Feliz

I write this while on an old and rusty bus rattling its way across Kottawa's sleepy backwaters on a warm Sunday morning. The slight lump I feel in my throat seems to indicate an impending case of sore throat. This bus is moving at a commendable rate for a 336, or maybe writing this is way more fun than it seems. Bah time, forget about it. Being in a state of time warp-y consciousness a few too many times seems to have permanently altered my body clock.

Graduation was a swift affair. The "kids" were ruthlessly herded into an assembly line to be paraded, awarded and photographed. Men of greatness on the quest seeking maximum efficiency have no time to ponder such trivial things like human dignity.

And of such nature is the adventure that awaits me today. It might sound dead simple to the gullible man, but handing in a robe and collecting a transcript is not a task of O(1) complexity.

(Sorry if none of this makes any sense, by the way)

Edge cases

It's been a surreal couple of weeks, these past few. A few days back it was me trying to make a friend laugh as she was talking to a recruitment agent from Millennium IT (I am known for being a bastard like that). Today, it was me sitting almost alone in the canteen that the gang and I spent most of our first two years of uni at.

Metro is a different creature on weekends. The (four!) lifts are empty, the hallways are deserted, lecturers run about dressed in jeans and t-shirts, and the canteen shop is closed. A few awkward couples sit scattered around the place, sharing bath packets.

I'm in no mood for lunch, so quickly scavenge off the chicken and a few mouthfuls of rice before discarding everything into the bin. I know, I know. Bad. But I just can't. I haven't felt this alone in ages. My okay, yet distant new group-mates are upstairs git-merging a system that has and will never be completed. Our final year project supervisor is scheduled to meet us in fifteen minutes, so I hurry back upstairs.

Happier times at the canteen (pic by Meshak)

So, a year has been spent at Malabe, and I've only managed to visit Metro campus two or three times. Once  tried to unsuccessfully smuggle Himal and Raisa upstairs, but the security guards noticed. Hawkward. Malabe is huge, and free, and people sit for hours under trees happily gossiping and checking out potential mates. Metro is cosy, office-y, and located at the heart of Colombo, a stones throw away from every place you'd ever want to be (Galle Face? MC?). The life students here spend is pretty different to the life students in Malabe spend, and while I'm thankful about everything Metro had to offer, I think I might just like Malabe better. It's a camaraderie thing. Also the library is huge, awesome and has plug-points. :P

Our meeting with the supervisor is progressing with the usual hiccups. Ugly interfaces are berated, inconsistent button styles are pointed out, exceptions that only seem to occur when we show the system to someone pop up all over the face, and threats to fail everyone are made. A voice that sounds a lot like Miss A's (refer link at the beginning of the post) seems to waft in from an adjacent computer lab. Attempts made to locate her post-meeting are unsuccessful.

So, in a week, the lectures for this semester will end. And then a few more weeks will see the end of our final  examinations, and the conclusion of our degree programme. The last time I faced a life-changing event like this, I didn't even have this blog. It's been a while, and I do hope I've outgrown my panic attack days. :P

This sucks

Ohhh, I have a blog now? Whoa.

So my uni life's ending in a couple of weeks, and things have been hectic. Actually, that's an understatement. But yeah, you always manage to find some time to do the things that really matter, and that's what counts in the end, right? Unless I've been counting wrong all this time, and someone comes up to my deathbed and laughs his arse off at me.

Yeah, that's about it.

What?

Were you expecting something more? Coz I've got this for you:

Image of/by HootingAngie

Laters.

random post #62

Let's go back to one of the oldest tricks in my book of what to do when I have nothing to write about.

So, I'm going back to uni next week. Baller girl will be there, balling away. Here's a sketch of her that I drew one boring evening at the library:

And here's a story of how things will not work out between us:

"Fifty rupees. It'll make you feel better." said she. Reluctantly handing over the money, he went and sat by the window. The table hadn't been cleaned after its previous occupants had left. He had barely started playing with the straw (from a half-finished bottle of Pepsi) and the ketchup on the plate when she joined him, ice cream cone in hand. "But I have a cold!" he protested.

