I’ll try to keep this one short because I have an OOAD exam tomorrow and I haven’t really done anything.

Abhiyaan is Bharati Vidyapeeth College of Engineering’s (Navi Mumbai) Technical cum Cultural Festival. I’ve not been attending for the past 2 years for different reasons but this year I had to, considering I was the event head of LAN gaming. We had over 165 entries for our event and that’s quite a lot considering not even the Technical Paper Presentation event, which is supposed to be the crown jewel of Abhiyaan drew that many entries despite what I believe was a Rs. 10,000 prize for each branch’s winner in that event (and there were 5 such branches I believe. Comps/IT, Electronics and Telecommunication, Instrumentation, Mechanical and Chemical). It was indeed hectic with 47 entries for NFS (an event I was in charge of).

I also had my Imagine Cup 2008 Round 2 Telephonic Interview on the same day (27th of March) so it was a bit hectic. We had been working the night before at SaM’s house discussing our presentation and project’s actual implementation. Having done this, I returned at midnight for the third time this week, the prior two times having been in similar discussions with the members of Team SKAN. The next morning I reached at Noel’s place at 8:15 and the 4 of us spent time testing out the phones we were to use in the upcoming interview. At exactly 9:30 we got a call first on the land line number we had given and then the cell phone number. And so it began. 17 minutes and 6 seconds after we had started, our presentation had concluded. A 15 minute QnA round followed which went through well (so I felt at least). Once our presentation was done, we ran off to Domino’s at Hiranandani, Powai and oh, did I forget to mention, I saw the Accenture Campus from outside. Its dead opposite to the entry of Noel’s colony It looked great. Quite sadly I couldn’t get in, not that I tried

I reached college at 1 PM and things were hectic. 160 odd students waiting because our event hadn’t started! Well I fixed that soon enough. NFS started in less than 30 minutes and CS followed soon after. Things began to flow and it felt great. We had a few visits including a special staff NFS match between our female staff in our department! It was fun to watch. I kinda one when the teacher in last place (by 15 miles) left on getting a phone call. I took her place and still won with less than a lap and a half to go! Then again the race was kinda unfair considering I play NFS MW pretty well to say the least

The second day followed and it was pretty much like the first. I had hardly anything to do having only 1 semi finals and the finals for NFS to complete that day. The FIFA event had to be canceled due to lack on participants or rather them disappearing. At around 3 PM, the college mysteriously lost power so the event was stopped. This was admist the NFS MW Finals but thank god for the lab UPS Now while we don’t have power, I really can’t hold LAN gaming matches on a UPS even though the UPS would probably last an hour or more for 4 computers. I had just 6 FIFA contestants show up so I told them that once the electricity would reappear, the even would start. Give it an hour or so. Mean while I left for the top floor for some valley crossing and wall rappelling! I had a camera so I have videos of me doing both. I shall put it up when I have the time.

Anyway, it wasn’t long until the electricity was back again and so was I. To my surprise all the FIFA contestants were gone and so the event had to be canceled. Well there were 2 guys but you can’t really have an event like that. I wanted at least 8 contestants

CS finals approaching and it was getting tense. I was in the lab having fun watching the matches (now that I was done with my work ;)) A clan of my juniors came along. They needed 2 players since their players had left and had already recruited a random guy. They needed another one so I stepped up. Little did I know that this was the same team that my friends were joking and telling me about yesterday. What had happened was that these guys didn’t know how to play CS at all. They had to be told how to plant a bomb live in the match! Luckily the opponents were newbs too so it all worked out. So they won the first match and had received a bye for their second round. Third round I and the random guy join their team. I totally pwned the opponents with 18 kills while the random guy got 12 kills. This was on de_nuke with us being the Terrorists for 7 rounds. We were leading 6-1 and it was time to be the Counter Terrorists. Needing 2 games we were comfortable. The score for the reverse was 4-2 so we clinched it. The newbies were in the top 3 teams thanks to the 2 new players in their team! 3 teams and only 2 can play in the finals. Time for a draw for who gets the bye. As fate had it, it had to be my team! The guys who won the other match were pros so they totally owned us. Doesn’t matter. I got away with a 2^nd place certificate for CS at Abhiyaan 2008.

So here I am, a day before my mid semesters having had a nice time at Abhiyaan and our sports festival where our class lost in the quarters in soccer with a defense so strong that the goalie never had to touch the ball in the entire tournament other than during the penalties we lost on of course. I need to study every single subject since I have no idea what’s going on in any of them. I need to complete journals too since I haven’t written a single experiment or assignment. And the worst part is that I haven’t studied a bit for my GRE yet either! I haven’t written code this entire semester so I wonder what the bloody hell I was doing all this time.

May God have mercy on our souls

Expect my next post to be on the 8th of April. Get ready for a surprise

PS: There was one “event” that had more people attending but I’m not sure its really an event. Sure the Adventure Sports guys got a few hundred entries but quite a few of them were repeated ones and staff members (who had a discount). But the “event” which undoubtedly had the most people, if you can call it an event, was of course the Jam Session. The huge party on the last day of the festival with a decent DJ by the looks of it, drew in tons of college students. Always good to see.

One thing I never thought would happen in my campus would be someone playing Cranberries - Zombie. I was in a meet with the managing committee telling them that the results for LAN gaming will be a bit delayed and I heard the song. I just stopped talking and smiled for 5 seconds. Sadly no one other than a girl from SE appreciated this moment of serenity
On that note let me leave you with this..
Now Playing: The Cranberries - Zombie [No need to argue (1994)] [0:08/5:06@128kbps]

With their tanks and their bombs,
And their bombs and their guns.
In your head, in your head, they are dying…

In your head, in your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie.

Tags: college, competitions, interview, SKAN