A Rough Guide to crack BITSAT in one or two - three months.

      Folks, I am posting this up on my blog just so that everyone can avail the benefit of reading through my experience of taking a shot at BITSAT, the admission test to the integrated first degree programs at the Pilani, Goa and Hyderabad campuses of the Birla Institute of Technology and Sciences (BITS).



    BITSAT which was recently declared to be India’s most competitive entrance exam. The finer points of the guide will be mostly oriented towards Goan students but the post as a whole will be relevant to all. Firstly, let me brief you up on my preparations for the given exams so that you have a better perspective of how I geared up for the examination. I did not attend any JEE level coaching classes but primarily depended on the AIEEE level tuition center that I used to go to, the internet and my higher secondary school for my source of knowledge. Yes, I did top my higher secondary in the 11th but I did have my share of fun too. I used to read a lot on the sciences, do experiments but never overdosed on problem solving. As the test is based on the 11th and 12th standard NCERT syllabus, I had a jolly time.           As my 12th standard took over and the hectic preparations took kept me occupied for a major part of the day, I’d still not say that I was strictly serious with respect to my studies and I don’t regret it. Right since the 8th standard I wanted to do research in Physics and was mentally prepared to do only that. So, after checking out all the institutes in India, having interacted with many of the Physics faculty at the Goa campus of BITS and finding out that my research interests were on the same lines, I zeroed in on BITS. 
    Now here is the crazy part. Besides my boards, the only exam that I decided to give was BITSAT because I was singly focused and I knew what I wanted (not that I was over-confident). I did not answer the JEE, the AIEEE or even the CET. It was a risk that I took since I completely understood the implications of my actions, if I were to fail. I do NOT recommend you to do the same as you might not meet with the same fate as mine.      Goa board students please note that you are not supposed to neglect or downplay the board examinations if you are gunning for BITS. Believe me, the board examinations test essential skills required in science and leave the rest to be tested by the competitive exams. Take care not to mess up on your internals. If it wasn’t natural to you, please learn to maintain good relation with your teachers (that should have gone unsaid, but still) and prepare well for the Boards. One has to get an average of 75 marks out of 100 in PCM to be eligible to admission to any BITS campus. I started preparing for my BITSAT seriously right after my boards got over. In fact, I had a little less than 2 months time left for my BITSAT. But still, I crossed the line.
     I ended up getting a comfortable 304 marks on the examination. As of the 2011 cut-offs I can get any of the branches at the Goa campus (obviously Hyderabad too!) and all the MSc courses at the Pilani campus. But obviously, I shall go for the MSc Physics at Goa. Believe me folks, with efforts in the right direction, the task becomes easy. The best advice one can give is to tell you to stick to the prescribed syllabus.

     The exam is held on a computer for a duration of 3 hours. Be sure to select a decent date and time. The time of the day plays a very important role. You don’t want to be answering on a full or a completely empty stomach, do you? Goans, be prepared to face the AC chills while answering, dress accordingly.  
     The exams has 150 questions, divided as mentioned below. With a total duration of 180 minutes, you get 72 seconds per question, which is marginally less than what one would face at other exams. You get +3 for every correct answer and a –1 for every wrong answer. So keep in mind that the questions at BITSAT will be easy, but deceptively simple. They wish to make you panic and let you yourself do the damage while panicking. It is a race against time, to frame it in a better manner. Also remember that the questions are randomly generated and no two people will get the same set of questions. So, it does depend on your luck. But prepare so well that no luck can cause you harm!! That is the essence of the spirit. One needs to be mentally tough and have a good strategy!      Also, BITSAT has this unique feature of allowing a candidate to answer extra 12 questions to better his score even more. Below is a quote from the BITS website.

“If a candidate answers all the 150 questions (without skipping any question), the candidate will have an option of attempting 12 (twelve) extra questions, if there is still time left. These extra questions will be from Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics only; four questions from each part. Further, once the candidate has opted for extra questions, he cannot go back for correction of any of the earlier answered 150 questions.”

Here is what I went in the time strategy! Adapt it to your strengths and weakness.

Subject	Questions	Time I thought of giving
English & Logical Reasoning	15+10=25	10 -15 minutes
Chemistry	40	20 - 30 minutes
Physics	40	30 - 40 minutes
Mathematics	45	60 - 90 minutes

 
    Now, I shall go on to the in-depth details regarding the preparation that I did in the given time-frame. You may mould it to your convenience. The more the time you have, the more the chances you have of turning the game in your favor!

Chemistry : Be thorough with your NCERT chemistry textbooks, be as perfect as you can with them. Research on the tiny details in inorganic chemistry as the questions obviously try to pick you on your knowledge of that part of the text that is less frequented.. The questions asked in Physical chemistry are of the textbook level and so are the questions asked under the organics section. Do the extra content given in the BITSAT syllabus. Stuff like dyes, petrochemicals might help you in scoring high. Especially stereochemistry and configurations (I had 3-4 of the questions on these topics). Questions on biomolecules, CEL, Polymers are asked frequently. You might hate inorganic chemistry like I did, but you can’t avoid the fact that it is real scoring once you put in regular efforts. Play cool at organics, I repeat. The questions are not difficult.  Others don’t and they loose out. Use that to your benefit. No pain, no gain. Chemistry if done well can change your fortunes. It always used to be a scorer for me.

Mathematics : Nothing can beat practice and we all know that. Try to attempt the easy questions on the test first. It is a very scoring strategy. Start revising XIth math content as soon as possible. Trigonometry, Cartesian geometry formulae can be easily forgotten. Hence, I beg of you to revise them from time to time. Knowing the general equations of anything and everything helps. Don't stick to formal solving. Use your brains and experience to squeeze the answer out of the question. Numerical substitution, trial and error methods work best in mathematics. Know the answers to common questions at the tip of your fingers. But always know how to obtain them too, for questions on BITSAT appear to be easy but are actually deceptive. Deceptively simple. When it comes to integration, try stuff like differentiating the options to get to the question as a back-up. As I didn’t have much practice, this was my weakest section overall. But such techniques saved my life.