I found this in the drafts folder. Must've written it one one of those bad days when I was frustrated with everything. And just when you think of how she means nothing to you, and how you're sooooo over her, you see her sitting there at uni; her long hair waving in the breeze, her perfect pearl-white skin glowing in the morning sunlight, and her arms crossed like the total tomboy (yet elegant girl) that she is, and you're left doing this:

Blogging during long weekends

Regular readers of this blog know that long periods of silence are usually followed by a post where I tend to rant about stupid lecturers and having to write mindless assignments etc. This will not be the case this time around, since I don't have the energy to even write a rant anymore. Nothing describes the feeling of going from an awesome 7 week break where you grew in leaps and bounds as a programmer - to a grueling study course which involves about 2 hours of C programming a week, supplemented by 38 hours of reading reference books about the intricacies of dependable software design and time sharing operating systems.

For someone who's never been inside the library, like ever, it's a nice change to be spending so much time in there, faithfully reading the ebooks and typing notes on the laptop. (I don't take the physical book anymore because it involves scanning the bar code on my student ID - a student ID I lost 2 years ago and costs an arm and a leg to replace, hence me never bothering.) If year 1 and 2 were spent taking notes in class and treating the lecturer as god, then year 3 is trying to digest every reason Avi Silberschatz gives as to why Solaris was the greatest operating system ever built, and hoping that your Australian paper marker feels the same way Avi does. But hey, cheer up. Pass rates from previous years hover around the 40% mark, so it's all good! :P

It's not all bad, though. I'm actually managing to stay motivated and properly sit down and study, something I never managed to do, even during my A/L days. The Malabe campus is awesome, expansive and beautiful; and there's enough and more eye candy around. ;) I also met a bunch of awesome new friends, and it also helps that our old gang of five still remains pretty much intact, which is super cool. Maybe when we're done with this year, we could (hopefully pass and) go back to Galle Face and grab an isso wade, like we used to in the good old days. :)

Farewell, Colombo 03

I'm sitting here alone in the 15th floor lab, near a window looking out on Dharmapala Mawatha. A view I've taken for granted since the initial wonder of being on a high-rise bulding passed. It's been two years, and the memories have been good. Good friends, good times and of course, pretty pretty code. :) The first great memory I had was seeing the central mountains from the windows, barely a month after first coming here. It was so beautiful that I kinda became obsessed with seeing them again. I have, twice, and once actually managed to snap a pic. :)

Other good memories from the first year include finishing off weekly programming exams super early in the evening, so I could go hang with Meshak and the others at Galle Face (he's got quite a few pictures of us ronde-ing around here and also, our national past-time of drinking Nescafe and plain tea in the canteen here)

All in all, a good two years, under the wing of some lecturers who really cared for us. Especially Miss A (our awesome junior lecturer on programming and algorithm-based subjects), who came to our lecture hall today and wished us all the best for our next year(s) spent in Malabe, to keep up the good work, and to make sacrifices now for a better future. It was pretty emotional, and it's sad that we won't be seeing some of the great lecturers who taught us in Malabe next year (but I'm hoping against hope that Miss A will get a transfer there or something!) :D

And now, without boring you any further: Chavie out, one last time. :)

A farcical end to a farcical semester

Why do lecturers insist on doing this to us? Giving us assignments that fall so out of our scope of knowledge that we're left with no option but to steal shamelessly. Maybe this is about shame. Maybe this is to condition us, to make us understand the grim reality that we'll probably never write an original block of code in our lives.

Meh. I know the world turns regardless. Life goes on without so much as a second glance. We're the lucky ones. We have the luxury of pecking down a few words in protest before having some lunch and, if you're lucky like me, pudding.

Crashing in 3... 2... 1...

The sheer volume of stuff we have to memorise for this final is astounding. From obscure statistical formulae to the intricacies of various routing protocols to the exact code needed to write certain Java applets (which even the lecturer admits is an outdated technology) to godforsaken Bash scripts.

It's all too much. And I'm more concerned right now about how good the ocarina sounds on Wild Thing.

:/

5 days to go and right royally screwed.

Things

I've been a bit busy in the past few days. And things will only get more so, with exams approaching. I'm kinda excited about the things we're learning these days, bar the antics of a certain Statistics teacher who has wild mood swings. We're learning regular expressions next week! Things I've heard about for such a long time, and we're getting to try it out! :D And yes, we've hit the fifth stage by learning Perl. ;) So exciting stuff, albeit very tiring.

I've been keeping a close eye on the destruction in Japan. My mom got the text message about some radioactive rain falling in Sri Lanka or something. Totally agree with Pseudo that children should be taught basic nuclear science so that people don't panic unnecessarily like that. I mean, every time someone mentions the word 'Nuclear', people think of Chernobyl, Hiroshima and cancer. The phobia is so much that MRI scans, which should be called 'Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging', had to drop the N so as not to scare off patients. But seriously, panicking over Nuclear power is so 1950s! People should get with the times already.

