IIT Bombay

Diary Entry – 42

The only reason why I am giving such a boring title for a blog post is because there is a lot of talk about Search Engine Optimization in the blogging world these days and I am just trying to say IIT Bombay so many times in this post so that when someone searches for IIT Bombay in Google, they will land up in the Diary Of The Narcissist. So if you are that someone who came here because you searched for IIT Bombay then I am sorry to inform you that I do not have free GATE or JEE Test Papers here in this site.  

  

Last three days there was this international conference on Simulation and Modeling in IIT Bombay. My project guide who is one of the leading experts in the field of simulation, was one of the few invited guests. He wanted me to come and promote a simulation technology in this conference. This conference in IIT Bombay had more participants from the industry than participants from the academic field. It meant a lot of clients for my guide who was a consultant. He promised to pay five thousand rupees if I came.

Now I did not want to go to IIT Bombay to attend this conference for two reasons.

1. I have been using this simulation technology for a month for my final project. This meant that I knew little to promote it to any potential customers.

2. I cannot speak a word in Hindi.

But I had to go because I was in debt to my professor for a few reasons. Yes, curse my sense of loyalty towards people. Anyway just so that I wont be massacred in an alien city, I decided to learn a few sentences in Hindi, two hours before my flight to Bombay. I asked my friend to give me the translations for the following sentences.

I want to go to IIT Bombay (Mai IIT Bombay Jana Chata Hu).

I started learning Hindi only Today (Mai aaj Thoda sa Hindi Seekha)

Can you tell me this in English? I speak very little Hindi (Kya aap muje angrezi mey samja denge? Muje Hindi Bahut thode hi aati Hai)

Finally just in case I stopped to ask direction to Raj Thackrey who has been known to bully people who came from other states, I learnt this:

I am going to IIT Bombay to attend a conference for three days. (Mai ek conference meing saamil hone ke liye IIT bambai jar aha hu... teen dino ke liye)

That was by far the toughest sentence to remember.

So the first thing I say when I enter the Taxi was this –

Me: Namaste Driver Ji? Aap Kaise hey? (Hello Driver. How are you?)

Driver: :|

I looked up youtube for learn Hindi Videos the previous day and this Aap Kaise hey line was one thing I learnt. I was determined to use every single thing I learnt in Hindi. So I tell the guy in Hindi I want to go to IIT Bombay and I feel confident that I can manage anybody who talks to me in Hindi. But then I met this hot police chick in IIT Bombay’s entrance.

I know all North Indian women are hot in the eyes of South Indian Men but this super fair police officer was different. I thought such hot female law enforcers existed only in the movies. She was more like the security of IIT Bombay. The lady did not just let me inside instead she said crap in Hindi and the sentence had bag, mobile phone and laptop in it. The last time I heard a similar sentence in Hindi was in the plane and it was the flight attendant asking us to switch off our mobile phone and laptop during takeoff and landing. I told this lady that I had no laptop in my bag. This lady for some reason repeated the same sentence again. I was frustrated and told her this:  

Mai aaj Thoda sa Hindi Seekha (I started learning Hindi only Today).

Kya aap muje angrezi mey samja denge? (Can you tell me this in English?)

Then I realized the mistake I made. She looked at me stone faced. I practised these two lines so much on the way, that I probably sounded like a native Hindi speaker when I spit it out fast. So after I told her that, she probably thought I was a creep who was messing with her because she was pretty. I had to keep talking in English before she would finally let me in.

The actual conference and my time in IIT Bombay went very well. I mean I was totally wrong about North Indians. They were just like the Hindi guys in my college if not more friendlier. For some reason they all liked me even if I did not speak Hindi. After that incident with the police lady, I decided to stop pretending to know Hindi. At first I was a little bit intimidated when people spoke Hindi. Sure I could understand and all but I can only respond in English. But that ended up intimidating people who spoke to me in Hindi. But they still liked me. They gave me their email address so that I could add them on facebook and stuff. One chick I met in the conference was a M.Tech student in Industrial Engineering Department. She asked me how I was finding IIT Bombays’s campus. I told her it is very large and I am scared of getting lost. I also told her I speak very little Hindi, in Hindi. That got her rolling on the floor laughing. When she finally stopped giggling she told me that I sounded like Katrina Kaif when she first came to Bollywood. Turns out that Katrina Kaif had this British accent in her Hindi and I was talking Hindi the same way. For a moment I thought my Hindi was as good as a film star’s.

It was finally time to go home. My cousin kept telling me don't go to that area in Bombay, don't go to this area in Bombay, because I will be robbed or raped. Though being robbed worried me a little, I thought rape was for women. I reached the Mumbai airport and I thought I successfully managed to leave Bombay without being robbed or raped. Well all that changed when I went through the routine security check. It was a Nightmare. The guard asked me to spread my hands and legs so he can check if I was carrying some bomb or ammunition. What happened next made me jump and shout out WTF. That guy grabbed my uh.. Yeah that.

Gay Police Officer: First Time in airport?

“First time being groped in public by a police officer. Where do I give a complain?” I wanted to ask. There is no terrorist in this world who is going to sacrifice his man hood just so that he could place a bomb between his legs. It is going to be really hard for a terrorist to place a bomb in the Bombay Airport because the security leaves no place unchecked. I am going to need therapy for this trauma. 

  

P.S – For the sake of search engine optimization I required to say IIT Bombay one more time in the very last sentence, which is this. :D

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