Hogwarts vs. ICFAI

What is common to all flights today? The answer is...you will find at least one passenger reading one of the following books: "The World is flat", "Da Vinci Code" and "Harry Potter". I'll pick the last one. For me, Enid Blyton and childhood are synonymous....and I believe that it is almost impossible to replace the magic and awe of childhood readings by any bestseller, no matter how popular and how creative....BUT the Potter series DID succeed in "recreating"( not "replace", mind you) the magic and awe of childhood in me......In school I used to hide a Malory Towers inside the General Science book and keep reading night out.....In B school I read Harry Potter e-books night out...In school, we used to emulate St.Clair's characters... Riya was Alicia, Shalini was Doris, Corina was Gladys, Bidisha was Ms. Jenks, I was Mirabelle and Satya was "poor catty Elsie"....we had gone to the extent of having midnight feasts too ( we were seriously miserable as the menu could not be matched with the one in the books...Satya had even attempted to hunt for "gingerbeer"). At ICFAI, Sheetal is Harry Potter, Puneet is Ron Weasley and I am Hermione Granger ( the creative attribution is by my sister...the rationale is not very strong, but I think I like it sis). Well, ICFAI is not exactly Hogwarts (in fact quite far from it) but , to an extent it is "magical". "Technically" we are "muggles"....though you would find some crazy wizards in the form of CAs and CFAs...And "Section C" is the house of Gryfindor! Thankfully you do not find many "slitherins"...(Hey, by the way, let me tell you that this is by no means an attempt to copy Shashi Tharoor's juxtaposition of Mahabharata on the Indian freedom movement in his "The Great Indian Novel".)....We do have our own "alohomora" to open forbidden doors and "Wingardium leviosa" to "float" rumours ( not feathers) and my reader's question is an obvious "How?". Well, this is a place of loopholes and in a way, it teaches you to survive, fight, learn, share and care...ICFAIans have a great "7th sense"....that's a stronger version of "6th sense"....and that enables one to hunt for the philosopher's stone....few find it....fewer realise the importance of it. WHAT???No Quidditich?? Cricket is the heart of ICFAI...and so is gossip...we are high fliers at both and strangely enough, the Gryfindors win most of the time...! That's how life is over here....magical, fun and adventurous...Three cheers to our Hogwarts...three cheers to ICFAI!

It's only words..

It is strange that one “knows” about most things in life but at some point of time he realizes that there is a new way of knowing the same things. And that very fact makes a great deal of difference. It was just another Wednesday in the scorching summer of Hyderabad. The usual morning rush was followed by a more or less satisfactory day in college. I came back to my PG tired and hungry. Back home I would have thrown my weight around if I did not find the food warm and ready on the table. On my way back in the auto rickshaw with an abnormally accelerated meter, I calculated that I had some biscuits that had turned soft and half a cucumber in the refrigerator, the latter’s existence I was not sure of due to expected thefts. With my dupatta around my head to prevent the scorching sun, I halted at the fruit vendor and after a round of shameless bargaining I finally picked up fruits to last just for two days (the reason again being theft). “Drink water” came the sms from my mother. I drank the hot water from my bottle with utter dissatisfaction. The first thing I do in the PG after I return is to take a count of the clothes that came back from the laundry and clear payments. I saw that my favorite pair of cream socks was systematically colored in patches by Finla's red shirt. “I took utter care akka!” wailed the washerwoman with genuine concern. I was happy to be least bothered. I washed the grapes and stored them in the refrigerator after an eye estimate. Washing grapes is a nice feeling. Back home, during the humid summers, dad would get grapes for us, both purple and green and mom would wash them for minutes altogether till they were devoid of dust and dirt. That was hardly a noteworthy event then. But now while washing grapes myself; the picture of my mom busily washing grapes would emerge in front of my eyes. Rrrrrring! The phone calls started. I patiently attended all of them. The clock showed 21.00 hours. I realized, I still had an empty tummy. I opened the lid of the sabji bowl only to discover the level of disrespect man can have for man. It will take my amateur culinary skills a lot of effort to be able to cook like that even for my worst enemy. The mercury in my barometer touched the highest point. “Apni bachchi ko aisa khana pakake khila sakti ho?” ( “Can you feed your child the same food?”) I asked the cook. Ignoring all her protests and explanations I helped myself to the morning milk and 2 rotis. Brushing my teeth, the new pimple on my left cheek became blurred on the bathroom mirror. I felt disrespected, uncared and unloved. “All these are experiences. Just experiences. And nothing else. They hold no other significance. Accept, forget and move on,” a voice said. The pimple on my left cheek reappeared and I started making plans for tomorrow morning…”set the alarm at 6.30 so that you can wake up by at least seven, don’t forget to put five hundred bucks in your purse…..” I took my laptop, switched on Elvis Presley and started working when the lights went off. I lighted the candles and continued working…all alone….in the dark….in the heat….tired but happy with nothing to be sorry for.