And in other news, I will be casting my first vote tomorrow! :D Yep, pretty excited about this. Look for a purple pinky to be my profile pic on Facebook for a couple of weeks to come. ;)

P.S. I broke with tradition and didn't post a big match update this year. I didn't get tickets early for the match, and when it looked like a friend could set me up with some tickets, I fell ill. I should stop this nasty habit of falling sick right before the big match. :( Anyway, it was a wonderful game and I watched a lot of it thanks to the live broadcast on Prime TV (or CSN) and on ThePapare.com. A big "Thank You!" to those guys for making it possible for us unlucky folk to catch the action. :D

Prefectship: Is it worth it?

Those of you who subscribe to the Sunday morning rag sheet would've have seen the good name of my Alma Mater being dragged through the mud. With it, the shadowy world of prefects and the ragging that they receive as the initiation ritual have come to light.

No right to hurt your brother

I am lucky enough to attend one of the few institutes of higher education in Sri Lanka where ragging is unheard of. When it is so, a new student feels freedom and belonging and a sense of security in his new environment. This is in stark contrast to what some of my friends have had to go through at some of our universities. Ragging, therefore, is a hurtful and vicious activity that should be eliminated.

As schoolchildren, our teachers would make it a point to disciplinary action against children who bully the other kids in the class. Therefore, isn't it a logical extension of that principle to view ragging as a systematic, and extreme form of bullying? And therefore, isn't it logical that the students who have been guilty of bringing upon their fellow students mental and physical harm be subjected to the most severe punishment that the College can hand them: expulsion?

Prison-guard mentality 

Out of the 17 prefects who got suspended, I knew quite well a few. I knew a few of the victims as well. They were among the smartest, most talented (through sports, aesthetics, debating, etc.) and most level headed people I knew. These are kids who would go to debates and make the audience cry about how humiliating and painful ragging is. These were well rounded junior citizens, on their way to take on the world (at some of the most prestigious universities the world over).

So what gives? What turns a non-violent, smart, level-headed kid into a thug who abuses kids (most of whom he has known for years). And what allows this kind of abuse to go on for years without the abused speaking out against it?

There was a very interesting experiment done in the Stanford University in 1971.  Termed the 'Stanford prison experiment', it took 24 undergraduates and assigned them roles as 'prison guards' and 'prisoners'. The outcome of the whole experiment was astounding. The 'prisoner guards' adapted to their roles so well that they began being authoritarian and torturing the 'prisoners'. And the 'prisoners' adapted so well that they would take that abuse as if they deserved it and generally behaved in a subjugated manner. I highly recommend that you read that entire article, because it certainly blew my mind away.

So, giving kids who are in the cusp of adulthood and responsibility a 'prison guard' role, are we endangering theirs and their subjects' futures? Are we bringing up a generation of 'prisoners' who think that they deserve the abuse they get? Are we telling kids that it's okay to be authoritarian and abusive, if you're in a position of power?

Is the tradition of 'Prefectship' worth all of this?

Happeh!

This is going to be nonsensical, but I'm mentally prancing around in joy. This week, everything from Monday onwards, has been awesome. Lectures got cancelled Tuesday (Pirith at uni) and we got tomorrow off as well (research symposium at uni. HA!) and I wrote a report I had no idea was due today in like an hour, got it printed and handed it in as well, and to add to that, I helped out a friend who couldn't make it, made his report look fabulous (note to Meshak: you sent it as email text... aneyyy babo! :P) with my customary formatting (wink wink... look at the design of this blog... imagine that minimalism in a word document. People who've had the (dis)pleasure of working with me hate me with a passion for messing with their formatted headings and painstakingly tabbed indentations) aaaand printed it and handed it in too and I did all of that and I got out of the building just right on the dot at 5 when I told my father that I was coming out and I fully appreciate how much I love my mom for the first time in years and I ate so much food today and had yoghurt and cookies and I'm hiiiiiiiiiiigh...