Physics : Get your basics perfect. Yes, perfect. Also, your formulae. There is not much I can say besides that when it comes to Physics because almost any sort of question can be asked in this section.  Do go through NCERT texts once in your lifetime. I know that Goans tend to never ever touch them. But going by my experiences, these books are gems. And obviously, practice. I remember answering almost all of the questions in Physics on the test. Not many numerical questions, because of the time-frame hence you have to work out on the tricky conceptual questions. Use dimensional analysis and your common-sense to the maximum and also know where to stop using it.
English & Logical reasoning : Stuff that people tend to neglect the most and hence, suffer the most. One can’t pick up these skills in a day or two, sorry. So a lifetime of dedication might come in handy here. Higher secondary level English, please be good at it. There are some difficult vocabulary questions thrown in which you can’t deal with unless you are a voracious reader. Do regular practice on logical reasoning a few days before the test. Referring to the Arihant/MTG books on BITSAT should give you a clear idea on these topics.

      While test taking, DON'T Guess too much. ANSWER WHAT YOU KNOW. Leave what you do not know royally. Be confident and go for what you know. NEGATIVES KILL (remember deceptively simple?). Remember that. Don't even think of extra 12 questions, I say.  If there was one thing that saved my life at the end of the, it was this small tip.       Preferred order of answering to maximize marks : E&L>>C>>P>>M      Also, remember that this might not guarantee you success. Nothing besides efforts and sharpening brains can. Hope you know your plus points, limitations and goals. Dream, but only with firm feet. Don't take risks like I did. It might not always work. Start now. I'm not kidding. BITSAT isn't difficult if you know what to do.     Those Arihant/MTG BITSAT books are not so awesome, tend to confuse you on syllabus and level of questions asked. But try it if you want to, I used Arihant. It did help me when it came to Physics and inorganic chemistry. But was way out of line with its Organic Chemistry level just like MTG was with Math. Pearson's Guide to the AIEEE is cool. Again, concentrate only on what is in BITSAT syllabus (but as you'll be taking other exams,you'll have to stuff outside BITSAT anyways). Try tests from minglebox once done with preparations. The level is as good as that of the actual test. Also, download the official sample test from the site to be even more comfortable with the way of answering. What you do, will decide where you end up. Then no use repenting. Once your 12th standard is done and you make it to a good place, all the pain of efforts vanishes! Remember that there is no substitute for hard-work. It all depends on what efforts you put in as knowledge never goes waste! :)      Aha. I'd love to take questions over email or in the comments section. Do share for the benefit of all! I shall try to update it as soon as I remember any important detail. Do visit the BITS360 forum to get your queries sorted out!
Yours,
TheBiggerBang

Edit 1: I don't have much of a clue about which book to use for Maths because back in my time, I messed up in the same. If you have less time on hand, you probably should practice and pick up pace rather than run around trying to do something new. Also, it has been two years since I gave my exam. I do not posses the best of knowledge when it comes to books to be used. Edit 2 : I'm seriously happy that I am here. This is one of THE best places in India for pursuing theoretical physics. It's magical. Wishing you all the best! Let me know if this post helped you ace your BITSAT! Here is another article that I wrote on MSc. (Hons.) & duals.Edit 3 : I graduated :-)

(Special thanks to Kaushal Sahakari, Shambhavi Narvekar and Mihir Umarye for the valuable guidance that they provided me with!)

Quickie.

    It has been two months since I last blogged. Maybe more than that. Blame the exams and my busy life. Leave all that aside for a moment. Let me get to the point. Allow me to make it random. Questions and a stanza or two await you.

   This is a quickie. I’m desperate to write. ___________________________________________________________

“You are like a blank paper. Blank.

You speak of nothing, tell no tales.

I would fall for it that you came from a rock.

 

But then I know, you were once a tree.

Lush and full of life to spare.

Can I ever get you back there?”

 

     Is equality a law of nature? Is the world fair and equal to one and all? One nice quote.

“Being nice to the world and expecting it to treat you the same is like being an vegetarian and expecting a tiger to spare your life for that reason.”

    I have conflicts in my mind whether equality truly exists. Billions of people are born in the world. Some die within a year and those who survive, well they just survive. A very few live. Think of those who died before they could even give their parents the joy of hearing their baby’s first word. Or those innocents who were massacred in an act of war. Or swept away in a tsunami. I ask, what was their crime?

    Go on. Tell me they committed a sin in their previous lifetime. Go on, invoke rebirth. Tell me that the purpose they served was to highlight the plight of the hungry and the destitute all over the world. I ask, why choose them, these innocent mortals to bring the issue to the attention of fellow humans. Why this inequality in choosing who dies? Sacrifice? For what? A piece of land which you think belongs to you just because it is on paper? Sigh. We are not different, are we? Yet we are not equal. Now blame it on the creator’s plans will you? Spare him. Spare him the blame. You know who is the culprit.

    Go on, kill the animals, eat them just because they are tasty. And helpless too! I ask, who has given you the right to kill other living beings if you can survive otherwise? And why shoot a lion if it tries to survive off you, then? Why this inequality? Don’t bother to think, is that your escape? Try.

    Who are we? Why do we act like the boss, when we know we are not?

   I am not frustrated. I’m simply crying from within. I am just like you. I am guilty. And I’m trying to make you feel the same. No offence.

    I think the following piece from my Facebook Timeline speaks volumes about what I consider as the truth. Right click and zoom to read the text comfortably.

  

   Yes, I do believe we are here without a purpose and I build up on the stand I take in the last few lines of my previous post, Being Human. We might be an accident. But how much of an accident are we?
     The discussion brings me to another crucial junction but it involves a detour. Are we puppets who are here to enact a story that is already written? Or are we the master of our future? Herein, lies the great free will v/s determinism debate. Let’s see what science has to say. Mind you, I am no expert but I shall try my best to give you a rough idea.

•   Determinism

  You must have surely heard about Einstein’s theories of relativity. Take the General theory of relativity. What evolved from it is the idea that the universe is like a loaf of bread. Each slice, representing a still of the universe at a given point in time. So, different slices show you how the universe is at different moments of time. This is known as a block universe. This, is where the past, the present and the future all exist. What do I mean by ‘they all exist’? Well, they all are equal. They all ‘exist’ in their own right. It is just that you experience a different slice which you call ‘now’ or ‘present’.

   Suppose there eventually is a ‘theory of everything’, that is something like a formula that you chug in all the information about the universe in and given enough computational power, you will be able to see the past or the future as the laws of nature don’t change over time. Well, that means your future is already out there. You are just walking towards it. What is to happen, will happen. And you are already immortal. Death won’t affect your existence as they frames of time you were ‘alive’ in, they all exist!

•  And Otherwise

   I pretend you must have heard about quantum mechanics too. It is the theory that governs the minute domain. The funniest part with the theory is that is mathematically beautiful, and it is very much true to real world observation but no one knows for sure what the math means! No one knows the physical significance of the math! So, many people came up with different interpretations of a single observation.

