all this talk of iit's and stuff makes me nervous. will i die without having taken my share of it's everlasting charm? was it particularly special to have spent time at an iit, rather than anywhere else in the world. for god's sake, there are books being written about iit's - one of the my office-mates wanted to know if i write as well.

it's all so peculiar. i remember my stay at iit very well. there are flashes of memory, like a photo album, which i can browse through. i remember counselling, when i saw a couple walking the summer flower laden paths of IIT/K, holding hands. i had never seen a couple holding hands in public. i was with my father, and i was embarrased for his sake. i also remember the intensity of heat in kanpur; my fascination with heat, which i wrote of in some other entry, probably dates from those days.

i remember reaching kanpur - a raw teenager - and being ragged to tears almost every day. i remember hiding in the sports grounds. i have not known deeper misery than i experienced in those days. there was a sunday afternoon i remember measuring the length of my hostel wing with a 25 paise coin. i remember that coin being kicked out of my tired hands half way through the wing - deliberately - and starting again. i remember feeling that this must have been how jews must have felt when they'd just been carted over to the concentration camps.

i remember getting through ragging, and receiving a late night march from residents of hall2 with buckets of water. i remember my seniors encouraging me to feel enthusiastic about this, and i remember feeling entirely bored with the proceedings.

i remember a lot. i won't tell you all - for fear that i'll lose my potential book royalty to my gentle reader. but really because i don't think my life at iit was really anything special. i would have had as much fun, if i'd studied at XXX Engg College. fun is a function of will.

i also remember spending drunken evenings with folks who passed out of other colleges, and whose faces, redolent with memories, were more evocative than any i know. it's clear that these iitan's are just setting themselves up for royalties! believe me...