I never expected that there would be a farewell for final year students. But yeah ... There was one. A great one! All the final year students of mechanical got an invite for the farewell party from third year students. After I saw the invitation in my cell, I thought, apparently we're gonna get beaten up by them. Yeah, we got off on the wrong foot. So, It was decided that the venue was ABIRAMI MEGA MALL, one of the ... uh, let's say ... a decent malls in Chennai. My invite message said that the function is gonna be held at 6PM. I reached the mall around 5.50PM. I was said that the function is going on at the terrace, roof top! I cautiously climbed the stairs. I didn't know what was waiting for me. I said to my leg ... 'Even the slightest sign of danger ... Runaway my boy' I was so hesitant to open the door of the terrace. Everyone of us would have experienced the 'ahhh ... what the hell' moment. I experienced it and I opened the door. But 'what was I thinking?' ... It was unbelievable. The decoration, the stage, the speakers, even the chairs looked great! It was an actual grand farewell! Third year students forgot the friction between us and came up with a mind blowing party. I'm sorry guys and I thank all of my juniors who made such a great effort for a great party.
All of my classmates were present. There were shouts, claps and joy. I felt so terrible to even think about what I thought. Our juniors asked everyone of us to speak something about these four years. So did we. After the grand speech, I realized that it's not just me! Just me to think that 'To love a girl is an absurd think to do' Almost everyone warned the third years to watch out for girls, and by this, I mean "no offense" for all the girls out there. You know what I mean. Then started the music. Music of the south! The fast beats and the environment made everyone to dance. 'Sounds gay right? :P' But I swear it was 'friggin' awesome!!!
The roof top offered a splendid view of the city. Then dinner! I must say, it was filled with variety. It was amazingly delicious !!!
But another important thing ... this farewell party proved to be a great opportunity to meet a lost friend who's now in 'Balumahendra Film School'. The best film school in the city. He discontinued the engineering in his second year to pursue film making, something which I tried to do, but couldn't. It was great to meet him and we discussed about films, film making and his film school. Finally the fun came to an end as the clock struck 9PM.
But that's the last time, I guess. Everyone's gotta plan. Next year, the same time, I bet many would be studying or working there ass out in some other part of the world. Very few would be here and am sure they'll be so busy looking after their life. No more messages, no more 10 rs ticket in Devi theater and no more night out at the beach. After many goodbyes and take cares the place finally became empty. Empty stage, unoccupied chairs and silent speakers ...
It's been 22 years since I first saw this world. Out of those twenty two, I could surely say that the last four years were the best part. This chapter is dedicated to my best buddies in Mech'B' who contributed more than anyone for that 'Best' part. We are totally sixty in number. Out of those sixty, here I'd like to introduce you to some of them, who have a unique and interesting set of characters. Let me start with the person whose word-press inspired me to write this blog. Vinodh Venkatesan (aka) Balli.
BALLI (aka) VINODH VENKATESAN
When I first saw him in my class, I misjudged his looks. I thought that he's like those super rich boys who never mingle with other students. He is a perfect high class city guy. I hesitate to say this now, but I had an inferiority feeling back in my first year. I was so hesitant to speak to my fellow mates. 'Who knows?' Maybe that inferiority feeling made me to think like that. But I came to know about the true 'BALLI' once when I sat next to him from second year. He's noway near to those super rich boys I mentioned. He is an easy-goer and the most friendly person. But the problem with him is, he's not emotionally communicative. If you hit him in the balls, he would say "Ahh" in a low tone. The next moment he'd be back in his business. The thing I admire in him is his command in his written English. He has an awesome word-press work where he writes about something from his daily life. It has a splendid narration. Our gang is called BRUDERMEER gang. BRUDERMEER has a very nice story behind it :-P. BRUDERMEER consists of four members. Myself, Balli, Thiruvikrama Srinivasan and Pavan Kumar. Four of us shared a common dream and goal. Travelling and enjoying this life to its craziest and fullest extent before marriage.
THIRUVIKRAM
But Thiruvikram shared even more specific dream like me. A dream called "EUROPE". We both love Europe to the core. Thiruvikram has another secret goal in his life. He's working on it now. Do you guys want to know his little secret goal?. "To drink a full-barrel beer in OKTOBERFEST which is an yearly grand beer festival in Germany". It's not a coincidence that he applied for three German universities. I sincerely hope that he should achieve his little goal :D
Mr.PAVAN KUMAR (aka) BABAJI
You guys should know about Mr.Pavan Kumar (aka) Babaji. He has a great command over his spoken English language. Many doesn't know that he's a great poet. Pavan's special quality is his nervousness and curiosity. He once called me continuously from 2AM to 4AM to talk about the match which was not until 7AM. He's a great friend ho helps you at the right time.