    The observation is somewhat like this. When a tiny tiny (does that make it cute?) particle goes from a point A to another point B, you just can’t tell what path it took. Straight, curved or maybe around the moon. Suppose a ideal train was to travel from Mumbai to Delhi, knowing its speed you could tell where the train is without actually having any contact with the train. On the contrary, you just can’t say anything about where the particle is until and unless you detect it. That’s nature.

   Also, you should know that every particle has something called a ‘wavefunction’ associated with it. A wavefunction is supposed to contain all the information that one has to know about the particle.

    The Copenhagen Interpretation says that when an act of ‘observation’ is carried out, the particle is forced to assume a particular position, it is no longer vague. This is known as the wavefunction collapse. That is, the probability of finding the particle at the place it is detected is unity.

    Another interpretation, which is steadily gaining steam is the Many Worlds Interpretation. At every event with an inherent uncertainty attached to it, the universe splits or forks into many more universes. Every quantum possibility is realised albeit in a different world. The universe, is not deterministic in a philosophical manner. I won’t go to the length of relating this to free will, though. But I do hope you get the gist of what I am trying to lay before you.

     That is, the sort of contrasting views about what exactly is happening. Scientists are yet to figure out what the truth is. Do read up on this from reliable sources if you are interested in knowing more as I am afraid I might have over-simplified it.

  But wait.

Wasn’t I supposed to be here doing only a quickie?

Ah, the damned diversions!

 

Yours,

Thebiggerbang.

Being Human.

      Not blogging for the past few weeks felt as if my philosophical side had gone into a hibernation mode. So here I am, all set to revive myself. To digest that much needed the food for thought that I have chewed upon all these days. Exams, provide us with more than enough on our platter. Like everybody else, we make grand plans that vanish in a puff as soon as the exams get over. Most notably, the grand promise of taking a long nap the day the last paper gets over. It never happens with me, blogging being my priority. Sharing my thoughts is a passion.

       Often, small worries get us down. Be them missing out an answer in an examination or a cell-phone that we want. In this post, let me delight you, excite you and take you on a journey where we shall together explore what it is being human. Seldom does a passing thought get directed towards issues regarding the basis of our very own existence and how special it might turn out to be. There is the science and there is the philosophy behind our existence. Let the journey begin.

        Being born is quite an event. No wonder our entire family tree is jubilant when that happens. I remember reading a text saying that whenever we face trouble, we should recall the fact that once upon a time our origins are to be attributed to that one sperm that won the race. But does the ‘being lucky’ part starts right there? I think that there is more that we miss out on.

     If I were to write an acknowledgement or make an acceptance speech at the Oscars Nobel Prize giveaways, maybe be list would run like this.

• I would like to thank the universe for creating itself out of nothing. Possibly.
• I thank the laws of nature for being the way that they are. In fact, string theory allows for a vast number—10⁵⁰⁰—of possible ‘worlds’ with different self-consistent sets of laws and ­constants. Thank you for landing me in here!
• I thank all those events that occurred for billions of years to get the universe to the state that it is currently in. 13.7 billion years to be specific. Cheers to all those stars that exploded and all those gases that ganged up to make up more stars and galaxies. From the innumerable quantum uncertainties to the explosive supernovae, thank you.
  
• Cheers to Mother Earth for landing up in the habitable zone, the ‘Goldilocks zone’. Not to hot, not too cold.
  
• How can I forget that comet which seeded the Earth with life? Or perhaps to life itself for coming into being from a random arrangement of molecules? A bolt of lightening? Thank you, whatever you were!
  
• To evolution, those million years that gave us the tools of survival. These teeth and those eyes, minus the tail. And to whatever brought about consciousness, the state of being aware of your surroundings and influencing it at your own will.
  
• To my entire family tree, right from the organisms that arose out of the primordial soup to my ancestors for mating with the right person. For doing all that they have done. As a matter of fact, every generation you climb up leaves you with twice the number of people to thank, it is an exponential increase since we started mating sexually. I too plan to keep up your hard work and keep the wheels moving on!
  
• Ah. Finally to that damn sperm that was lucky enough to find itself home. One in a million. That reminds me, one in a million sperm won every time your ancestors mated!

   Anybody game for calculating the probability of you having ended up here? The number zero will be given a run for its money. This brings me to unveil before you a beautiful quotation by the Austrian physicist Erwin Schrodinger who has indulged in considerable philosophy.

“How would we express in terms of the statistical theory the marvellous faculty of a living organism, by which it delays the decay into thermodynamical equilibrium?  The device by which an organism maintains itself stationary at a fairly high level of orderliness, really consists in continually sucking orderliness from its environment.”

     If that was a bit tough to chew on, let me elaborate. All he meant to say is that life is something that ‘miraculously’ manages to keep itself going on despite the odds being tremendously against it. What strikes you the first, when I tell you think about life? A picture of a micro-organism or perhaps, your very own arduous struggle? Whatever it may be, we look at it in such a superficial manner that we forget to appreciate it and its workings. That is where, everything that came before the one-in-a-million sperm gets forgotten. Sometimes, the poor sperms gets forgotten too. Sad, isn’t it?
      10⁵⁰⁰ and counting. That is a one followed by a five hundred zeros. So, the question asked by many learned folks is whether we, humans occupy a special place in the universe or whatever that there is. Whether, this universe was set in motion with the right ingredients just so that one day, we could walk on this land and appreciate its beauty, maybe bring about our own end. After all, what is the use of a universe when there is no one to observe an appreciate it? Or is it that we are just an outcome of chance? Of a probability that is of mind bogglingly small magnitude. That, we just came to be, and do not posses any special position in the scheme of things. Sorry. The question is of chance versus choice is never-ending, as I have found out. It remains one of the hottest topic that we ever discussed at the observatory.
     The Anthropic principle advocates the first case. According to it, the universe has moulded and evolved itself in such a way that conscious beings ended up observing and understanding it. It created itself in such a way that it ended up getting observed. Because it wanted to be. This argument, toes the thin line between metaphysics and cosmology. People who argue for it cite the fact that the value of the fundamental constants are just they way that they are supposed to be. Not a little more, not a little less. They say that the selectivity the universe has shown for these constants clearly portrays the fact that it favoured carbon-based life. On the other hand, cosmologists argue that we might not be so special. Why would we have to be? We might just be stranded in a universe which itself exists in a multitude of universes. What is so special is the fact that we realise that we are here. And that we are stranded.
      Would it do wonders to you if you knew that you posses around a 100 atoms that once figured in Isaac Newton’s body? Or maybe Emperor Ashok? Yes, each and every one of us. We are a part of one big recycling machine known as the universe. But where did all of these atoms and the subsequent molecules come from? Have you ever wondered about that? The answer lies in the simple fact that we are made up of star-dust. You might find this gross, but when our food and excreta are fundamentally made out of the same basic atomic and even molecular constituents, why is that we mentally place them a world apart? Why do our associations and reactions to them differ? Just give it a thought. But don't radically change the way you think about food and poop. You will stop being human. Let me quote a small part of today’s The Speaking Tree column.

