Universally Speaking

December 31, 2011
by Vivek
12 Comments

A Semester Deep

There’s no denying the fact that the end of finals week was like a breath of fresh air in a toxic landfill (I believe I’m borrowing that eloquent simile from Family Guy, my new TV online video streaming obsession). And yet, it was tinged with a tone of “Wow, I’m done with one of my eight semesters already? It doesn’t seem like it’s been that long.” However ironic as it may seem, I also reminisce about how chronologically distant orientation week seems to be. It’s like a bunch of neural synapses playing silly buggers with me. I’m also certain that this first paragraph resonates with quite a few of my fellow freshmen and freshwomen (Yes, I came up with that term just to make people question its legitimacy).

It’s the middle of winter break, and I’m on campus in Pittsburgh. Not because I don’t want to go home. But because of a number of other reasons:

I like it here. As I mentioned before, CMU’s a nice home away from home.
I had some “unfinished” business in the ECE lab…
I’ve been slacking on some research I’d taken up halfway through the semester and need some time to work on that.
A round trip home and back isn’t exactly cheap.
I’ll have to return a week early anyway to help with Build Week for Fringe buggy (More on what exactly buggy is later – otherwise just look up www.cmubuggy.org).
Free tickets by Megabus means I’m going on a quick getaway to Washington DC and New York City in the first week of January.
I was planning on exploring a lot more of this city, but haven’t really gotten as much done as I’d originally planned.

However, despite this list of things which should be keeping me busy, there’s a large Blackboard shaped hole in my head. FYI, Blackboard is CMU’s online course management thingamajig. As absurd as it may sound, but after several weeks of relentless hard work, the complete and utter lack of course readings, assignments, tests, homework and exams is getting to me! It’s a dangerous drug…

First, a little more CMU-plugging. I’m not being paid to do this, it’s just that I do, honestly, from the bottom of my heart, feel this way about this place. First, it’s impossible for me to consider alternate universes where Vivek Nair didn’t accept his admission offer to CMU. Why? Because I have no idea how this place compares to other universities. I’ll be honest, after being at this university for a couple of months, I’ve realised that ratings, blogs, online guides can only tell you so much about a place. You need to be there to experience it all. And I don’t just mean a quick campus tour. Besides, accepting a college offer based on a campus tour is like marrying someone after a date. Not that I’m one to speak – I didn’t even do the whole campus tour deal before I accepted my offer – which essentially makes me someone who just married someone off an online matchmaking website without even meeting said person(ified university). That said, it’s really difficult to imagine myself at another college. I’m sure the other Viveks in all the alternate universes are equally happy in their universities of choice. (Note to all juniors: Do not let college acceptance/rejection letters get to you. In all likelihood, after a few months, you won’t be able to imagine it any other way (Now if only I had a time machine to send this back an year to myself… (parentheseception))). On the other hand, I’m pretty sure a few Viveks have dropped out simply because they felt like it…

Getting back to CMU: it’s like a black hole of talent. It naturally pulls bright high school students towards it and sucks them into this small campus to create dangerously high levels of talent density. What gives me the authority to say this? Nearly every person, every…single…individual, I’ve met at CMU has one or more talents that makes me go – “Wow, that person is really amazing. I wish I could do something like that” (Yes, I am fully aware that that was the third time I used the word “Wow” in this post, and no, it does not bother me in the very least). It’s true – I’ve met people with incredibly high levels of intelligence, creativity, leadership skills and a host of other talents. I could be more specific, name people, embarrass them but they all know who they are. Another one of the other things I love about the people I’ve met here is the way I can simply bounce ideas off people. I’ve ended up forming a host of friendships that do end up going a level deeper – people I can talk ideas and issues over with – technical, philosophical, anything – not necessarily limited to any curriculum – with absolute certainty that I’m not boring anyone to death. It’s that kind of intellectual freedom that CMU and the people I’ve met here afford me.

