

I tried to do as much as I could in the night and next morning. The rest was all in His hands and I went to my examination centre. The test began late and ended by 11:30. It was pretty easy, basic C++ stuff and the like. On the whole I think I did pretty well. Now came the wait for the results of round 1. It was expected to be out by 3:00.

3:00…3:30……

Oh it seems now that results will be out by 4:00.

My 4:30 train plan? Out of the window.

4:00…4:30….

Oh, apparently they are conducting this test in centres across India and can only announce results after every centre has completed. Great.

The results did come. At 5:45.

And…..

…..

…..

I WAS IN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

And now came round two. And it was easier than I expected. I solved the two programs easily. However, when it comes to execution time, my second program is too slow.

And this might cost me.

Dearly.

Anyhow, I was done…and I have to wait a whole 2 weeks or so for the results. Anyhow, this is what happened later.

It was 7:00 PM. No vehicles to get me to the railway station. I desperately needed to catch the 8:30 train atleast.

7:20.

Still no vehicle. And completely out of the blue, I saw an auto a short distance from there,  and he agreed to take me to the railway station. He also informed me that it was very difficult to get vehicles after 6:00 there. And it was pure chance that he had been there.

Chance? Or the Hand of God?

I believe the latter.

I made it and am now home.

Oh Lord, this is AWESOME!!! Thank You SO MUCH!!!