“In the divine game, One becomes many. Only the One exists, as truth, as consciousness, light and love. But the play scripted by the Divine is one where not only does One become many but many become One. Oceans, rivers, mountains, streams, everything is One manifested as many.

The ocean has numerous waves; can we say that each wave has an identity independent of the ocean? The identity of the wave exists because of the ocean, just as life exists because of the divine. Each sun ray exists because of the sun. Therefore to declare, "This is my life," has no meaning. Because with forgetfulness and ignorance, the ray forgets that it came from the sun, and starts imagining that it is separate. Our situation is similar. As human beings we forget our origins and end up saying this is mine, or that I exist. It is the ego that makes you say so.

One becomes many, and the many live on in ignorance. No sooner do they lose their ignorance, than they will feel that they are part of the One, the only One which exists, and exists everywhere.”

    Being human comes with a truckload of benefits and naturally, worries. After all, nature provides for balancing all the good with some stuff bad. And we should accept that fact. What makes us humans so different from other living organisms? What quality of ours separates us? I used to think that empathy was the answer to the question. And that was, until I read this.

    So, it might not be that empathy is the answer to that question. Do let me know if you think that there is any one characteristic that distinguishes us from other living beings? I hope it isn’t something like hate, jealousy or the ability to self-destruct that is the answer. That would be real bad.
     I like to wonder upon how we have made such deep and complex forays into nature that we can relish a marvellous piece of music and understand what seems to be random tapping of keys on a keyboard that eventually you can see with your eyes, decipher and understand. Smile in the end, perhaps. Creations right from the arts, sports and philosophies enrich our lives.  Humans have a powerful tool in their hands; they are called feelings. What follows is a innocent and simple poem that one of one my friend, Maithili Shankhwalker wrote a few years ago.

“How do I pen down feelings?

They actually mean a lot

But writing them down on a paper

Have you given this a thought?

 

If you come to think of it

Feelings are not a few

Every now and then your feelings

Are something new.

 

One sweet feeling is

The feeling of love…

It’s not a feeling that can go away,

With just a shove.

 

An unavoidable one is

Of happiness which we all feel

Even if it’s a feeling of grief,

Time will heal.

 

The dangerous ones are of desire and hatred

They are as destructive as fire and ice,

To destroy relationships and life

Either of them would suffice.

 

How can I forget the one of jealousy?

We all feel it once in a while

The feeling makes us really self-centred and

With it we can’t even walk a mile.

 

The feeling of superiority

Can do no good.

It only makes you egoistic and

A whole lot rude.

 

Its antonym inferiority

Is also no way positive

It just makes you under confident

And very very sensitive.

 

The feeling of forgiveness

Makes us divine

It brings out the good in others

Making them shine.

 

The feeling of sympathy

Paves way for the values of care and concern

It makes us human

And takes away qualities like treason.

 

The feeling of confidence that we have in us,

Gives us self motivation.

Helps us in fulfilling our dreams

And reaching our destination.

 

The feeling of satisfaction

Is basically an experience of fulfilment

It makes us happy,

And most of all, content.

 

The feelings of guilt and repentance

Would have made me feel defeated

If I had not penned down the poem

That I have just completed.”

      Right from love to hate, boredom to excitement we all do experience them. Feelings are universal, in whatever language you bother to describe them. Isn’t it wonderful that you saw your life flash past you as you read the poem? How the author successfully conveyed the truth about feelings? We often take such beautiful things for granted. Again, it is human to do so. Isn't it?
     I can very well understand the fact that this blog-post must have made your mind feel quite worked up and although I can go on and on, let me top it of with some thought for you to take home!
      We humans, we are not born here to be judged by the means of any tool. Be it an exam or prejudice by another human. We are born to be and live a life for ourselves. They say, we are not born with a silver spoon in our mouth and nor do we take one with us when we die. We come from the dust and end up in the same dust. The very little time that we have to spend here, should be made as beautiful as possible. For us, for the others who undertake a journey called life alongside us. Leave nothing to repentance, for you only live once. Like like a child, I say. Yes, these days the supposed God of Death says that in a TV commercial. He might not exist, but makes a correct statement. Live to inspire others to live. Even if you fail one day or the other, accept it. Learn from your mistakes and let go of them. If you have inspired someone, you shall have the satisfaction of seeing that someone do great in life. Isn’t satisfaction all that we live for?
     Male or female, why do we draw lines? John Lennon rightly askes to imagine a world with no religion, a world without borders and countries. Wouldn’t that be in the true essence of the universe? We all come with a purpose to fulfil is what some say. If you don’t believe in that, remember that probability that brought you here. Create your own purpose. It was not your choice to be born to the parents or the place that you were born in. The other way round, your parents didn’t get to choose what kind of child they got. It is a fair game, this life. For, we all are gifted with blank paper to write the story of our own choice.
 

You are given the chance to be a human.

A chance to be special.

A chance to be YOU.

Live it up like a boss.

 
Live it up as if it is 
thebiggerbang!

No copyright infringement of images intended.

Of trailing stars and thoughts…

     Of late, I have developed a habit of taking the liberty to create my own words and portmanteaus. The most recent one was ‘sparty=star+party’. ’Yeah, language was created by the living beings not only to survive this cruel world but also to communicate all about its beautiful facets. And it is the latter that I’m concerned with.

      Languages. On a random note, do you know of any language that helps you predict the future? A language so revolutionary yet so intuitive that even chimps and pigs learn to use? Poetry in this language assumes a different form. Creativity takes on a different meaning. But unlike all other ‘beautiful’ languages that exist, this language does not believe in breaking rules and creating exceptions. Yet, it is a language that has haters galore and romantics a few. If you still have no clue about the great invention of mankind, maybe it is time to learn how to do it from a dog.

