The ChatMaker - Part II - The Train Journey

People who has not read Part I please read it before continuing to Part II


Finally the Sunday came up. My parents and brother were supposed to board train from Calicut and i was suppose to join them from Shornur. Train had a 15minute stop there. I reached Shornur at 5.30PM. The platform was fully crowded with students who want to go to Chennai. After the holidays the students somehow wanted to reach their destination. I stayed near a group of girls who were standing outside the waiting room. You know if you want to time pass, then hear girls gossiping. You wont even notice the time ticking. I felt like 10minutes but it was 6.30PM and the train was already arriving on the platform.

My parents had called and informed that my brother would be standing outside the sleeper compartment to find me. Since I donno in which compartment they are(reservation status after chart preparation was not known to me), i was looking for my brother from S1 to S8 briefly scanning all compartments to check the availability of girls. He found me when i reached in front of S7 compartment(I didn't notice him even though he was standing straight against the door. U know the reasons). I dumped my bag in our seat and looked for mom.

"Where is mom?" - I asked my brother.
"They are in S4" - reply came
"Then wat the hell we are doing here?" - Asked I
"We got it confirmed in S7" - My brother told in a sad voice

S4!!! A bulb suddenly got lighted in my head.

"Wait a min. Il b back". I told my brother as i sprinted to find S4. Outside the S4 compartment i checked the passengers list sticked near the entrance. Scanning from top. My mom and dad got side upper and lower confirmed. 44 & 45. And it was true. Rizwana 20f was there in 33. I entered and found my dad tensed since there was no news from my brother. He was glad to see me. I looked for Rizwana. A girl(a Muslim,should be rizwana) had occupied the window seat in the cubicle next to us. She was talking with another female seemingly 6-7 years elder than her. Definitely not her classmate. Should be her sister or aunt. She(Rizwana) was not wearing a hejab, but dressed well enough in a chudidhar with neck and long hands covering till wrists. The dupatta was used to cover the head with only the face visible. She also wore a pair of shoes. I checked all over and found that 47 & 48 were two students boys traveling to Chennai. I talked with them and swapped our seats with them. I went to S7 with them and came back with my brother. My mom was so excited to be with us during the travel and i was so excited that first time i am meeting somebody whom i chatted with. I was looking at her without taking my eyes from her... Her eyes once met mine and she looked away outside the windows. She would have thought - "Thonnyaasi... Embokki... Nokkana notam kandille"(Sorry non-keralites).

I am with my parents and she was with one of her aunt i suppose. There were no chance of i going directly to her and getting myself disclosed as Rajeev who chatted with her. I was hoping that somebody in their cubicle will initiate a talk and i can join them, thereby letting her know who i am. But the stupid peoples in their cubicle was in a hurry to finish their dinner and get to sleep. In half an hour after the train started from Shornur, the middle births in her cubicle came down and people were climbing up. She was telling the elder lady with her that she want to sit some more time. But the elder lady wanted to sleep and climbed up the middle birth. Hesiantly she also climbed to the upper birth. For the next one hour i noticed that she was not sleeping. She will lie for sometime, then sit up, look the elder lady in the middle birth, again lie. I was having great plans to make a good friendship between us. But fate was against it. Finally i also decided to go sleep. When i looked she was in deep sleep.

Early morning itself train reached Chennai. Very sadly i saw her getting down from train and going away. Me and my family now started on our way to Saidapet where the interview venue was. And she would be going to Adayar where IIT is. I did ping her after i reached back. I informed her that it was me who was staring at her from the next cubicle. But i never got a reply nor ever she came online. Did she ever see that message?

The ChatMaker - Part I - The Meeting

That was a Saturday in the pooja holidays of 2005. Almost everybody in my hostel has gone home for the pooja holidays. Only some of us stayed back. Pooja holidays during my childhood is coming to my mind. In my native we used to keep our books for pooja. All studies and skilled works are suspended before starting of pooja till the end. Those were the days of happiness. No studies. Only play. Keep books for pooja and forget about it. Even people were there who don't like to take back the books cos they don't want to study.