I feel that this post would be incomplete without a brief description of some of the instructors I’ve met here. I won’t be specific, and at the risk of overly generalising, will say that most, if not all, of the faculty I’ve met here are incredibly knowledgeable, extremely supportive, absolutely approachable and I think I’ve run out of superlatives at this point. It’s here that I was introduced to the concept of “Office Hours” – an alien concept for me before I got to CMU. The idea that an instructor would set aside time exclusively to answer questions that students might have was definitely something new to me. It’s not just the professors and TAs really, even Supplemental Instruction (student-led extra sessions) were immensely helpful (special shoutout to a certain SI leader – you know who you are if you’re reading this). And I’m really glad I made the most of all the opportunities I had available to me as a student – not because I got to clear my doubts or anything, but along the way, I got to know just a little bit about how some of these fascinating minds worked, or as a friend put it, “It’s like osmosis, you just sit there and soak in all of it like a sponge”. Even though these are just freshmen-level courses – essentially mindless work for most of the faculty – you do get the feeling that they are completely involved in the whole teaching process and want you to learn. Looking back, without that level of enthusiasm exuding from the faculty, I probably wouldn’t have been interested in lectures either.

And that brings me to the work itself. No, I won’t go into specifics, but I’ll be honest – there was a lot of it. So I was lucky enough not to put myself in a position where an all-nighter was of the essence, but I came close a few times. It’s as if orientation week was a frolic filled few (say the last three words over and over, really really fast) days of laughter, food and activities at the beach, followed immediately by the academic equivalent of a tsunami. I’m pretty sure that most people were caught off guard, like me. It was like trying to drink out of a fire hydrant. Traction was hard to find at first, but eventually, most of the people I know got the hang of it. I don’t know about others, but I for one, take my work very seriously, no matter how banal it might seem at first sight. Probably has a lot to do with my insatiable thirst to know more and do better – which, hopefully, is not really a bad thing. The seemingly never-ending homework assignments, the papers, the exams – it all seemed like a huge burden at the time, but in retrospect, I’m proud I survived my first semester. This is essentially the cue for upperclassmen to be rolling about in splits, telling me I have no idea what’s going to hit me in the not so distant future: “Pfssh, silly overly idealistic freshman, he’ll wish he was never born by the end of junior year.” They may very well have a point – CMU is well known for its academic rigour. However, I’ll take things one step at a time. That said, the first step has put me in an interesting dilemma. CMU’s grading scale goes up to a maximum CGPA of 4.0. I’ve started off with a 4.0. Now that’s a good thing and a bad thing. Good thing because, well…doing well doesn’t really need a proper justification now, does it? And it’s a bad thing because when that first B or C does eventually wind up on the transcript, it’s going to be just that little bit more painful. But anyway, that’s definitely a first world problem and also one I won’t have to deal with till May.

I feel that this is also a good point of time to reflect on what’s changed over this past semester. Not a curriculum overview, mind you – that’s the last thing you should expect on this blog. More like a “Wow, things have changed and I didn’t even have time to notice.” For starters, I’ve had to radically change my work ethic over the past few months. The transition from having literally no homework in the last two years of school to having weekly assignments was a bit jarring at first, but thankfully, not a huge adjustment. Also, in many ways, college was a fresh start. That’s because since I was in a completely new environment, where no one had any preconceptions of what I could or couldn’t do, it allowed me to try new things without having to worry about what people would think of me. Not that it ever stopped me before, but the collective sense of liberty with respect to action and thought that the first few weeks of college injects into the minds of freshmen really does let an individual develop in unimaginable ways. I saw it not only in myself, but others around me. For instance, before I got to CMU, I was convinced of the fact that I was born with two left feet. A semester down the line, not only have friends commended me on my moves (which, in all honesty, are still rather pathetic), but I’m motivated to try out for the university wide Dancers’ Symposium next semester – just a singular example of what the combination of letting oneself loose and positive peer pressure can do.

The development didn’t really stop there – I enjoy pursuing intricacies of topics that professors choose to leave for higher-level classes. The nitty-grittys of why things are the way they are motivate me to look beyond the course. And for once, my questions are no longer met with the frustrating refrain from school: “Beta, it’s out of the syllabus” – faculty appreciate these questions and do not mind going out of their way to satisfy the intellectual curiosity of students in this university. I spent hours agonising over something as elementary as the precise manner in which a capacitor reacts to square waves, and I always had someone to talk to it about. And that’s not all – after going to a few events and talking to a few people – it was actually surprisingly easy to find a small time research assistantship at the university. Again, even when I’m working with people far far more experienced in the field than I am, I don’t detect any trace of condescension or any form of negativity at all when I ask questions that seem elementary, even to me as I ask them.

