“So, Veena, are there any truths about beautiful
girls in heaven similar to the ones that we just described about engineers? Or
tell me, is every fairy in heaven as beautiful as the two of you? Or is it just
a myth that all fairies are beautiful, asked Aditya with certain playfulness in
his voice.
Veena rolled her eyes for a while, as if trying
to dig out an appropriate answer from some corner of her mind. Finally, she
spoke up. “Hmm… Let me put it this way. Bollywood movies portray angels as
beautiful, curvaceous and suave models. I must tell you that we, dwellers of heaven
are big fans of such movies and the women there. In fact, we bring eminent
personalities from earth into heaven from time to time. You won’t believe if I
say that seventy-five per cent fairies are obese. They have at least twenty
kilograms of fat on their waist alone! They normally do the back-end jobs like
booking accommodations, renting swans and air-bikes, etc., for the new members
in heaven. We, the pretty ones, are like public figures, interacting with
people at first and making them believe that heaven is all about petite angels!
If you think all angels would be the same, it’d be like concluding that Mumbai
is all about poverty and filth after watching Slumdog Millionaire. Mumbai is much more beautiful that what is
shown in that movie, right?” concluded Veena.
Aditya’s eyes twinkled and he looked at me
instead of responding to Veena, “Hey Dipen, why don’t we also bust all the
myths and facts of the life of an engineer?” suggested Aditya.
“But Aditya, we just wrote a chapter called ‘Universal
Truths’”, I counter argued.
“That’s true! But we could make this one
showcasing logical explanations as to why some statements are just myths and
what is the reality behind those facts. So, let’s go ahead with this; I’ll tell
you what to write. Trust me”, averred Aditya. He sounded pretty confident; everyone
agreed.
---------------------------------
You must have come across various myths in life:
‘Girls want sweet and soft-spoken guys as their boyfriends’, ‘India will be a
corruption-free nation someday’, or ‘Sunny Leone will feature as the dutiful bahu in some daily soap’. There are similar
myths about the life of an engineering student which need to be busted! So,
following is a list of myths and corresponding facts of the life of engineering
students:
1) Myth: Reading foreign authors alone
will make my fundamentals clear.
Fact: Most engineering students read foreign authors for two
reasons:
a) They like to boast: “Yes. I am
reading Shaum series.” And then they like to see the “Are you fucking kidding
me?” expression on the listener’s face.
b) They feel reading foreign authors
will actually make them understand the fundamentals! My observation says that Indian
authors are the ones writing in the simplest way possible. So, if you have not been
able to understand an Indian author’s book, you are surely wasting your dad’s
money on these ‘foreign’ books. You could have rather used this money on some
movie or maybe taken your girl friend (if you have one) for a date.
2) Myth: Engineers are a very
knowledgeable species!
Fact: No, no, no, no, no, no, no! Trust me when I say that engineers
know only theory. In every practical lab, there will be one guy/gal from each
group who will carry out the experiments with confidence and would know what
has to be done and why. The rest of them would just stand a few feet away from
their respective equipments and pray to god that no mishap occurs. As far as
practical knowledge goes, ITI guys would know more than engineers!
3) Myth: I am an engineer, so I will get good matrimonial offers.
Fact: Hello, wake up! Well, girls would be dealt with later, but
when it comes to men, gone are the days when engineering was a respectable
degree. Now-a-days MBA is the minimum qualification that girls and your
would-be-fathers-in-law would expect! Beautiful girls would look at you with
disgust and distaste if you are just an engineer. Your audacity to offer to
marry them would be snubbed in no time at all. With so many engineering
colleges in India, the number of female engineers available for marriage has
increased and hence when they are of marriageable age, they want their husbands
to be a notch better than them or their friends’ husbands. So, if you want to
get married to a good looking engineer (which is a rarity in itself), better plan
to get an MBA degree from a decent college first!
And if you are a girl and thought
you’d get good matrimonial alliances after you completed your engineer’s degree,
you’re wrong again! You actually thought it’d be a child’s play, eh?