'REACTION' RA.VINODH
Now I should tell about Mr.Ra.Vinodh (aka) ***** *** ****. Ra.Vinodh is one of the most interesting character in our class. Entertainment is guaranteed when he's around. I still can't forget the reaction he gave when Vijaykarthik (another unique character) hit him in an unexpected manner. That was one hilarious incident. We were laughing our ass out.
'PIRATE' VIJAYKARTHIK
Vijaykarthik is another unique and weird character. He would help anyone at anytime. That's his character. But the uniqueness and weirdness? Well, he wants to become a pirate! The rest is for your judgement!
'CURIOUS' SWAMI
There's a character called Swaminadhan Sundaramoorthy (aka) Swamiji. It's not usual to get acquainted with a guy like Swami. He's not like other nerds. He knows everything about everything. Or at-least he'll try to learn if he doesn't know. Curiosity has an other name called Swami. He's my only friend who talks about Einstein's relativity and the possibility of parallel universe which I'd love to discuss. He writes some well crafted Tamil poems which I'd enjoy reading. Here I'd write down a doubt, once he asked me, then you might know about him, a bit.
"I hav one doubt machi. Consider a number of trains such that one is running inside the other train, so that their relative speed gets added up (i.e) speed of the running train plus speed of the train on which it is running. Extend it to 'n' trains, So that u will attain the speed of light. Still the mass will be a stable one with respect to other train, so in this case it seems relativity is practical... Is that right? just a thought!!"
SAI BEATING SRIVATSAN
It's a punishable crime if I didn't write anything about our great Mr.Srivatsan (aka) Bachu. Srivatsan has the most peculiar and weird character. Entertainment quotient of our class. Except his mom and dad nobody has ever escaped from his mouth. That's what makes him interesting. Irrespective of the designations, every staff would get their ******* chance to fall as prey in his mouth. Not only staffs, every student, every actor, every cricketer, every politician, everyone gets their chance.
PAPAKUMAR,SIDDARTH,RAMS,PAVAN
Papakumar (aka) Ramkumar. He's so helpful to all his friends. But don't ever try to tell a secret to him. The word secret would die at that instance. His life is pretty smooth, with no twist or turns. Often I would envy his smooth life. One person, who shares a common interest with me in movies and books is Rama Subramani (aka) Rams. Most of them find my interest as a weird one. But usually it's the same for me and Rams.
ANAZ, NIDHI WITH HELPING HANDS
Anaz, Nidhi Karthik, Suresh and Sai shyam. These four guys really needs our encouragement and support in their great work. These guys started an organization called HELPING HANDS. They're helping the poor, downtrodden people and they make it possible for poor children to study. This is a noble work guys, and you guys would have all our support always.
'THALA' PRADEEP
Pradeep (aka) Thala is another great friend of mine. Srivatsan and Pradeep resides in the same area and they always act like as if they're the worst enemies. They're like ITCHY AND SCRATCHY or any two weird cartoon characters. But the truth is they're the best friends. There're lots of them like Praveen (aka) Kuzandhai, Siddarth, Sai Prasad and Raj Anush .Infact Raj and Sai were so curious about my enrollment in NZ film institute.
RAJ ANUSH
Raj would constantly ask me about the improvement in the application process every week. These are my best friends who contributed for the BEST part in the "BEST four years of my life". I'm sure that each and everyone will have their own contributions to make in my life for a long time :)
I didn't know that my life's gonna take a big turn, the turn which opened the door to quench my thirst, the thirst of film making and travelling !!!
It was a bright sunny day, The Re-opening day. I must say that my third year started in a pleasant manner. Lots of good and equally bad things happened to me. Actually my third year paved a way for understanding life to its fullest.
ONE FINE FRIDAY EVENING OF MY THIRD YEAR ...
I saw the real faces of people, people like us, some were so nice by heart, some were so pretty, some wore masks, some were selfish, some were greedy, some betrayed. There's nothing wrong in saying that third year brought out the man in me. As I said earlier, by that time I learned to make my own short movies. I began to understand the trick of bringing life to a script through my first short movie THE SYNC. I shot the movie with a Digi cam. My friend Judin samsun helped me by holding the cameras and planning the shots and Vignesh Ramesh brought out his acting talent. I must say Vignesh is a born actor (No Sarcasm). We worked hard and finished that 10 min movie within 24 hours. I won't say that it's a good movie. But I tasted the happiness in bringing my first script to screen. Every aspiring film maker might say this 'Once you brought your first script to screen, nevertheless how bad it is, you just can't stop.' As said, I didn't stop there. I decided my screen name then, which is also my Facebook profile name 'KARTHICK SAMPATH'. I've to mention here that Karthick is my nick name and Sudharshan is my official. "What stands out in that name?" one might ask, my reply would be "The 'C' stands out" Yeah! Normally the spelling of my nick name goes like this 'KARTHIK'. But my name is 'KARTHICK'. That extra 'C' made my name unique. Try googling Karthick Sampath, you would get all the links of my blogs and short films. Following SYNC, I made four more short films till now. THEDAL, FEVER ABDUCTION, THE KNOT, THE HORRENT.