Moreover, even the infrastructure CMU has to offer does speak volumes about the university’s commitment to its students. It’s winter break – and I asked for access to the ECE labs over break, which was promptly granted once I explained what I wanted to do. When I got locked out of the lab, possibly by the cleaning staff, the lab manager popped by the next day and unlocked the door – this was the day after Christmas. It’s little things like this that give me the feeling that innovation and personal projects are not merely tolerated, but enthused over. And speaking of infrastructure, the fact that I also get access to some really serious video recording equipment is only a small perk in the context of a bigger picture. Not an arts major? No problem – just activate your ID card. It doesn’t matter what you signed up for when you accepted your admission offer, you can do what you want once you get here. Although these 2 instances might not seem to be related, but they’ve let me explore my technical and creative sides in ways that I couldn’t predict before I got here.

Honestly, I am capable of going on and on, but it’s safe to draw a line here and say that despite CMU being among the most expensive universities for higher education in the world, at this moment in time, it seems like an investment that has the potential to yield benefits far into the future, both tangible and intangible. It all depends on whether you’re looking to reach out and grab each opportunity and milk it for all its worth. Hopefully, I manage to do that over the next 7 semesters I’ve got lined up in Pittsburgh.

I have to admit, I've spent more time at Hamerschlag Hall over winter break than I did all semester...

November 25, 2011
by Vivek
0 comments

Ice Skating 101

Disclaimer: This happened. Not in the exact same sequence, or fashion. There have been a few changes to the true story. Consider them whatever you want – embellishments? corrections? addenda? You’ll just have to take it with a pinch of salt.

“WHAT THE F—!”, he yelled as his legs slid out beneath him at a painful, yet comedic, obtuse angle. As his hands go out to grab the handrail that is literally just an inch too far away, he collapses into an ungainly heap of flesh, denim and fleece-lined jacket. This is definitely not the best day of his life. It’s a cold night, and falling just made things a whole lot worse. He gingerly gets to his feet, legs still shaking from the complete lack of preparedness for his fall, and attempts to brush the ice off his clothes. “Why in the world am I here?”, he mutters under his breath.

Flashback 6 hours

Bzzt. His phone vibrates on his table. Turns out it’s a text from his friend Keenan about a bunch of people going ice-skating tonight. Interesting? Check. Something new? Check. Hanging out with Keenan, Delia, David and more people? Check. No urgent work? Check. Seems right – let’s do this.

Back to the ice rink at PPG Place

“Stupid flashbacks”, he mutters. Turns out that sweeping the snow off his clothes is of no use – most of the snow’s seeped through to his skin anyway. He looks up to find Delia and Keenan finding it hard to contain their mirth. Understandable really – he’s pretty sure it looked comic from a third person perspective.

“Are you OK?”, asks Delia, through barely contained giggles.

“Yes, I’ll be fine”, he says. He’s not completely certain though, but better put up a brave front right?

Delia brushes some of the ice off of him that he couldn’t reach. “OK, now the first thing you’ve got to do is learn to walk on ice – the same way you’d walk on the ground”, she says.

“Easier said than done”, he shoots right back at her with his trademark grin. Setting his sights about a foot in front of his extremely unsteady feet, he goes for a second shot.

Transfer weight to left leg. Lift right leg. Move right leg forward. Plant right leg down. Transfer weight to right leg. Lift left leg. Move left leg forward. Plant left leg down. Repeat. Sounds simple enough. If only he could do it right. The handrail is his friend, and for the moment, dearer to him than any form of instruction or advice Delia could give him.

He pauses to look around – the rink is a circular rink with a large christmas tree in the middle. He hasn’t really had much time to admire the holiday decorations on the tree – he’s been too busy trying to stay on his feet. Standing at the outer rim, he sees other people gracefully skating past.

“How do they do that?”, he can’t help but wonder out aloud.