    Well, that was no insult to your intelligence. It is a fact to be appreciated! The very fact that a dog can perform such mental tricks throws some light on the fact that nature around us is beautiful. That, we tend to take things (sometimes people too!) for granted. But I shall spare a few words about this some other time. For now, take a look at what a dog perhaps will never be able to do. It is the same language again!

    Quite dazzled, aren’t you? Well this for sure was no dog’s play. And hearty congratulations if you still have the willpower and the zeal to read ahead despite being freaked out.

    Life has never been oh so much impromptu and intuitive than what it is with me these days. On the 24^th and the 25^th December of 2011, I went on to attend the 4th star party of my life. It gives me great pleasure to say that we at the observatory believe in partying with the real stars. The immortal ones. Well, not exactly immortal but as compared to us they are. I always pity my best friend Anmol Naik who always dreams to watch the star Betelgeuse (pronounced Betel-jooze) explode into a supernova. Now even if this ripe old supergiant rips itself apart this very moment, it will take about 450 years for the news to reach us. And unless my friend here is not cryogenically preserved for those many years, he shall miss it. Unless, the explosion has already occurred 450 years ago. So what does it mean?

    It very simply means that we go to these star parties not only to create and gobble down our versions of Maggi noodles, but primarily to have a look at the past in the present. If this fact fails to blow your mind off, I think your senses have all gone dry. Knowing the fact is not enough. Feeling it and living it is what matters. There is nowhere else that one can do this, look into the past just by turning your head up.

    With the sky, we can feel the past. With the math, we can get a grasp of the future. And with our being, we journey through the present. We are all familiar with time but no one bothers to interpret it. And as they say, it is not going to wait for you to make sense out of itself. Aha!

    Sometimes my detours make me feel like changing the title and the whole purpose of making a particular post. I go away, drifting in a sea of ideas only to be awakened by a change in the mood of the songs that come on shuffle. Ah, that reminds me of probability. And also of music. Some other day, I tell myself.

    For this star-party, we headed to the dangerous Tillari Ghat, in Maharashtra. Dangerous enough for my relatives to scare the hell out of my mother and make her loose a night’s sleep.

                                      
   Doesn’t look dangerous from here, but when you undertake that tummy rumbling journey you know that the trip be better worth it. And it turned out that I wouldn’t mind making another hundred trips to get the view of that particular sky again. I usually narrate a particular incident to highlight the ignorance that people have right since the post-industrial revolution period.

“A strange giant, silvery cloud -- The above statement is not at all overly dramatic. It is a real trend. The National Institute of Health's issue of the January 2009 Environmental Health Perspectives Journal included a story from the 1994 Northridge earthquake that knocked out the power in Los Angeles. Apparently local emergency centres then received numerous calls from anxious residents reporting a strange giant, silvery cloud in the dark sky. What they were really seeing — for their first time — was the Milky Way, so obliterated by the urban sky glow that it was quickly forgotten and had practically become an urban legend.”

   I had read the story about 6 years ago. But I shall never forget it due to the repeated validation of this ignorance. In fact, the richest skies are found in the places that we think are ‘poor’. Have a look!

    I would seriously be in a fix if someone promises to set up an amazing observatory in remote Africa and tells me to shift my base there, forever. No kidding.

    In all, 7 people had a rendezvous with the stars. Two telescopes (a 6” and another 5”) and a camera (Canon 500D) is all they had. And boy oh boy, they rocked the night. Not to forget, our driver who was than curious!

    I will not be wrong to say that over the night, we exploited the sky that was exposed to us. 94 Messier, NGC and IC objects along with 40+ meteor sightings is not a joke. And yes, we were exploited back with the chilly winds in the valley. So much so that even if you managed to lock yourself up in the car, you could hear the winds howling outside. Photography being my forte, was running on my mind. After two hours of dedication behind only two images, I decided not to expect much when I come home and process them. The results were one better than the other. And this time, I managed to pleasantly shock my own self. Hah!

   Two hours of cumulative work had paid off! And my mom finally understood why I took up the ‘risk’ of going to such a ‘dangerous’ place. Phew.

    But what are these lines that you see?

I bet you that you have never seen such lines drawn across the sky! In fact, no one has. What you see, is a trick played by the camera. As you must be knowing, over a period of time the stars move. Well, they appear to move. The simple reason being that just like when we sit in a car and the trees appear to move past us while we are stationary, the Earth is what actually rotates and this rotation is perceived as the motion of the stars across the sky.

  But why is that star in the second photo stationary?

Imagine a globe that covers the entire Earth. Say, the stars are all stuck on the interior of the globe. This is precisely what the celestial sphere is. 

All of us know that the Earth rotates around its axis and that this axis passes through the Earth’s North and South poles.

In our construction, when the Earth rotates, we see that the celestial sphere rotates around this same axis. And co-incidentally, the very same axis points in the direction of the star that does not move!

Thus, we call it the ‘Pole Star’ or the never moving star. The current pole star Polaris is the brightest in the constellation of Ursa Minor. I have seen many people think that the Pole Star is the brightest star in the night sky which is a sad misconception. The brightest star in the night sky is Sirius whereas Polaris is hardly visible from city skies!

If you stand on the equator of the Earth and observe, the pole star will appear to be at the horizon and if you observe the pole star from the north pole itself, it will always remain exactly overhead. Thus, one can infer that the latitude a particular place is at, is equal to the angle the line between you and the pole star makes with the ground!

What the camera does is that it keeps its sensor or film exposed for hours at a stretch and thus picks up the motion of the stars as they chart their path across the sky. The very same thing that the human eye naturally fails to pick up!

Continue reading only if you have a clue about trigonometric functions.

Have you observed that as you move away from the pole star, the trails keep on increasing in length? While I was passing my time under the sky, I wondered if I could find out a way to relatively measure this difference in lengths.

All I knew was that the pole star never covered any distance on the celestial sphere and that the stars on the horizon covered the maximum distance. And what hit my mind immediately was something like this

     This pretty much seemed like common sense to me. But then, one can’t just go around and fit in formulae which work without a formal proof! So I pondered, thought I was wrong and so on. Well, I didn’t expect myself to unearth this!! But what happened is as follows.

[Consider theta to be angle made by the star to the ground; phi to be the latitude of the place. So phi subtracted from theta will be the angle made by the star to the pole star]

   It is pretty easy, this one. But I was overjoyed because I predicted the formula even before getting it. Frankly, it is really simple. But such small things bring joy. This is called poetry using mathematics and of course, common sense gained out of day to day experience. And you get overjoyed especially when you have been bored by studying chemistry for days at a stretch! Do note that the celestial sphere being an imaginary sphere, the radius is not defined. So one can use this only to compare the lengths of arc.