In the hostel we had an internet connection shared by our batch mates and it was the only time pass i had there. Browsing, checking mails, chatting with my regular friends. Gradually i got bored with doing only these. So i went out to public chat rooms in search of time pass. Of course girls were the target. After almost a day of chitchats i got one. She was from Kannur. A Muslim girl named Rizwana. She was not like the typical Muslim girls i used to see in Calicut. She was very smart, seemed intelligent and had great knowledge about worldly matters. Gradually we became good friends so as to share some things between us.

I came to know that she was studying in IIT Madras for B.Tech CS, same educational year as me and was of the same age. She was at her home for pooja holidays. We talked a lot about so many things. I was very glad to know that she was already engaged. Bull Shit, why all girls i meet are already engaged or committed??? She told me that she was returning to Chennai only on next Sunday. One week after pooja holidays. Next Sunday??? Ah!!! Next Sunday even I was going to Madras. My brother had an interview to some post in a factory in outskirts of Madras and the interview was in some hotel in Madras. So we thought why not have a family trip to Madras. So booked ticket to Madras in Mangalore-Chennai mail. Mangalore Chennai mail!!! She exclaimed. That was the train she had booked tickets too. What the hell??? Same date. Same train. She asked my reservation compartment. I dont know. My father did the reservation and the ticket was with him. I asked hers. She told it was S4. I investigated and found out later that our status of reservation was RAC. When i told her she thought like i was fooling her telling this. Its a good idea right. RAC means you are traveling in the train and you need not tell a correct location/compartment.

Her engagement was with a young Mechanical Engineer working in AbuDhabi. And their Nikah will happen immediately after her studies get over. It seems he will be going back after Nikah without taking her with him. She wants to have a professional career rather than being a house wife and i was surprised to hear that the guy was supportive to this. Something very rare to hear in Malabar at that time. They will start their post marriage life only after the formal marriage function which will be there three years after the Nikah. She was already placed with three companies and she can choose among them. Very sweet for ear right. Starting of the third year of B.Tech she had three companies in hand and we people in GEC didn't even see the face of a single company. Little bit of inferiority complex shed over my mind. Still she was not showing any indifference towards me like she was from IIT and im from a local college, or she was placed in three companies and im still jobless. She was well behaved and very friendly. Towards the end of the holidays we parted hoping we will meet in the train.


To be continued....

What i learned in my B.Tech

These days I am accidentally meeting many of my seniors. I come to know that they were my seniors only when they ask - "Are u from GEC,TCR???". I feel like I have not met them in college. Actually I may not have met them cos I seldom went to classes. In other words I went to college only to get as much attendance to avoid condonation. So some of you may get a doubt - "What about lectures and the topics covered in classes?". Il reply - "Are you joking???". Read on for my explanation

As far as i remember i was regular in classes till my 3rd Semester. I used to be very prompt in class and was relying on lecture notes as a source for study material. And of course this was enough in the first & second semester. The third semester marked the beginning of electronics related classes. And everybody liked digital electronics very much. The subject seemed interesting and classes also were good. We did a lots of study over AND/OR functions, Minterm/Maxterm expansions, Kernaugh maps, Quine-Mcklusky Method, Design of combinational/sequential circuits using gates with the help of these methods and some of TTL/RTL logic. The KERNAUGH MAPS seemed to be the most interesting topic of our lecturer and we were impressed with him till the end of the semester came. The exam was nearby and that was the time when we were giving a look into the syllabus actually. Whatever topics i have explained above that he has covered comprise only one of the four modules we were supposed to study in that semester. The guy didn't cover any part of the other modules which were important in digital electronics linking the semesters forward. Included were latches, flip flops, registers, counters, synchronous circuits, and state machines. This pointed out to the importance of self study in professional colleges and marked an end to my regular attendance in classes. Even though i was not so successful in self study that was the only way left in front of me. So i urge all who are into professional colleges after their schools. Don't expect spoon-feeding as in schools. Even the syllabus to be completely covered in classes. Thank you pals and have a nice day.