“Oh, you’ll get it eventually”, replies Keenan with a smile.

And with that, Keenan and Delia float away, leaving in their wake nothing but grooves in the ice.

20 minutes later, and…erm…a few falls

Keenan skates up to him. “How’s it going so far?”, she asks?

“I think I’m finally getting the hang of it!”, he responds brightly. He’s been walking for a bit now without having to grab out for the handrail every so often.

“You’ve got to stop pretending that you’re walking on ice”, yells a person standing outside the rink as he passes by.

He looks back to see who it was, which turns out to be a bad idea because before he knows it, his hands are flying out to steady himself on the treacherously slippery surface. Catching his breath, he says, “Nobody saw that happen”.

Delia slides up alongside him and Keenan. “Wow, you’re getting better at this”, she says, “Now try keeping one foot straight and kicking out behind you with the other one.”

5 minutes later

“Sorry!”
“Excuse me!”
“My bad!”
“Yeaaargh!”
“Rookie coming through!”
“Novice on ice – make way!”

And suddenly, the legs are sliding out again. Slip. Slide. Grab at thin air. Find metal handrail. Legs still slipping. Helpless? Almost. With a burst of strength, he manages to pull himself up to the handrail. Panting, he grins at the bystanders who are looking at him with a mixture of pity and amusement on their faces.

And then, he hears a swoosh followed by the sound of metal scraping on ice. He looks in the direction of the noise to see a bunch of skaters showing off some of their moves. Dodging, weaving through the mass of people, coming to screeching stops in a matter of a second or two – they really know their stuff. He looks wistfully in their direction, wondering if he’ll ever be doing that on an ice rink. Oh well, practice makes perfect.

10 minutes later

He’s been skating around the rink for a while now. As of now, his right foot’s doing most of the work. But he hasn’t been holding the handrail much. David floats past. “You can do this, Vivek”, he says, while skating away with a grace that he can only dream of reproducing in the immediate future. Oh well, back to the grind.

But coming up ahead, he sees Keenan, standing with a camera. “I’m going to get a group photo. Stop here, I’m getting the others”, she says.

This is right about when he realises that he hasn’t really gotten the hang of stopping his state of motion. Keenan sees this and sticks out a hand to help. Instead, she just ends up clotheslining him in slow motion and, well, he finds himself landing on the ice once more in extremely comic fashion.

A couple of group photos later, he heads out on his own again. However, this time, he’s willing to concede that he’s been making some progress. From being in a state where he was unable to stand straight, to gingerly gliding over the ice – it’s been a surprisingly short but tiring journey. He’s barely been skating for 40 minutes, but after listening to Delia’s useful advice about keeping his knees slightly bent and keeping the handrail within arm’s reach, he’s finally starting to look somewhat like he’s skating.

He looks up to see a large group of skaters lounging by the rim. Unlike other groups which he could work his way through, this one’s dense. He’s got a decision to make: stop, or leave the safety of the handrail and work around the group. Feeling particularly brave, he decides to go with the latter course of action. Several profuse apologies, half-uttered oaths, flailing limbs later, he’s made it.

Sam, another friend, sees this happen. “You should head out over into the middle of the rink now”, she suggests.

“Not on your life!”, he responds. He feels nowhere near confident enough to do that sort of thing. For now, the handrail is still very much a necessity. Ice is not his element.

10 minutes later

The rink is slowly emptying. He’s been on it for almost an hour now. But he hasn’t caught hold of the handrail in a while. He’s not a 100% steady, but he’s not falling either. He’s moving into the middle of the rink too. Picking up some speed. Delia and Keenan skate past. He can see the pride in their eyes. For his first time on skates – ice or otherwise – this has been a good expedition. He looks at his phone – it’s almost 10 PM. The rink’s about to close. But he feels accomplished. And he’s definitely not had enough…

November 23, 2011
by Vivek
5 Comments

Home: An Exercise in Self-Inquiry

Disclaimer: Oh my Bob, this post is a mess…..

Home is a four letter word. Begins with a h, followed by an o, then a m and finally finishing off with a nice e. And if I’m honest, that’s really all that I know about that word for certain. It’s strange really – it’s not a new word for me; I use it all the time. It’s not a complicated word – at least it’s easy to spell. But does it have an easy interpretation? I think not.