   One thing exciting about the formula is that it if you have stars in a line (along the celestial equator), and let them trail for some time, you shall get trails in the form of a sine wave. Given good enough wide lens and the right perspective, one shall obtain at least 1/4th of the wave.

   So here I am. Exams are approaching and I’m doing science. Identifying problems and finding solutions. This is life! Yes, this is it.

If you did not understand some part of the derivation or any assumption, please send me a mail or leave a comment as I have derived it in hurry after working for 6 hours to make this blog post. Phew. I leave you with some images, do scroll over them for the captions.

Wohoooo!

Thebiggerabang

121 : Geminids revisited.

     In this post sourced from the AFA-Goa blog, I revisit one of the most thrilling experiences of my life; the Geminds shower of 2010! Since then, I have grown from discovering one of the best and the most user friendly meteor shower websites to working as a managing editor of the same website, Spacedex which is run by an amazing guy, Travis Brown! The moon phase kills it this year around though.

 

      

           14th December 2010 would have passed of in my life as an another rather ordinary day, had it not been for some bouts of craziness that only astronomy can instil in oneself. Since a few years that I have been involved in amateur astronomy, this was one of the most fulfilling moments that I had. I was on duty at the observatory, a cold winter night promised me some of the usual delights of the sky including the awesome nebula in Orion and the Andromeda galaxy, along with a dazzling display by the Moon and Jupiter to brighten my day up. Little did I know, that there was a big thing waiting in line, down the horizon!  

 

           As me and my colleague and friend Anmol Naik let the visitors peep through the universe through the 5” telescope, we managed to catch a glimpse of a few meteors here and there, which aroused our interests. As an amateur, I am not supposed to forget stuff like prominent meteor showers, but that is what I did!! Realising that we had a good sky in hand, one of the best of the season, we decided to have a meteor watch the very next day after checking out the fine details of the event. But, confusion with time zones prevailed and this led to the chaos!    After resuming my usual internet browsing session at home that very night, I found to my horror that the shower was meant to peak at midnight. The very same night!

 

 

               Realizing that I had just a hour or two in hand, I pressed the panic button and started making frantic calls to my seniors and fellow observers to hatch a plan for observation. This started to look seemingly difficult to materialize as our seniors were just returning from a programme at Bondla. But after a few swings from one end to the other, we finally got the nod for the night!!!   

     And there we were, the three of us, me, Anmol and Omkar Borkar who had decided to brave the cold nights of December to catch a glimpse of this amazing annual display called Geminds! Getting a little technical, the Geminids have a radiant lying just besides Castor, one of the heads of the twins in the constellation Gemini. This shower is said to be the 2nd most consistent meteor shower annually, after the Persids and has garnered a lot of attraction from astronomy fanatics this decade due to the rise in its activity which is caused due to the remains of comet 3200 Phaethon in the the orbit of the Earth around the sun. The expected peak rates for India ranged from a 60-140 ZHR. But, as we were to observe form a location affected by light pollution, we expected much less of a show. The last time I had stayed back for a shower, I had seen only 15 meteors through-out the whole course of observation throughout the night, that being the 2009 Quadrantid shower. As I was leaving home, I just managed to message a schoolmate of mine, Riya Borkar that there was shower happening tonight as I knew she was very much interested in astronomy and incidentally one can see her window from the Observatory, and thus ensued a round of crazy gesturing to her to communicate to her the general direction to look up to. I was really glad to see people getting interested in such events, by looking at the number of updates posted about the shower on Facebook. But now, was the time for the show to begin! 

 

             After a quick tour through a few Messier objects,  we settled down, our heads making an angle of 120° with each other. As the show began, we realized that we would get much more than expected!!!   Our main motive being to enjoy the shower, we didn’t give much strain on carrying out a detailed observation nor photography due to the lack of manpower, but did not forget to make a mention of every meteor that we observed, with respect to its path and magnitude. For an hour or so, we had to face the extreme. From a period of a few meteors in a minute to a dry spell of about five minutes, we had to face it all! But, with the true spirit and patience of an amateur, we sang and talked our way, perhaps just to make sure that we do not doze off! 

 

              After a short break and a tally, we concluded that the plan was a success and truly worth all the hassle taken! Most of the brighter meteors ended up in the constellations of Orion, Canis Major, Canis Minor and Auriga, with Gemini not far behind. During the next spell, the mercury dropped even lower, making way for the chilly winds. Although the magnitudes of the meteors ranged from -3 to 4, we did no distinct fireballs or ‘bolides’ were observed, but that is very much typical of the Geminds. By that time we had a tally of 121 meteors, and that number would be good enough to last me for a few lifetimes, to put it straight! This was our first major shower observation, and the number of ‘WOW’s would have made our mood very clear to you, if you had graced your presence!  

 

             Unfortunately, at about 2:25 am, due to the wind-speed, we had clouds moving in slowly and thus forcing us to cut short our observation, almost half-way!! Although, this very news was disheartening, it could not overshadow the joy of seeing all those bright wonders, streaks of light that made my day! We wrapped up in a matter of minutes and despite being prepared to stay awake the whole night, we found more sense in sleeping under the table (employed some science in here) in the observatory room besides the terrace, thus ending another one of our crazy endeavours with an equally funny thing. Besides that, we also conducted observation of Venus and Saturn in the morning before leaving for our respected houses. Oh yes, I missed school that day. But it was worth it in the end!

 

Yours,

Thebiggerbang

 

(A time-lapse video of the Geminids sourced from YouTube)

No mess candle-stand.

I’m answering my terminal exams right now. And yes, there is a power cut-off due to the pestering rains. Having nothing else to do, I thought this up.

1) Take a candle.

2) Place it on a plate.

3) Put water in the plate.

4) Light up the candle.

And there you go! It’s as simple as that. The wax that falls of will just float on water. It’s common-sense you might say and I do expect you to go “why didn’t I think of this?”

It’s one of the most simple way of have a clean candle-stand, one in which wax gives you no trouble at all!

It would be good if you set aside a plate for the candle as I consider it to be much safer if you fixate the candle on the plate. That will eradicate all the possibilities of it falling over and burning up your examination notes.

And as my buddies Atharv and Shubhankar suggested, we could possibly recycle the wax in the water. Now how is that for an idea?

Now it is your turn to spread the idea!

  If you are lucky enough, you will get so see wax forming such beautiful hexagonal structures!