I'd proudly accept that all these five films are nothing but crap. But it made me understand a bit about film making. I don't care that am making crap movies now. I'd be keep on making Crap movies and BOOM!!! One day ... am sure one day I'd be making great ones.
Not only films, third year had an other 'horrible truth' cutlet inside a 'pleasant surprise' burger for me called 'LOVE'. Love is the magic word which made even the famous and strong writers to blabber. Oscar Wilde says
"When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving oneself, and one always ends by deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance."
Diana Arbus says
"Love involves a peculiar unfathomable combination of understanding and misunderstanding."
But I say
"There's one such thing called 'TRUE LOVE'. But no one could find it, it's in a heavenly place"
But I once thought that I had found it. It was a mesmerizing and heavenly feeling. I floated in the thin air, I felt weightlessness, I felt that I was in the top of the world. But sadly, my true love lasted only for a year. That one year, was a special one, it brought out all my life's love, it was like a beautiful spring season with fresh flowers and blossoms. Each and every human should experience it. But don't expect it to last longer. It won't. It happened in a rainy day.
" I can't meet you hereafter ... Take care"
She gave a gentle kiss and whispered "Good Bye forever"
I can't forget that day. I felt so alone and dejected. I was drenched by rain. It was so late at night. The traffic was so low. The magnificent city was half asleep. I heard the rumblings of rain. The sky was full of thunders and lighting. The lane was so empty as I walked in it aimlessly. Usually I like to walk in rain. That day, it felt like the rain is my only company. Once Charlie Chaplin expressed the same feeling by saying "I like walking in the rain, so no one can see me crying". But later I learnt that even the break up is a best teacher as it taught me a most valuable lesson.
"Never expect anything from anyone ... Nothing's permanent"
Soon I found that it had a hidden message "Time Heals ..."
I met Mr.Selva Ganesh in the first day campus tour. While we were wandering inside the CAD lab, two professors joined there for our guidance. Mr.Rajkumar and Mr.Selva Ganesh.
Mr.RajKumar introduced himself and to Selva Ganesh.
This is the recent and only photograph of Mr.Selva ganesh, which I was able to collect.
" Your regular class starts tomorrow. I'm prof. Raj Kumar, class teacher for Mechanical 'A' Section and he's prof.Selva Ganesh class teacher for Mechanical 'B'."
I still remember his first sentence.
" For these many years, you people could've followed some other crappy rules. But here Selva Ganesh has some set of unique rules and regulations and each and every one should follow it."
I was so scared to look at his sharp eyes. At that very moment I prayed
" Please God, Please don't ever make me sit in Mech'B' tomorrow. Please "
- NEXT DAY -
I was sitting in the class of Mech 'B' with a terrorized look in my eyes and with some uncomfortable feeling inside. The feeling raised to its peak when Selva Ganesh walked into the class.
" I know that many of you don't like engineering here and even some of you might have interest and passion in some other field. Let me say one thing 'Its never too late'. The most easy thing to get in this world is success. You've to put only two inputs 'Hard work and Immense interest'. Remember the words ' Never too late '. But another most important thing, ' Enjoy everything you do, including BE ' Coming to the point, I'm your Engineering Graphics teacher "
Those words got struck in my heart. Life in Chennai and my undergraduate took a big turn there. Life took a race from there, months passed and I was having a smooth fast life. I learned to flirt with girls, I got a new DVD player, new set of friends to wander around Chennai. After all the curse talk I did, Chennai'd been very nice to me as it showed the way to my dream in the form of 'SATHYA BAZAAR'.
The place has whole collection of all the DVD's from around the world. When I found this place, I had the same feeling which Columbus had when he thought that he had found India. That place introduced me to the real cinema, rather than introducing me to movies. That is the place where I actually found the difference between a movie and cinema. I got acquainted with many friends such as 'Life is Beautiful', 'Bicycle thief', 'White Balloon' etc. I saved Rs.60 every week and would buy 2 DVD'S at the weekend. This same routine continued for a long time. After watching each and every movie I'd speak to myself 'Film Making is my path, my goal, my dream, my everything' and I confirmed it after watching Majid Majidi's masterpiece 'CHILDREN OF HEAVENS'. I was doing well in my academics too, so my father was never concerned about me, watching lots of films. I learned a lot. By the end of second year, I got unlimited internet connection which opened more gates. I learned to write scripts, to design story boards. I watched lots of behind the scenes and making of films. By the beginning of third year, I learned to make my own short movie. Not only that! Internet sowed an additional interest in my heart, more like a bonus. That is TRAVEL and CULTURES!!!
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