In this part of the world, around this time, families get together around dinner tables to carve up inordinately large stuffed turkeys to celebrate Thanksgiving. Of course, the turkey is just a ruse to get the family together under one roof – it is not uncommon for ticket prices for various means of transportation to skyrocket around this time of the year as family member make a mad scramble to reunite over dinner. Everybody’s talking about going home for Thanksgiving.

And it’s pretty much all this talk about home thats caught my fancy. What is home? Is it just a structure with 4 walls and a roof where you’re sheltered from the weather? Is it a place where you go home and find people who are close to you? Is it a place of which you have fond memories? Is it a none of those? All of those? This is pretty much how I’ve managed to turned one of the most basic constants of life for most people into a great unknowable.

I’ve tried to analyse my story thus far – born and brought up in the capital city of India, New Delhi, it’s the place I called home for 18 years. Sure, thanks to my parents, I had roots back in Kazhakuttam, Thiruvanathapuram, down in the southern peninsula, but I can never truly call it home. Yes, it does satisfy some of the parameters I laid out in the previous paragraphs – I do have a place to stay there – though to be more precise, my parents have homes there. Yes, there are people there who I am close to. Yes, I do have memories of the place – as limited as they might be in number because I only visited Kazhakuttam during summer break. So, is Kazhakuttam home? It’s definitely not my first home.

But can it be one of my homes? That raises an important issue – can a person have more than one home? Sure, maybe it’s not easy to be equally at home at more than one place – but if you can set threshold levels for that homely feeling, maybe you can. Makes me wonder about my Dad really – he’s a really really busy man who spends half of his month in Delhi, half of it in Chennai and whatever’s left in hotel rooms and airport terminals around the country. I’ve seen his home in Chennai. It certainly looks like he enjoys living there. Sure he doesn’t have family there, but well, he’s got work to keep him busy. But he knows he’s got a home in Delhi to come home to. And another one back in Kazhakuttam.

But that’s besides the point – I’m digressing. Getting back to my definition of home – well, for me, home is really just where I’m at. As weird as it may sound, about three months into life at CMU, I haven’t really felt homesick. Unlike several of my friends, there haven’t been teary emotional breakdowns at the mention of that four letter word. Nope. I’m just busy chugging along here.

I had several theories about why I haven’t been subject to this homesickness yet. At first, I assumed I was simply having too good a time to miss home. However, most of that fun vanished shortly after orientation week ended and classes began. (It has been previously theorised that orientation week is just a ruse to cover up for all the pain that the rest of the semester can fling your way.) Then, I started thinking that maybe the workload was keeping me from dwelling too long about Delhi, and family and friends. Maybe that was the reason I never missed any of that – I never had much time to think about them in the first place. But this wasn’t really true. I talked on the phone with my parents a couple of times. Called a couple of friends. Skyped a lot. And no – I didn’t get close to any emotional moment whatsoever. Then I started thinking that perhaps I really was an emotionless robot – something I aptly demonstrated several months ago when me and my friends were going through a pretty emotional period. I kept contemplating which of those two states of mind I was in – too busy or too non-human.

I’ll be honest, before I left Delhi, Delhi was home. Not the city of course. I’m using Delhi to refer to my personal ecosystem within the city. The family. The house. The friends. The school. The room. I can close my eyes and imagine all of it. I really can. I can imagine my mother’s face (even though I haven’t even Skyped with her in months), I can see my best friends, I can see my room. I see it all. And again, the only time I’ve ever done this in the past few months is…well…now… Not once over the past several weeks have I stopped to think about what I’ve left behind. Wow. This post is pretty much an attempt to think out loud – for my sake and for others to understand why I’ve taken some decisions.

And again, nope…no emotion when I just flashed back through my memories. Why is that? Why don’t I miss home? Is it because it isn’t home anymore? I highly doubt that. I’m sure that if I return to Delhi – I can expect things to look more or less the way I left them. And even if things do change, I’m sure I can adapt. The people will be there. The apartment will be there. Delhi is still home.

