The first year of my PhD has come and gone, and with it, a lot of mixed feelings. While I have (more or less) gotten the green light to begin research work, to quote Inspector Clouseau: "Well, you know... it wasn't easy." And of course, it wasn't easy.
I got an 8.0 CPI - maybe I could have increased it had I credited Topics in Natural Language Processing instead of auditing it. I could have prepared better for my Seminar had I a little more time (especially with End-sem corrections later), but all in all, I just came out on top. Now, I am home in Bangalore and recapping a hard, but enjoyable, year.
The purpose of this post is to recap a year of cultural excellence (excellence? I participated in only one of IIT Bombay's many cultural domains, and within that, I excelled in only one event!). As mentioned in my earlier post, I am an avid quizzer, and this year, along with academics, I had a lot of fun quizzing (although realistically, not too much success).
The year did not start out too brightly, as I finished a close 4th in the Open General Quiz in IIT. (NOTE: Open here means that it is open to anyone in the Institute, not anyone in the world). Since I did not know anyone there, I decided to make use of a Freshman quota for qualification, by teaming up with a couple of freshmen, thus making it for the finals via quota (Yay for Experience-based Reservation!). As the year went on, I slowly began hitting my stride, teaming up with some of the strong quizzers in IIT.
December was a hectic month. It started first with Mood Indigo 2013 at IIT Bombay, and was followed by Chaos 2013 at IIM Ahmedabad and Nihilanth 2013-'14, also at IIM Ahmedabad. Although I failed to win anything in Mood Indigo and could only just manage a 3rd place in Nihilanth, January was the month I grew leaps and bounds as a quizzer. It was also the month in which I caught a train to Churchgate from Borivali, before going to Dadar, Thane, and then Pune for Landmark Pune, 2014. All because of an almost midnight arrangement with Shamika to go with her to Pune. We qualified for the Finals and won - the wooden spoon, of course. However the momentum continued, culminating in me winning the Wolf Pack General Championship.
In February, I had to complete the two great quizzes of the year that I had set - That's All Toons! (the Cartoon Quiz) and Solus Rex (a massive 400+ question Solo Quiz). In March, were the Hostel, PG, and Institute Awards. Submitting these achievements as a portfolio, I was confident of winning some awards. I had already won a couple of awards in quizzes in PG Cult - helping the Computer Science Department finish 2nd, after IDC - before winning the following awards:
I got an 8.0 CPI - maybe I could have increased it had I credited Topics in Natural Language Processing instead of auditing it. I could have prepared better for my Seminar had I a little more time (especially with End-sem corrections later), but all in all, I just came out on top. Now, I am home in Bangalore and recapping a hard, but enjoyable, year.
The purpose of this post is to recap a year of cultural excellence (excellence? I participated in only one of IIT Bombay's many cultural domains, and within that, I excelled in only one event!). As mentioned in my earlier post, I am an avid quizzer, and this year, along with academics, I had a lot of fun quizzing (although realistically, not too much success).
The year did not start out too brightly, as I finished a close 4th in the Open General Quiz in IIT. (NOTE: Open here means that it is open to anyone in the Institute, not anyone in the world). Since I did not know anyone there, I decided to make use of a Freshman quota for qualification, by teaming up with a couple of freshmen, thus making it for the finals via quota (Yay for Experience-based Reservation!). As the year went on, I slowly began hitting my stride, teaming up with some of the strong quizzers in IIT.
December was a hectic month. It started first with Mood Indigo 2013 at IIT Bombay, and was followed by Chaos 2013 at IIM Ahmedabad and Nihilanth 2013-'14, also at IIM Ahmedabad. Although I failed to win anything in Mood Indigo and could only just manage a 3rd place in Nihilanth, January was the month I grew leaps and bounds as a quizzer. It was also the month in which I caught a train to Churchgate from Borivali, before going to Dadar, Thane, and then Pune for Landmark Pune, 2014. All because of an almost midnight arrangement with Shamika to go with her to Pune. We qualified for the Finals and won - the wooden spoon, of course. However the momentum continued, culminating in me winning the Wolf Pack General Championship.
In February, I had to complete the two great quizzes of the year that I had set - That's All Toons! (the Cartoon Quiz) and Solus Rex (a massive 400+ question Solo Quiz). In March, were the Hostel, PG, and Institute Awards. Submitting these achievements as a portfolio, I was confident of winning some awards. I had already won a couple of awards in quizzes in PG Cult - helping the Computer Science Department finish 2nd, after IDC - before winning the following awards:
- Hostel 1 Person of the Year (Cultural)
- Institute Freshman of the Year (Cultural)