You must know that there are three kinds of (guy) engineers
available for marriage:
a) The ones who want a girl who is
below par: These sorts are more traditional and believe that girls should stay
at home, take care of kids and their old parents. So, whether you are an
engineer from a good college or not doesn’t matter to them. What matters to
them is whether you are at least presentable to the society. They’d prefer
girls from a regular college and just about any degree if she is ‘presentable’
and ‘homely’.
b) The ones who want a girl who is at
par: This is one section of engineers who care and value the essence of you
being an engineer. But, sadly this section of engineers has very few eligible
candidates!
c) The ones who want a girl above par:
These kinds want more financial security in life than companionship, and want
to boast amongst their friends. They prefer girls who with an MBA degree and,
hence, just an engineer from some aandu-paandu
college (you know what I mean) doesn’t impress them much.
4) Myth: I am a very generous human being. Despite the fact that I
could have done it single-handedly, I call for outside help so that he could
also benefit.
Fact: Who are you trying to fool! You are simply scared to take care
of the electrical problem and hence want to call the ITI guy who would know
more than you would ever know as an engineer. An ITI guy has practical
knowledge, whereas you are just a stuffed shirt boasting mugged theorems and
laws!
5) Myth: I am an engineer. So, I wouldn’t face problems in getting a
good job after the completion of my degree.
Fact: You must be nuts if you feel so! With more number of engineers
coming out at the same time than the number of Nano cars, finding jobs is like
finding a needle in a haystack. An MBA degree is the minimum requirement from
an engineer, although technically both degrees have nothing to do with each
other in most cases. Only then can an engineer hope to get a good, respectable
job in the market. It’s the simple “supply and demand” equation! If there are
10 jobs in the market and with engineering colleges spawning in every nook and
corner of this country, there are 100 engineers competing for those 10 jobs.
So, to distinguish themselves from the rest, there is no other option but to do
something better than others. I fear the day when MBAs will be like engineers
of today. The rate at which MBA colleges are coming up is scary enough already.
6)
Myth: Your surname starts
with “Y”, giving you the privileged place of being the last one to be
questioned, so you would know every question that the external examiner is
going to ask in the viva.
Fact: As much as you want your external examiner
to be dumb, he will never fulfil any such wish. As the viva session progresses,
the external examiner is somehow endowed with superhuman powers to formulate
worse questions. You’ll still be screwed just as bad!
7)
Myth: Engineering studies are
so boring. I am going to go out, earn a heavy amount each month and enjoy life
as soon as I am out of college.
Fact: Trust me, after years of work with the best
of companies (eight years for yours truly, too), the best of us crave to go
back to college or school and enjoy! Professional life sucks big time! You get
only 24 Earned Leaves and 8 National Holidays! That is it! And 5 out of those 24
leaves will be spent on resting at home when you are sick, 5 will be eaten up
when your chunnu-munnu are sick, 4
will be spent when your relatives or your in-laws come from your home town and
want to spend time with you and your family. All you will be left with are 10
days to enjoy! Ten days in a year for yourself, for me, is not a very good
score!
8)
Myth: I will first earn and
then impress those nice chicks that I liked in college.
Fact: Hmm... Good thought! But it’s a shitty plan!
Once you step into the corporate world, you realise that most of the beautiful
girls were already booked in the college. If you approached your favourite girl
in college and were sent back with an expectation of being settled in a good
job, then be ready for a shocker when you meet her in the job world. Now, with
a job in hand, she would want to marry some guy who is already well-settled,
has a good 2 BHK, a hefty annual salary package and apparently, a car, too! Since
you, like her, would be a fresher with hardly any penny to spend or save, your
girl will be patoed by your superiors
in the office. All you will do is slog in the office and hope that you had
tried your best in college!
9)
Myth: I will stay in the
hostel instead of home, and study more.
Fact: Ha ha, good joke! For those who stay close
enough or slightly far from campus, yet chose to stay in the hostel to save the
travel time for studying, it is common experience that they use all their extra
time to rest their eyes, i.e. sleep. The time saved by avoiding travel is
always spent on sleeping or chit chatting with hostel mates. Yes, there are
many advantages of staying in the hostel that way; it at least gives you
memories good enough to cheer you up for life.
10) Myth: I will start studying at
the start of next semester.