I told you it was going to be nonsensical. I swear it's the gotukola and all that lime acid talking. :D

But yes, moving on to the more serious part of my post, one of my oldest and bestest (suck it spellcheck, that word exists!) friends, who's also a budding veterinary student, is starting out a small foundation for pooches, that aims to do big things. So if you're inclined towards animal welfare, and would like to learn more, please visit their blog at http://thepoochfoundation.blogspot.com/ :)

Soooo, to end my happy, high, high post I shall leave you with a gig played in the sky (or on the rooftops of London) and the longest microtonal lick George Harrison was ever forced to play by one Sir James Paul McCartney. It last from 1:22 to 1:26 in the video and I think it beats the one in Helter Skelter by a mile, but my ear hasn't been tested recently so can't be sure. ;)

P.s. A note about everyone who's complaining in that video: They got to hear the last gig ever played by all four Beatles together. Imagine what that must've felt like after a good few years! :D

A month in a post

Erm, so hi! Yeah it's me again, the kid who went AWOL all of a sudden. Trust me, there's a good explanation as to why I wasn't around, and as to why my left arm has been shaved of all fur hair just above the wrist. But this is not a time for such trivial pursuits. Or is it? Nah.

Anyway, I was genuinely offline for like 9 days and apart from external factors like nausea and the fact that I was peeing saline... it felt good. It felt good to have some down time. I even learned how to turn off worrying about all the lectures I was missing. I still haven't been able to switch that back on, even after I realised today that I have no flipping clue as to how one could get a user's keyboard input on a Java program (this lapse in programming knowitallitary has since been rectified). Sometimes you realise that there are bigger things, that you could just drop dead and the world could move on without so much as a whimper, that the true value of friendship becomes apparent only when you're lying in a prison (of sorts) unable to move about, that sometimes the little things matter - like you eat one grape too much and you throw your whole dinner down the toilet. It's then that you realise that your dickish, constantly moody, nothing's-ever-good-enough attitude hasn't got you anywhere, and that we're all human and we're all mortals and that we should all chill a bit and be kind to each other and all other kinds of drug-induced crazies. But seriously, this post is getting nowhere.

I just want to jot down something here that's far more important than my ramble up there:

On the 13th of Jan, just 11 days ago, Colombo experienced temperatures of 18.8 Celsius, the lowest recorded in over 6 decades. That day, due to unusually high cloud and an extremely clear lower atmosphere, my little obsession was visible: not only from the 12th/15th floors where we usually look at that, but even from the lunch room of a certain 5 story building, from what I heard. I was in bed that day, unable to crawl out. I missed that golden golden day, and that is perhaps the only thing I regret about this whole month. Meshak got some pictures of it though and hopefully he'll put them up. (I got a sneak peek of the pics off his phone a couple of days later.)

So that's that, that was my Jan. I hope yours was happy and fulfilling. :)

Welcome to the rain-affected test match known as life*

11:21 AM

The downpour keeps steady as I gaze out the window on the second floor of Liberty Plaza. Hard enough to make the towers in the distance a barely visible grey silhouette, but not hard enough to drive away the people from the street. The street, as it runs in front of Liberty, has 6 lanes and is one way, though it functions like a 4 lane road. I love staring at the rain, more so when I'm safely behind a window. Yes, I'm evul like that.

Liberty cinema is playing a Hindi film called Guzaarish. Aishwarya Rai reminds me of a creep zombie for some reason. O_O They're playing an old Bathiya Santhush song called 'Tharuka', which I heard is based on a Hindi song. Earlier they played some hip-hop song which had the lyrics 'This is an awesome ring tone for your phone' in the rap. Hmph.


01:34 PM

We're walking back to Kollupitiya in the rain. The buriyani and doughnuts we had for lunch are getting digested. Talk shifts to malfunctioning computer parts and how to destroy hard drives without any scratch-marks and have them replaced. The school yard has filled up like a lake and a stream is flowing out into the road. Fucktards drive at breakneck speeds in the almost bumper to bumper traffic and splash water all over the pedestrians. I yell obscenities at 'em. Rain is fun.

2:51 PM

We're at the uni canteen again, Meshak, another friend of ours and I (Yes, in the middle of vacation. So what? We kinda missed the place okay?). The second years had decorated the common room with and the wall sported a sign saying 'Thank U'. I guess they threw a little party for the lecturers before 'graduating' from here and moving on to the bigger campus. I'm going to miss them. They were the polar opposite of our own batch, always together, having fun. Even from a distance, it was a treat to watch them. Le sigh.