SCIENCE IS EVERYWHERE!

Small ideas can make a world of difference.

 

thebiggerbang

A cousin, a tabla and a blade.

    In the past few hours, I have done what I perhaps do the best. I’ve been myself. I’ve done what I do the best. It’s rare that I get such intense bouts of umed to blog my heart out over intense topics, but tonight is that night. I expect words to just flow out of me, to the tune of Beethoven. So here I go!

   I’ve done many things today. I’m confused whether to captivate your attention by mentioning all of them, or to unveil them as I go on. I think I’d prefer the later, for I’d like my day to be as surprizing to you as it was to me! Let me start off with a bang. A weird one.

    I ‘discovered’ a cousin of mine. Yeah, you got that right. And yes, I can explain it by saying that I am an introvert and that I don’t like to socialise and stuff. But over the years, if there is one thing that I have learnt is that excuses are for sore losers. So, if not for anything else, I’d better not give any for the fear of being a looser, a lame one that too. I don’t like talking to people, and that’s it. I prefer to stick to my people, apparently for reason! But today, I found out the answer why I find a lack of intellectual people in this world. It’s just because I don’t want to find! It’s partly because of my shyness to say, open up a conversation or so. But I just can’t relate it to my enthusiasm to do so once I know a person really well!

    She is a year younger than me, but makes much more sense. I remember seeing her loads of times for family functions and stuff, and you may call me ignorant, but I didn’t bother to remember her name too. Yes, I can again brush it off saying that I have a bad memory but truth be told, I am feeling a little guilty of not making an attempt. Yeah, like in today’s world, it all beings with a Facebook friendship request (Alas, It’s the much touted day today wherein mobile companies charge you more for texts and people make money by selling 'friendship bands’). I wondered for a while, what to do with the request, but something told me that it was a familiar face out there. A little investigation with my mother told me that yes, she was my cousin. “Oh” I said nonchalantly, and clicked on the accept button. I was accepting my stupidity more than the friend request.

    But wait, that is not the discovery I was talking about. A discovery is meant to be much more deep than a find, and so it was. It’s pointless to divulged into the details of what we talked about, but to sum it up, it was a very intense questioning session, an intellectual storm which rather felt as if I have been debating with her since time immortal! Realization strikes all, albeit a little late for some. But what matters is that it does! She writes poetry, plays the guitar just as I do! What I learnt today is that life is short, and we should not always rely upon the other person to initiate the discussion. And you should never guess about what a person will be, it’s not a true or false question that we are dealing with over humans, but it is humans instead.  Unpredictable creatures, they will either stun or surprize! Prejudice sucks. I have faced the brunt of it, so has a friend of mine. We both know how baseless and hollow it is. If you do not have experiences with people, you naturally will be scared and shy to interact. It’s a vicious cycle, beware!

   My cousin turned out to be one of the handful people that I was very much comfortable talking and philosophizing with. Blame my socializing ‘prowess’, or accept that it’s the truth but it is hard to find people who talk something more than the marks that they wanted to score or the latest trend in town. Nothing wrong in that, but I find it deeply unsatisfying to talk about material things. Every person has different needs and capacities, agreed. But I’m just stating a point here. I find a lack of people who can pose questions and work out their answers for contentment and deep satisfaction. I don’t need you to be a poet to communicate to me, a photo or a work of art can do the same. A piece of music can do the same job. They take you on a journey to discover your own self. And that’s where the tabla comes into the picture!

  I’ve always wanted to post on my connection with music, I didn’t do much justice to it with the monsoon playlist, but here is a better attempt. I’m a guy who is a fan of western music, international music sometimes, as I belong to the class of people who think that language is no barrier to the tunes that we connect with. Music is truly universal! But my interest in jazz, operas and instrumental along with genres like antifolk and alternative have tuned me off from the pop, rap and hip-hop that prevailed over everything a few years ago. But slowly, it did lead to the decline of my inclination towards Indian classical music, I had this prejudice. But just a few hours ago, my school-mate linked me a video of his, wherein he was playing the tabla with a sitar maestro. I was really eager to watch it, as I had heard that he played the tabla really well. But I leave it upto you to decide how amazing he is, after watching this video.

Ram Bhakta, my friend playing the table

   Within a few seconds, I was overwhelmed by the power, the potency of the music I was listening to. I was mesmerized, to say the least. I drifted away into a state of bliss. Although it was not Bismillah Khan’s Shehnai, it was magic to me. Maybe or may not be for you. I went back to the chat and being a learner of the guitar, and knowing how tough it is, I complimented him like a good audience would.

   But there was a much deeper lesson to be learnt from what I had just witnessed. I had linked him to a hair-raising piece of opera by Luciano Pavarotti, and he too appreciated it. We joked about how much of the Italian we understood, and then I again complimented him on his performance. As humble as he was to me, accepting that he was a nobody, we both agreed upon the fact that it was the need to improvise that kept us going stronger and stronger in our respective fields. That this was the simple but truth, the secret to a successful life!  Ram said that he never faced any problem in learning the instrument, as he loved to do it! In fact, answers came to him naturally!  Everyone has a niche for themselves in this world. It’s just that we have to struggle to discover and sharpen it. I’m talking stuff that we all know about but we hardly practise. We think it is tough. But here is a song, which was originally sung by Miley Cyrus. It suits the topic I’m posting on, plus the girl’s raw emotions make it worth watching!

   Sometimes, people ask me how much hours I study or what tips I can give to them to score good marks in examination. I start wondering whether they have learnt anything at all from 3-Idiots, the movie. I firmly believe that our passion decides the greatness we can achieve. Agreed, that there is no success without hard-work and talent combined, but when one has the passion, one doesn’t feel that he/she is working hard. It’s like powering your boosters in space, you are in cruise mode! It doesn’t matter what we become or do. It is the sincerity, dedication and love that matters. Or as the saying goes, Success follows the pursuit for excellence!  To sum it up, I make use the lyrics of the very same song!

There's always gonna be another mountain
I'm always gonna wanna make it move
Always gonna be a uphill battle
Sometimes I'm gonna have to lose
Ain't about how fast I get there
Ain't about what's waiting on the other side
It's the climb!!

