Finally got my hands on a laptop!!! Though its not mine, it serves the purpose pretty nicely I must say. It is indeed better than sitting in the Information Processing Centre with n people breathing down your neck, and dreading the thought of a power cut … which in 90% of the cases materialises into a nightmarish reality … and when that happens … well you can understand.
Hence, today, with a fully charged laptop at my disposal, a pretty sturdy cable for the network connection, and an absolute wilderness of thoughts in my brain, I start.
BITS Pilani, declared as a deemed all-India university, under section 3 of the UGC on the 27th of June of 1964 … is … erm … my new home, as all you people out there should be aware of. If you aren’t, here’s another chance. It is indeed one of the best colleges in the country, and possibly the only reputed college that does NOT have any reservations ! Admission is based on merit, and on nothing else, so you can understand that the general illumination in and around the place is pretty high.
The campus, as one would see it is a typical old-style campus, which has lots in common with the IITs and other colleges that were built around the same time … viz the mid 20th century, but is much well maintained than the government counterparts. An additional bonus are the peacocks that are so much common in the campus, which you can actually see making long jumps from one hostel to another (nah, couldnt call THAT flying!), and whose timely morning squawks are better than the best alarm clocks in the market. It is a HUGE campus … all of 331 acres, and the hostels, where we stay are two storeys high and they sprawl all around the campus … there are 14 hostels in all, 13 for buys and just the 1 for girls (would you believe that!), and they are all named after great people who have hailed from our country. Mine, for example is Budh Bhawan. Ram Bhawan, Maalviya Bhawan, Krishna Bhawan, Gandhi Bhawan, VishwaKarma Bhawan … etc … to name a few others …. and the one for the girls goes by the name Meera Bhawan.
The Institute Bulidings … the place where we have lectures and tutorials sprawl at one end of the gigantic campus. It comprises of the Faculty Divisions (I, II, and III), the Student Welfare Divisions (SWD) and the LTC (the Lecture Theatre Complex). Lofty stuff indeed! What say?
Our rooms. They are good, to say the least … especially when compared to the IIT/NIT ones. These are double rooms (but only for first yearites, from next year we get single rooms), and they are spacious, and pretty airy. Though the furninture is pretty basic, it does the job pretty fine. The bathrooms are a let down … these are the old Indian Style Kneebreakers (thats my invention ;)), and my knees do indeed suffer every morning when I use them, but at least, like my NIT Trichy blogger friend informed through his post, your activities aren’t made public … thanks to proper unholed doors and proper latches.
The guys in my hostel, hail from different parts of this country … my roomie is from Jaipur, my Sideys are from Manipur, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, and Punjab … other wingies include people from Bengal (yes there IS a Bengali here too), Nagaland, Bangalore, Jammu and … you name it, we have it!
What’s so great at BITS apart from the academics and the campus and the brand and … whatever else I’ve mentioned, are the awesome departments, clubs and the exciting student life that happens here. There are active departments and clubs for every goddam thing that a person can have the slightest interest in, be it music, dance, photography, drama, classical carnatic, and hindustani, sports of every sort, english writing, robotics, mathematics, cars, physics, quizzing, debating, art and decoration and the sort. There is a department of sponsz and controlz for those who want to do work for the fests and gather sponsors and all.
But a description of BITS is far from complete if we do not mention the great fests that take place here. There’s a BOSM (Bits Open Sports Meet) which is, quite obviously the annual sports event where colleges from all around the country take part and slog it out in more than 20 sporting events. Then there’s APOGEE (A Professions Oriented Gathering Over Educational Experience), which is quite easily the biggest tech-fest in the country, and also which witnesses some of the biggest names from the tech world right here in BITS. APOGEE also has hosts some of the coolest tech events in the world like an LED light show which was organised the last time, and was acclaimed the world over. I do not remember all the other details, because I wasn’t there, but the crux of the matter is that it was ONE HECK OF A FEST!
Last, but not the least, there’s OASIS, the annual cultural fest of BITS Pilani, which is, by far, the BIGGEST college fest in our country. It’s actually 96 hours of non-stop fun, entertainment, and excitement, and the sort of thing, you just can’t all of. It’s scheduled for end October this year, and I just can’t wait for it! What’s even cooler, is that here at BITS, each of thebig fests that take place have not a single professor signature in them … these are COMPLETELY, and ENTIRELY controlled by the students, and the way these guys actually pull it off, is simply mind blowing.
That’s all for now … the guy whom I’ve taken the laptop from is letting out grunts of displeasure …
so people, do take care … I’ll be back soon!
//blog 