* Okay, the title has got nothing to do with the post. But it does vaguely sound like something off Chinaman, yes? ;)

Right royally screwed

My last exam is tomorrow and I have:

a) Studied anything - negative
b) Done at least one past paper - nope
c) Watched the entire first season of Big Bang Theory in one day - check!

Oh boy.

On a happier note, I hope I'll be seeing many of you at the upcoming Beyond Borders theatre production titled "Patriot". It's happening next Tuesday at 5.30 PM at the BC Audi. The last one, "Elected" was a blast and you'd be crazy to miss this one. :) Invites can be had at http://bit.ly/aU5lEd and you can check out their Facebook page here.

Sightings

This has become a bit of an unhealthy obsession of mine, so I'm going to type it all out without holding it all in. I wouldn't blame anyone if they called me mad after reading all of this. And as for the all-important question: "WHY are you so bothered with this Chavie?", I have no idea mate. I wish I did.

(Copied from a Google doc I had made to keep track of my obsession, and edited to make it suitable for the blog)

Background

It was the end of our Foundation course at uni and exams were upon us. We had them in the 15th floor, the highest I had been to on the building till that point in time.

First sighting: 2x/12/2009 at around 7.30ish AM - Whole central mountain range clearly visible from 15th floor. Had phone but wasn’t bothered to capture image, since I thought this was a fairly common occurrence.

Obsession

Further sightings eluded me for almost a whole year. It was rather disappointing, but I would return day after day and the first thing I would do is look out the window. I was getting obsessed. Then, on one bright blue morning, the first day of October, I knew I might have a spotting on my hands.

Second sighting: 01/10/2010 at around 7.30ish AM - Peaks partially visible from 12th floor. Took camera even but didn’t take any photographs. Glare was too much (the sun having risen up just behind the mountains) when the window was opened. :(

Common phenomena

I observed that on both occasions heavy rain had occurred the night before. No cloud cover at all in the morning, brilliant sunlight (Not the usual bright tropical sunlight you get in this part of the world, this light is unnaturally bright and powerful.)

Why are they so rare: my little half-baked theory

Although most mornings are clear and cloudless, a constant smog (or haze, IDK) seems to hang over Colombo (and the countryside surrounding it), obstructing our view of anything beyond the Malabe hillocks. On most normal days it will be there from the morning till 5.30 when we leave. I believe this is a testament to how humid and wet our little island is.

Now this is where the whole rain-on-the-night-before comes in handy. The rain and cooling of the water vapour forces the haze clouds down to ground level, clearing the atmosphere. This would explain the ultra-clear skies and powerful sunlight. (The moment I saw that weird light on the morning of the 10th, I knew I would get lucky that day.) The trick to getting a good clear view of the mountains is to make sure you get to the Towers before the bright sunlight evaporates the water droplets from last night’s rain and recreates the haze. This is where I succeeded first time around, and failed (by perhaps 15 minutes or so) on the second.

It bothers me that sightings are so rare and only seem to occur (approximately) during the inter-monsoonal season. And that, my friends, is where it stands now. I just hope that during the 4 days on which we have morning exams in October, one would be clear, blue, and with brilliant sunlight.

When September ends...

...don't wake me up, I be exhausted and sleepy. The past 30 days have been perhaps the most hectic of my life, but thankfully it's all over now and October will be the month of waking up at 10 am and never leaving home unless it's for something fun. ;) So technically we're supposed to be on study leave, but who studies during study leave anyway? That's what the night before the exam is for! :D

Anyway, amidst all the chaos, I managed to make it to the book fair, got blown away by the literally madness (more like the breeze at Galle Face where we went after) and contrary to popular belief that I'm an illiterate hobo, walked home with a copy of Shehan Karunatilaka's Chinaman. He's perhaps the only person who's won both a Gratiaen prize AND a TNL Onstage. I'm glad I was busy, since I would've written a post about how absoflippinglutely freaking brilliant the book was, but I would never have made it sound as good as Indi did in his review.

Anyway, I better get to bed now... long long day ahead, many bugs to squash. I fell short of my target number of posts for September by about 7, guess this means I should set more realistic targets for next month. ;)


Tutu!