  And yeah, this leads me to the final part. My love, my passion taught me a small, but valuable lesson in life. It concerns a simple blade. I’m keeping the technical stuff aside for another post, you can skip to the last two paragraphs if you want to, or read on! In the recent past, especially in my XIIth std, I’ve taken a liking towards trying to apply or perform everything that I learn during the theory classes. And like every other guy (or am I alone?)  I’m fascinated by light and it’s dual nature. We learnt that light sometimes behaves as a wave and sometimes like a particle. To prove the wave-nature of light, we take the help of that property of waves known as interference. And at the time I learnt it, it looked as if this is the stuff that you can cook up, or see for yourself only in a lab. But, spending two days in Poinginim (mum’s place) and trying to utilize every thing that I saw with the help of my cousin brother who had returned from the U.S.A.,lead me to the internet where I saw a way of checking out the wave nature of light using only a glass slide, some candle soot, a blade and a LASER.

  Coming back to Panaji, I swung into action and within a day I got the experiment done, although I had to contact every person I knew for a LASER. I was not overwhelmed at the results I got, but yes, I did get what I wanted. But somehow I was not satisfied. In the evening, I went to the observatory, my second home on this planet and was guided by Videsh Khandeparkar and Rakesh Rao to do the best I could with the apparatus I had. But after a while I was pleasantly shocked. Using only a deformed blade and a laser, I had one of the most thrilling sights of my life in front of me! There was a diffraction pattern as beautiful as I saw in the books!

   Now you might ask me what’s so great in that! But what I feel is that beauty lies in simplicity. It’s not complicating things things that is fun, but simplifying things that is! What I had thought of as an experiment that I would just dream about as this juncture was done with the minimal amount of time and equipment! And now I’m sure that I’ll never forget the working of diffraction because I actually produced one, and I got pleasure in doing so. The stuff that we learn is not just to be locked up and forgotten. It’s meant to be applied in every sense we can! Funnily, I can find similarities between nature’s laws and human behaviour. Yeah, as I said, I am pretty much crazy!

  So if anyone asks you what one can learn in a day, tell them to speak to me! It took me around 3 hours to put this down, and I guess it is a pretty long post. If you made it through all of the stuff that I could cook up, then you do deserve a good dose of laughter, and I guess this song will just do that. It’s sung by the same girl as above, but thanks to the nonsensical lyrics, it is even worse than the disaster called ‘Friday’!! Do check it out! Don’t blame me if you faint!

Life Rocks.
Mid@$Touch

*Insert a suitable title*

    My mid-terms are done. It’s Sunday today! It’s a rainy Sunday today. It’s a rainy Sunday today with my mom shouting things at me while I write this stuff down! And yeah, I’m half an hour away from getting lost somewhere with my friends, thanks to a late riser (he usually is the person who wakes me up!) I’m here, just troubling my already beaten-up keyboard!

  Sorry for the repetition used above, that’s cause I’m used to beating around the bush while writing answers I’m not sure off! But I swear that it’s far better than sentences like ‘Froth stabilizers are used to stabilize the froth’ or ‘There is a difference of age between younger and older rocks’ to quote a few of the, I-don’t-know-what-to-call-such-junk lines that we have in our textbooks and notes given by teachers! Phew. No one can stop cribbing post exams, can they?

   Yesterday, for the first time in my life, I kept my promise. I actually did sleep after coming home from the exam. Don’t we all make promises to ourselves, that we will redeem the sleepless nights with a good siesta after the exams? Alas, we fail to do so! But I’m yet to realize that this is just the first of the many important exams lined up, and it didn’t go off as well as I had expected it to! But still, ki farak penda?  There is time to perform.

   Over the past few days, I’ve fallen in love with science all over again! Another question that came to my mind, is it that one should be good at what he loves? or is it that one IS good at what le loves? Figure out, and let me know please! Recently, I’ve joined this physics site and it’s been an awesome journey out there ever since! And yeah. It’s landed a good kick to my ego, well deserved too! Once you are used to being kind off on the top of your playing field, you tend to saturate your talent and turn into a once-champion-sumo-wrestler-but-now-really-overweight-man! And yeah, when you see people younger than you, in any field that might concern you, the reader, don’t you feel the pinch? When you are left clueless, when it’s time to realise that there is some ground to make up, I guess that’s the turning point! A well needed kick of motivation!

   I’ve seen a 12 year old guy teaching integral calculus on YouTube, he was mildly autistic. We are such being that if one part of us is under-developed, Mother Nature sees to it that it makes up for that loss with something else, which can make you truly stand out! Look at Stephan Hawking for example! I’ve recently read his biography, and observed that he was intelligent, but not as stunning as the so called ‘child-geniuses’ at his age! He had his fair share of craziness in his youth, but when he was actually paralysed  with ALS, his brain and mind knew no bounds! Is it that when he was relieved of all his daily chores that he could concentrate and expand the horizons of his thinking? At one point of time, he couldn’t write down, so he took to the task of memorizing accurately humungous mathematical equations! And yeah, he is today, the world’s most popular living mathematician, or physicist, whatever you want to call him!

  Ahh. This brings me to the topic of religion. I echo Hawking’s views. Many do! And many others do feel that I’m immature to know and talk about religion. Well, I’m pretty much sure that to realise such philosophical things, one doesn’t need age, but wisdom. Wisdom comes with age, agreed! But is it something like death? That is inevitable? Does wisdom come to ALL? I doubt that! I was pretty much averse to idol worship since long. And now, I believe that mathematics is the language of universe! it speaks to us via mathematics! One day, I presume we will be able to predict anything and everything that takes place in this universe of ours. That’s my belief! 

   Now and then, people ask me, what about life? Will you be able to predict how humans behave using the equations that I am talking about? Now, I wouldn’t like to make tall claims and face the ire of fanatics out there. Theoretically, it will be possible, if given enough computational power. But if we do it, I will be shocked. We will be what Naseruddin Shah thought he would be in Krrish. We would be ‘God’.  And you gotta believe in this, if you can make yourself believe that a baba in saffron can conjure gold rings, rolex watches and stuff from thin air! Don’t mess around with the conservation of mass and energy, buddy!


    Talking about human emotions, it’s one thing that I’m still learning. We all are, aren’t we? Whether it’s your love or your friends, pangs of jealousy or a scream of thrill! Be it mouth-watering pickle or yuck tambdi bhaaji, we have to taste everything in life! Our set of experiences define us! Yet, some questions remain unanswered! Is trust the only thing in friendship? Do you need a reason to love some-one? Or the most prized one. Why the hell are girls so conscious about their weight??

  Till you ponder over these questions, I take your leave with this photo! FYI, my alter-ego is named thebiggerbang.

Ciao
Mid@sTouch

  
   EDIT : Here is a collage of photos, of the very same hike that me and my friends indulged in. Courtesy blanknoiz