Fact: This is
called optimism. Optimism is a sober word for “fooling thyself”. As an engineer,
you will naturally develop a “will-do-at-the-last-minute” approach. Trust me,
this habit will be a good friend and stay with you forever. Needless to say,
you will be proud of yourself to finish off your work ‘just-on-time’!
11) Myth: Since I didn’t get a chance to sit in the campus interview of XYZ
Company, my future will not turn out to be bright.
Fact: This is
not at all true. In fact, as far as the IT companies are concerned, I have seen
that the best Indian IT companies “buy” the students by truck loads and make
them do crappy work in the company. To know more about this, you can read the
book LOSER
(Life Of a Software EngineeR).
Chances are
high that the company approaching after most people have been hired would end
up giving you a better job, not necessarily a better package, but a job where
you will learn more than your friends who get selected in the top-notch
companies coming on day zero of campus placements.
12)Myth: I didn’t get admission in the best college
in town; my life is finished.
Fact: In my opinion, a good college is that which can provide good campus
placements after teaching you decent nuances of your specialisation. Since most
engineers study similar things and mostly rely on self-study or crash-courses
or notes from seniors, it really doesn’t matter what and how the teachers
teach. So, feeling bad that you couldn’t get into the best of colleges doesn’t
make sense. All you should try to do is work hard and maintain an aggregate of
more than 65 %. Then, when the companies that didn’t come to your college for
campus placement hold an off-campus placement selection, showcase your
potential! Show them what stuff you are made of! Have faith in yourself and
don’t let the college brand decide your future. You will find plenty of idols
if you wish to take this part; not everyone lands in a top college.
13)Myth: I am so excited about the industrial visit. I will get to learn
something more from practical examples related to my stream of engineering.
Fact: Ghanta! Industrial visits are not to learn anything new;
those are to enjoy the rare opportunity to go on a week-long trip with the
whole class. It will be probably the first and the last tour of the whole class
together. So, try vodka or beer, dance around the bonfire, propose the girl
that you liked since you entered college, tell your friends how much you love
them and will miss them after college, and have a gala time.
14)Myth: I am a worthless piece of shit since I got
KT in engineering. I should have done some easier degree and saved myself the
horror.
Fact: My dear friend, if you
have got a KT, then that means you are a true engineer and this KT will only
make you stronger in life. Earning a KT makes your realise that you are not
giving your best and that you need to put in more efforts than you estimated
earlier. This realisation will make you stronger in life. Taking a KT exam is
not an easy thing; you might not have failed in any subject in life and here
suddenly you don’t understand a subject and you end up getting a KT. This
teaches you that corrective action is what is needed. So, buckle up, work hard
and clear that damn fucking KT in the first attempt. And trust me, that feeling
of clearing a KT is much more satisfying than clearing an exam in the very
first attempt. Engineers of various specialisations rely on this one saying
more often than you imagine:
“Wo baap hi kya jisko beti na ho,
Wo engineer hi kya jisko KT na ho!”
15)Myth: I will write to-the-point answers in all
exams; that will impress the examiner!
Fact: This myth
lies on the assumption that an examiner reads what you have written! The
assumption itself is wrong! There are hundreds of papers that an examiner has
to check. If you think it matters to him whether you covered every point in the
answer, then you’re a fool! What matters is whether you filled at least a page
for an 8-mark question and beautified it with a neat diagram. The neater your
handwriting is, the more you will score!
16) Myth: I am a Mechanical engineer. But I don’t
understand anything related to my field. I am nervous about my future. How will
I sustain my family after I complete my degree and join work?
Fact: The software industry is
like God. Does god discriminate amongst the rich, the poor, the white, the black,
the fat, the thin? Nope! Similarly, the software industry also doesn’t
discriminate amongst Mechanical, Electrical, Telecom, Civil, IT, Computer
Science or any other branch. If you are good enough to clear the aptitude exam
and the interview of an IT company, the rest will be taught to you in the
company itself. You need not worry about your future; it will be brightened by
some software firm or the other.
Jiska koi nahi hota, uska Khudaa hota hai,
Jisko kahin job nahi milta, usko IT company utha leta hai!
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