2nd February:
Ok, it’s been about 20 days since this happened, so I do not recollect things all that well. We were supposed to have gaming on this particular day. The Kriya Open Quiz prelims was sometime in the evening. I remember vaguely, qualifying for the second round of NFS MW. Vibu , Vivek and Co. had qualified for the CS second round. Sidharth had also come along. Since the gaming arena was damn crowded, we had to wait a long time for our turns. On top of that we had to pay 10 rupees for registration. All I could manage in between all of this was to crack the Crossword that was given in the magazine. I cracked it along with Vivek and Vibushan. Shyam helped out with one final answer. We then submitted it where we were asked to. I somehow got Vibu also to submit one entry. Vivek wouldn’t listen.
We went had lunch outside. We found the shabbiest of hotels just outside PSG and somehow downed our food with Mountain Dew. To this day it remains a mystery if we ate Chicken Biryani or not. We ordered something called Plain Biryani. Now, some people tell us that plain biryani is Chicken biryani with the chicken pieces removed. Still others seem to think that the biryani in Chicken biryani is cooked separately and the chicken pieces added afterwards.
After lunch, we attended “Googler” and “Mouse Handler”. Vibu and me gave Googler the miss and Vivek gave Mouse Handler the miss. Googler was just plain googling. You were given 5-6 images which you had to find online. Not as easy as it seems. It helps if you are into quizzing though. Mouse Handler was again a set of 5 images which we had to use to design something creative. I did design something creative, but I don’t know why I was not selected 🙂
Now all that was left was the Open Quiz. Me, Shyam and Vivek formed a team. Vibu and Sid also stayed. Quiz was done by Gopal Kidao from QFI. We had Frankies just before the quiz as we were hungry. Because of goofing up the prelims (I am solely responsible for this. As always I told my team-mates that I was sure that the answer they were giving me was not the right answer. I’ve done this even before 😉 as Shiva and Madhu will confirm) Had we got those answers right, we would probably have qualified for the finals. Worst of all was that two school teams qualified for the finals. 😦 I am no longer going to call myself a quizzer. We were at-least happy that these chaps would not be there the next day for the Intercollegiate quiz.
Vivek, Sid left immediately after the prelims. Me and Vibu decided to stay back. So did Shyam. The finals was won by Samanth, Sumo and Jayakanthan. (Not very surprising.)
Vibu and I had dinner at “The Park” in stadium quite late at night and then went home. We shit chatted a bit before going to sleep.
3rd February:
Well, I had the finals of gaming, the inter-collegiate quiz , the Crossword results and my prize money for Paper Presentation to look forward to. The Inter-Collegiate quiz was in the morning and Shyam was supposed to team up with me. Shyam came to the gaming arena huffing and puffing some 40 minutes after the scheduled time of the prelims. He had lost his phone on the the way from home to college and had no way of contacting me. 😦 Sad. We went to the quiz venue only to find that it was almost over. People were handing in their entries. We somehow got a answer paper and started going through the questions frantically. We did the quiz in something like 30 seconds. Obviously we did not qualify. We scored some 6 and as far as I heard 8 was the highest score. If only Shyam had not lost his phone. If only we had made the quiz on time, maybe we would have qualified. But then that did not happen. Shyam went phone hunting immediately afterwards and I went back to the gaming arena.
I qualified the second round of NFS too and then the third round. Now only the finals was left. At around the same time, my friends were doing pretty well in CS. 4 of amrita’s teams had made it to the top 6, and the organisers somehow managed to get Amrita playing Amrita. Of the two Amrita teams that emerged, they were again asked to play each other!! That’s where Vibu and Viveks team went down. Some bad organising with the home team being given wild card entries and all.
I drove pathetically in the finals of NFS. Somehow I thought I would win this race, but it was not to be. I once again came third on 4th. I now have the dubious distinction of never having won an NFS finals after having qualified some half a doze times.
So, now all that was remaining was the Paper Presentation prize and the crossword results. This was the most annoying part. I was asked to wait some 2 hours before I was given the certificate for the Paper Preentation and another 30 minutes before they announced the results of the Crossword. Me and Vibu were among the winners apparently. To add to the already bad organisation, I was told that my prize money would be sent to me by mail!! Whoa!! You made me wait two and a half hours to tell me that ? And I had made Vibu and vivek wait with me. I still haven’t received my prize money by the way.
Amidst all this, someone from Googler called me and I was told that I had won and they wanted to know my college name so that it could be written on the certificate. Now, both me and Vivek were bewildered because both of us had got only 4 on 6 right. After getting Shyam to investigate the matter, I found out that I had won a participation certificate!! (Actually not even that. It’s a long story and not worth it. So I won’t go into it.)
We left from PSG and went to Barista in R S Puram for my treat. (Which was foolish of me since I hadn’t even got the money yet!!) Rajani and Sid also joined me, Vivek and Vibu. I was a little low on cash. So, I told everyone that they could have one item form the menu. Thankfully, my friends were considerate enough not to order the most expensive stuff on the menu. 🙂
We went to Viveks home briefly after that and then back to Vibushan’s house. I had dinner at Vibu’s place. Here, I packed as my train was early in the morning and then we talked some more before going to sleep.
4th February:
Somehow managed to get up on time and get ready for the train. As always Vibu was more than nice to drop me at the station. Got my train on time. It was the bloody sitting train. I don’t want to go into how bad the journey was. All along the way, I cribbed and whined to Vibu and Vivek about it. And once I neared Chennai , to my friends here. Somehow came to Chennai at about 14:30. Got an AC bus to Thiruvanmiyur. Came back home took some rest, and then went to Cafe Coffee Day in Ascendas in the evening with Abhi and Gari for yet another premature treat. 😀 It was fun though and in a way nice to be back in Chennai.
SK KD BLAG 