Psenti Speak
to. The countless playlists and mixed tapes that litter my room and my hard disk serve as
a useful indicator of the fact that I am not who I was three years ago.
Karthik ALDYAN Manickam
Just Breathe
“Without music to decorate it, time is just a bunch of boring production
deadlines or dates by which bills must be paid.”
The cons of this method? Any A7 student can tell you how ridiculously inefficient that is
(O(n) at best - and that's the extent to which CP2 has had an impact on me).
The pros? I now have a larger-than-average collection of brilliant music that doubles as
the most intense nostalgia device possible.
It's impossible to spend an hour listening to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by The
Beatles and not be reminded of early morning shenanigans during a deserted Diwali
weekend.
Cosmia by Joanna Newsom will always send me on a nostalgic trip to first year nights
spent gaming in lieu of studying (big mistake in hindsight, but I guess things always work
out eventually).
Bulls on Parade by Rage Against the Machine and Monster by Kanye West hold memories
of the auditorium that match their intensity with their contrast.
Music had a hand in binding not only the events of BITS but the people of BITS to me
as well. Never again will I find in abundance so many people to discuss and fight and
quarrel with over something as trivial as if M.I.A. has more artistic integrity than Arctic
Monkeys (hint: she does), or if Pearl Jam are the greatest band in the history of the world
or not (hint: they are). 3 AM will never be the same after this.
Pilani has this unique propensity to warp all perception of time, in a way that no other
location can match. I am distinctly aware of the fact that I have less than 22 nights left on
campus, and yet I feel as though I have hundreds left to fritter away solving crosswords
at ANC with a motley crew of friends, acquaintances and passers-by. I know I have less
than 7 days of classes left to (attempt to) attend, but that doesn't stop me from skipping
said classes under the assumption that I can attend later to make up for it. There's only
one (worthwhile) show left in the auditorium to go to, but I'm convinced that I'll be lugging heavy equipment and yelling at batch-mates and juniors for at least a handful more.
I mentioned earlier that we will be passing out with a common tag but a vastly different
experience. The same holds true not only amongst batches, but across them as well: you
don't need a look at the curriculum to tell you that the experiences of the current first
year batch will be vastly different from that of my own. To that end, I don't see the point
in trying to pass on some generalized piece of fluffy advice from my lofty fourth-year
position. BITSians are a resilient breed, after all. I would, however, like to end my musings with the following bit of counsel that seems to hold true regardless of situation: devour all the music you can; listen, keep listening, and never stop listening. There's too
How best to measure the passage of time here, then? How best to remind oneself that much amazing stuff out there to listen to, and life's always better
three and a half years have passed? And more importantly, how best to retain the information of those years; not the book-derived information, but the memories and incidents To that end!:
and events that shaped our time here and ensured that by leaving we share the same tag, Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl - Broken Social Scene
but not even remotely the same experience?
When the Levee Breaks - Led Zeppelin
Pictures work, but then pictures have always been too nailed down for my liking: the Bend the World - Thermal and a Quarter
details of the subject of the photograph are fixed, and warp any memories associated with Pinball Wizard - The Who
them. Besides, DoPy are never around when you really need them, and my hands are too Landslide - Smashing Pumpkins
shaky to click anything worthwhile.
Dead Leaves on the Dirty Ground - The White Stripes
A diary would have been useful, but I've found that whereas another author's novel inSubterranean Homesick Blues - Bob Dylan
vites you to explore a hitherto unknown world, a diary only serves to limit an existing
Hey Joe - The Jimi Hendrix Experience
one. Besides, that sort of thing requires a level of discipline that my CGPA can testify I
Pride (In the name of love) - U2
don't have.
I chose music. Don't laugh! Music worked, and continues to work wonders. It had the
perfect balance of pretension and credibility to serve as my memory storage medium.
Every instance of my life here has been associated, either consciously or unconsciously,
with a song (or songs). Whether by virtue of said music being played in my vicinity at the
time, or because of some odd lyric that struck my mind and forevermore linked itself
with said event, I can trace my evolution through BITS by the music that I was listening
Vishala Arya
I hear train whistle.
Someone said, “The time to board has come”.
“No”, I replied, “you are but an unfinished dream of mine.”
And it whistled again.
Aye, I can see
It has come for me now
A calcified crow or a sooty swan
Or a boulevard with pernicious clamps
Octopus foretold, embraced I thee
Ah, not a maven wizardry it be
Wonted drama will follow you and me
The time as it ticks
Fickle heart chimes
Breezes of old snippets and funny rhymes
Recall, recall I will,
The summers, the fests
The cliché and the rest
To the dimes we collected
For the clams we created
Wonders, the show has begun
Or has escalated towards a plaintiff mark
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