The Golden Jubilee

It was just another day when it began. I had overslept, ditched the bath, dabbed some deo, gulped some juice and made a dash to the office only to find my vintage computer rebooted and my fly open. I make a very (mind you I am using the word "very" here) strong effort not to cause any grievance to this beauty of an equipment and hence I never shut it off nor do I open two applications at the same time - be it an empty notepad or the bulky Siebel. But this day, babbage's invention had some other plans for me.

This marvel of technology had caught an unassuming me completely offguard by shutting off on the very day I was a quarter of an hour late for an important meeting. So, cursing my fate, I decided to boot it up. It whirred, nasalized and grumpily sprang to life. This is one machine that knows no bounds of time. It started after a whopping 10 minutes and by the time I checked my calendar, took a few prinouts the meeting had ended. My boss had a look on his face which could give a good diarrhoea to people with weak bowels. The look said it all. I was required to present an important part and so someone had to fill in for me and apparently it had not gone well.

After a grilling session in one of those conference halls on punctuality and professionalism, I returned to my dungeon which others call a cubicle. Ahoy, what do i see... A forward from one of my college mates about a cultural meet that was to be held in our college.... This is what the "official" mail read.

Dear MITIANS
MIT Manipal will be celebrating its GOlden Jubilee in 2007. It is going to be a yearlong programme where each dept will host workshops seminars or conferences followed by cultural progrmmes. alumni meet is organised for 4th and 5th May 2007. We cordially invite all our alumni to attend these programmes. we would like to inform you all about all the events. for that we need to update our alumni database. Please log onto www.manipal.edu Go to institutions then to MIT there click on alumni Link is given on the invitation to the Golden Jubilee if you find any problem to register, please let us know. Please do inform other MITIANS. thanks with best wishes
Mrs Gowda
Asst. Registrar


Well, the college, as it is called, is located in one of the most godforsaken lands on earth. If it were not for the few domesticated cows that shit on the college playgrounds, it could well be called a desert. Nevertheless, after reading the mail, I was flowing in a confluence of emotions - bitterness, bitterness and more bitterness. It took more from me that what it gave - 4 years of my life. The pot-bellied college professors (who had more hair on their heads than me), the ma'ams who could have been mascots for gilletes razors and the college library which was nothing more than a mating ground - all came seated in the first class coaches of the train of though that was whistling thru my head. The urge was uncontrollable and being a human, I had to give in... I shot of this in reply... My own version of the invite...

Dear MITans,

MIT is going to celebrate its centennary in 2057. It is going to be a decade long programme where each department willshowcase their achievements in the past 100 years but as there arenone we are going to just kill you with boredom.

Over the years we have grown.. as a college.. as an institution..moreso as a mint. It would not be an understatement if I were to saythat, If MIT were a country, we would have been the largest nation interms of GDP (based on purchasing power parity). The mere fact thatIndia still is an alsoran speaks volumes of our achievements.

We cordially invite all our alumni (whom we have robbed financiallyand deranged mentally) to attend these programmes ( or whatever)

Please log on to www.M_For_Manipal_Not_Masachussets_IT.edu. Click onthe "GET HOODWINKED" ikon on the topmost right corner and fill in yourdetails. To make it simple for the users, we have retained bankbalance as the only mandatory field. Do bear with us if it takes morethan a day to load the site. It was created by our brilliant studentsin conjunction with our illustrious faculty and is hosted in ourstate-of-the-art labs. A few minor glitches still exist but we shouldget over with them before our next centennary.

Please bring along with you a blank cheque drawn in the name of"Manipal Inst. of Tech." (make sure the Tech. remains Tech. and notTechnology) else you will be shot along with the thousands of rickshawowners we slaughter each year. Do not forget to get your dentures along.

With all my very sadistic wishes,
Secretary to the Asst of the Manager of Department of AlumniRelations and Communcations and the Chaos Ward.
Prof V.D. Venkata Balabhadrapadmanabhacharya. ( X, XII, Diploma, BE,ME, PhD and some more crap)


Just then I recalled the hostel life. Just reminscing about it gave me goose-flesh. The hostel pranks, the birthday bums, the wisecracks, the invectives hurled at each other and the time spent doing nothing useful seemed so enriching. When I was on the verge of nostalgia, another meeting invite popped up on my beautiful machine. I got back to what IT professionals call "work".

~Dead Pep