Then what is it that prevents me from feeling that longing to be home? Is it because I never truly left home? Do modern means of communication technology render physical distance irrelevant? Oh certainly, Mom and Dad can call me whenever they want. My brother’s keeping tabs on everything I do via Facebook. I chat with friends using WhatsApp. Foursquare makes me an easy target for a serial killer. All of that does compensate, but I’m not sure it would compensate entirely for that void.

So, that pretty much leaves just one option: I’ve found another home. Here. In Pittsburgh. At Carnegie Mellon University, to be precise. Not just my dorm room, but this big invisible bubble that covers the places I frequent the most. The places I’ve come to know and love (and in some cases, hate) over the past 3 months. Breafkast from the coffee cart at La Prima Espresso. Chocolate chip pancakes at the Carnegie Cafe. My floor in Boss House. Walking across the cut to my classes. The buggy course. I could go on. And that’s just the places. I’ve found people too – sure, I don’t really have family here – but I do have an amazing bunch of close friends who I’m close with. I spend so much time in the libraries and my dorm room working that I’ve become very familiar with those surroundings. Seems like CMU’s ticked off all of those criteria to qualify as home. Does it bother me that I might not be here 4 years from now? No, it doesn’t.

And that’s because I’ve come to accept the fact that I don’t need to have one home – much like Dad. CMU, in these short three months, has become a home to me, much like Delhi was before this, and I’m sure any other place would’ve been if I hadn’t lived in one city all my life. I already have those treasured memories – and this time I’m logging them – photographs, videos, and when I get the time, a few blog posts – things that will help me preserve the memories that will help remind me why CMU is a home. These logs, in different mediums, will remind me of my time at CMU even when CMU is no longer an immediate home, much in the way that Delhi is no longer my immediate home.

The concept of an immediate home versus a latent home is also important. The immediate home is the here and the now. CMU is my immediate home. Delhi, on the other hand is my latent home. It’s a place I can call home when I go back. But it’s not home right now. It was. And it can be. Just not at this very moment. And that’s a comforting thought – especially when you know that your immediate home might, for some reason, cease to be a home at all. It’s true – events might cause you never to want to return to those places again. Not that anything of that sort’s happened to me – but just the fact that latent homes exist is a source of comfort.

Anyhow, I need to address a certain resentful crowd at this moment – a crowd of family and friends back home who resent my decision to stay over in Pittsburgh for winter break. It’s not because I don’t miss you people. It’s because I know you’re never that far away if it really does come to that – physical presence is overrated. It’s also because this place is like home too. It’s because the work I do here (yes, I’ve got enough of that planned out over winter break) distracts me from the memories that might consume me if I dwell on them too long. Yes, I acknowledge the fact that maybe the lack of emotion is a temporary thing, and that one day I will wake up, be hit by a wave of nostalgia and promptly be knocked out cold. But I’ll cross that bridge later, if I ever come to it at all, that is.

This goes a long way in explaining why watching all my floor mates and friends packing and leaving to visit their families over the week doesn’t affect me. I am aware that even if I really wanted to go back home, I can’t – flying halfway around the globe isn’t really cheap. But then again, I don’t really need to go home. I’m already there.

Even the city’s getting to me – I’ve visited a fair few places in Pittsburgh and have a few more trips planned over the next few days. I want to get to know more about the city. I’ve liked what I’ve seen so far. It isn’t as huge and bustling as New Delhi. Shops wind down by 9:00 PM. This city actually sleeps. And I can live with that. I’ve actually got a folder full of pamphlets I collected during orientation week. They’re about interesting places to visit in and around Pittsburgh. I should be getting a move on that soon – the more I explore the city, the more I’ll be able to identify with it. The more I’ll be able to expand my bubble from just CMU to include other bits of Pittsburgh. The more I’ll be able to create another hometown.

Oh, and the status update bit of the post, just in case there’s anybody still reading through that incoherent mess up there: classes are going well, will be heading over to a friend’s place for Thanksgiving dinner, need winter boots of some sort, need more sleep, have a morning exercise routine back in place, working on some interesting video projects, buggy rolls have ended for this semester, food could be better around this place. But, that said, still alive.