Window seat

The view over our beautiful city at 8.15 this morning. I've been meaning to take a panorama and put it up but it never happened till today. Once, on a really really clear December morning, Meshak and I were treated to the silhouette of the central mountains in the distance, and the distinctive shape of the butterfly mountain in the middle. Unfortunately, stupid old me didn't realise at that time how rare seeing the mountains were. I've stared out these windows on more than a hundred mornings since, but never again caught a glimpse. But I'm hopeful. Maybe this January, eh? ;)

p.s. Please excuse the image quality. This is what you get when your phone camera shoots through an unclean window. :D

p.p.s. You can see Mount Lavinia in the distance. :)

Also, I'll tack on a pic of old Tommy since this post is a bit too short. :D

Computers (and I)

Computers crash at the most inconvenient of times: when a friend comes over and you need to copy something off his flash drive, or when you've got a report due the next day, or when you're expecting an important E-mail. I was tearing my hair out just over a month ago when my PC went down, and my mom was seriously questioning what they taught us at uni about fixing computers. That was one of those rare occasions when I felt like I had made a big mistake in picking the path that I have chosen.

I've got a really good friend from my A/L class, with whom I used to hang quite a lot at school. We'd be there in the computer periods, idling and checking out the latest Alienware laptops. He was into gaming and introduced me to Alienware, and signed me up for their E-mails, which I still get. So I met him at the reunion, and he delivered to me shocking news. He's in a uni in Malaysia and he was going to get himself a laptop, and he got himself a MACBOOK! EGAAAAD! A little hugeass part of me died. Apple, in my books, is the worst thing that ever happened to the computer trade. (Yeah, I hear you macs in the back piping in about how they never crash...) They're elitists, their software and hardware are as closed as can be, and they treat the customer like an idiot. I mean, look at the iPhone 4 and how they're handling the reception issues! "Don't hold it like that, hold it as if it's made out of human excrement.", old Steve Jobs said. Nice! N-I-C-E!!!

Talking about the computer trade, the computer trade in Sri Lanka makes me seriously want to lob a grenade up someone's rear quarters... And I mean seriously! A laptop that is worth roughly 65K LKR in the international market can be bought for a fabulously low price of 93K LKR from the local 'Authorised Distributors'. And I thought we didn't tax computers... meh. :/

P.s. Uni's back on from Monday. No more late nights. I am a little excited about it now, but all the drama that will invariably take place when it starts is going to test my enthusiasm. Orsum! :(

Hey!

Hey 'sphere! :D It's nice to be back after a while. My modem was giving some issues and I couldn't come online, and with the added workload from Finals I didn't get it fixed till today, and now I'm back online. Thank you for checking up on me, Harumi! :)

There are so many things to write about and so many blogs to catch up on, and this two month long holiday of ours will provide ample time for both... But for now, I've gotta go sleep. I hope I'll be seeing you, yes YOU, at tomorrow's gig. Not that I'm a fan of Black Metal but our very own St. Fallen will be performing!

Excited, I am! :D

"Malli..."

"Sit down, I want to talk to you guys" A guy pushes his way into the hall just as we were about to leave.

"Three things I wanna tell you. First, there's an Avurudu festival at Malabe tomorrow, I want everyone in this class to attend."

When he spoke, the class that many lecturers had found hard to control was dead silent.

"Second, there are some absolute jerks in the second year. Please don't get provoked by them. I know that you guys can hammer the shit out of those fellows, but please don't. They're in better terms with the lecturers, and you guys will end up getting suspended in vain."

The guy, who looked really familiar for some reason, spoke on without any sort of hesitation in his voice. He was facing a crowd of a hundred and fifty increasingly hungry students that he was keeping from having lunch. But everyone was still uncharacteristically silent.

"Third, remember why you came here. Not to flirt, not to get into messy relationships, but to study. I'm not telling you not to have fun. Have a girlfriend, or girlfriends or whatever! But don't forget your core target here. Don't let some girl or boy or friend or even your best friend ruin that for you."

"Ok, now cheer up. What are you guys, robots or something? Don't look so scared, I'm just another guy who's giving some helpful advice. So, anyone here who disagrees with me?"

Silence.

"Anyone here who agrees?" "Raise your hands" "Oh come on! Raise them UP!!!"

I think the whole class raised their hands. I sure did... :)

***

Like I said before, he looked quite familiar. I later found out that he was from my school, a few years my senior. There are group projects that student groups have to do, and usually these groups have 10 students. His group has only 3, I got to know, and they have consistently got the highest marks in their batch for all group assignments. If you can go into a hall full of 150 hungry and rather badly behaved first years and speak to them for 15 minutes and get out of there alive, then I don't see how you can even dream of screwing up a presentation in front of a couple of nice lecturers... :D