And miles to go before I sleep...

Robert Frost's famous poem 'Stopping by the woods' reminds us of the famous last two lines "...and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep.", a glaring reality and a thought that struck me as I was sitting in the aeroplane gripped by the excitement of the take-off and by the uncertainity I was to face in the next four months.

Four months later, here I'm right now, with a realizations that spawn one after another everytime I encounter some mode of reality. A sample of that is one such - "one must be self-motivated in life, to have a sense of achievement, if not anything else." Of course that quote by me(*pride*) is copylefted, and I have no means, sadly, of checking where all you use it and pretend that its your own, for the want of something silly - recognition.

When I first stepped in to this country and was driven (by a very nice person named 'Ajay') to the university I didn't think much of this place, except that at some sights overwhelmed me and at some places I was too tired to feel it. I landed in the home of the ISA - the president, Tanay Shaha's place. The room, filled with luggages, a couple of guys sitting in and around, a "hi" from someone I don't remember, an unexpected greeting from myself, dazed is the least I can say to describe my feeling in there. It wasn't too long before I began to notice that these guys were doing so much - great planning, wonderful organization, and beyond all an impeccable cooperation within one another to pick up the freshies, accomodate them and be courteous. Books strewn here and there, with an occasional laptop surfacing from some corner, a couch, a wonderful view to the sacred poolside activities through the window, cooker with some leftovers, a fridge stocked mostly with ice tea, beds on ground, tons of people and single bathroom with toilet rolls and a basket to hold them. All of it made me feel dazed, and even more. "Gosh!This is graduate life!", I thought for a while. Bewildered at the new and calm in that place, I stopped to think for a while. Only later, would I know and realise, how better off they were all and how unorganised I could get. My time there was really peaceful, to say the least. I didn't think about courses, about how much the university extends to, or about the finest of babes(American) it held as its students.

Luckily for the lack of thoughts, which I should have had, the ISA then organized what is known as a briefing session for each major, on helping the newly arrived ones with what to choose and why. I wonder what I would have done had they not organised that useful session. Thanks to Tanay, et.al., I managed to figure out what to take, and be clear about the choice. The orientation of 14th of August, left be a bit disoriented. Tons of people, white people, chinkys, Indians, foreign accent, horrible vegetable sandwich, confusion on hot to get the holds cleared, how to waive off pre-reqs, anxiety, anticipation, tension on when my chance would come to go to the prof and get my choice of courses - all that I witnessed.

Sometime later I realized that I had to stay off-campus for real to startoff with. A kingsize two-bedroom, duplex apartment, was nowhere in my mind, but maybe my subconscious held space for such a wonder-ful living. A bike (folks here call a 'bicycle' a 'bike'...so what do they call a bike?...think..think..) had to be purchased, for you couldn't get to the campus otherwise in less than 15 minutes. Added to that was the total inexperience to cooking, leave alone living together with 5 other bachelors (who were here for their master's :P). I could tell you much more, but it wouldn't make sense to you and nor would it give me excitement in writing it all.

So here I am, sitting in front of a computer, typing away all that passes by this mind, the next day to when the semester is over. You can imagine.

Here's a view of mine that I'm stating so that I remember it long enough, and that maybe its useful for you someday. I've taken a view to doing an M.S., that is most rightly described by this analogy of my travel to the campus.

One evening, I had a pretty strange headache, a light lingering one, and I felt that I would sleep it off. I woke up and in about half-an-hour I had to attend a class. It was a good class, and the prof was going to begin with a new chapter. But the lingering headache made me feel that I should give it up and sleep. I even asked a roomie of mine as to whether I should venture, to which he'd say "If its bothering you too much then chuck it...". I asked myself as to whether I was bothered much by it, and as usual my mind didn't answer me back that well. I felt the 'what-the-heck' feeling and went to sleep. 15 minutes later, I woke up, and thought "now come on!..I can manage this with a tablet and I'm sure I'd feel better at the end of the class. And I wouldn't miss valuable lessons either." That single thought, threw me out of my sleep, made me have that tablet, bike in less than 10 minutes and land up in that class. In class, I forgot about the fact that I was supposed to have a lingering headache and be bothered by it. I enjoyed the class that day and understood very well all that was lectured. When I was returning home, my thought went back to that decision I had made in a split second, that changed a whole new lot of things and thought to myself "Maybe, maybe, this is what doing an M.S. is all about."