This is considered to be the digital age with almost everyone hooked on to some sort of gadgetry, a mobile phone at least. It is a common sight to see someone bored, taking out his cellphone and using one of its many features to kill time. While this revolution helps to kill time, it more commonly helps to manage and hence save time. We all know the role of Blackberries, laptops, GPRS, SMS, etc. Seeing all this makes an EE student proud

A friend posted a video link which left me and all my friends in shock and awe. We couldn’t believe what sort of technology the world is going towards, despite being a little knowledgeable in the field. In this post, I just want to share this video of a work-in-progress at MIT in USA. Hope you guys love it (obviously you will!).

It was more than five months ago when I attended the first lecture at Imperial in room 408. It was amazing and everything felt right (although the later lectures of that particular subject turned out to be a bombardment of esoteric sentences, but that’s another story). And today, in the same room 408, I attended, what is probably my last lecture at Imperial, and maybe my last classroom lecture (unless I change my mind drastically). As an icing on the cake, the lecture today was delivered by Prof. Chris Toumazou, who has been my (and everyone else’s) favourite teacher.

Most of the time during the lecture I couldn’t help thinking how quickly time has passed. It feels like only a few days ago I was waiting impatiently to get an unconditional offer from Imperial, and today it seems like the end of an era. It’s certainly not THE end, as the examinations are yet to commence which will be followed by the final project.

The time I spend in the classrooms have been phenominal and the amount of knowledge I’ve gained is enormous. In general, the teachers go to utmost limit in an attempt to make the subjects and lectures highly intriguing. And the fact that they are so deeply and heavily versed in their respective fields makes it all more interesting. One of the aids that almost all teachers use is classroom jokes, which keeps everyone involved (even when sleep is taking over the body).

The time so far has been the best I have ever spent in any classroom in my diverse academic career. It has been like a beautiful journey. The journey is not over yet and undoubtedly the turbulent paths are yet to appear. With this, I’m signing off, hoping for an even better tomorrow!

Google has come up with the Street View maps for UK and I was shocked to see my door when I entered my postcode! How did they manage to escape privacy issues????!!!

Anyway, the next search for Imperial College London in the street view brought up the main entrance on the Exhibition Road. The maps are very neat and worth having a look.

Here is the link to Google Maps: http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/

I’m told that this is about the perfect weather you get here in London. Indeed, it is obvious when I get to see people flocking to the parks basking in the glory of sunshine.

Speaking of sunshine, it has been abundant since the dawn of March. And with temperatures touching double digits consistently, the combination is extremely pleasant. Again, I’m told that this season is called spring. How would I know of seasons?? I come from a city that witnesses only two seasons annually: summer and extreme summer!! (The temperature in a steam room is sometimes the normal atmospheric temperature there ).

Therefore, it has been pleasantly amusing for me to see people coming out to enjoy the weather when the sun is out. Back home, people used to come out to enjoy the weather when the sun was hidden behind the clouds and there were predictions of rain: completely opposite!

So for the first time I am in a position to enjoy sunshine and I’m very sure that I will be reminded of these times when I go back (and face the sun straight at temperatures soaring above 40 degrees).

My absence from the blogospher is a result of multiple miseries inflicted upon me in parallel by the combined efforts of the forces of nature and the examination department of Imperial College. Defying all odds, here I am, sipping Red Bulll, crunching Doritos, scribbling these words on a fresh notepad I purchased today to aid in my exam preparation and using one of the many pens that you get as a result of Career Fairs. This, also, is the first time ever (and hopefully the last time) that I’m writing a blog post on a sheet of paper and intend to perform the daunting task of digitizing it whenever I’m capable of. The reason of doing so forms one of the miseries aforementioned.

The last couple of weeks were, at best, chaotic. One of the aspects of living abroad is the worry of home [country] if things go wrong there. Despite living on a different continent and being kept awfully busy in academics, one cannot help this feeling. Undoubtedly, the last two weeks witnessed one of the most trubulent times of political confrontation in Pakistan and hence consumed my attention.

But that’s just a small part of my problem. If you happen to be one of my very few readers AND (logical) you did read my post regarding some bomb being dropped, then you know that I’m about to have my exams soon. The lovely people in the examination department who dropped off this bomb have now made an attempt to ensure a resounding effect of their lethal weapon by coming up with the worst possible scheduling of my papers. (ok ok..mine is not THE worst ). As a consolation, my exams end on 13th May, earlier by a week than my friends in other courses (this is a great feeling!!).

I decided that I’d not be blogging (read whining) about my courseworks but the temptation (and the need to fill space) is just irresistible, and the prospective students should know how it feels like to be here, stretched to the extreme limits. Anyway, I’m supposed to submit two courseworks by the end of term and I’m yet to reach a stage where I can be confident of a satisfactory end.

The biggest and the most unexpected of all has been the death of my dear laptop, which has made my life dysfunctional. The ol’ buddy released extreme heat and then something inside got fried, one thing led to another and the whole thing finally gave up. I’m very surprised to see my dependence and addiction to laptops. Since it forms such an integral part of my life, I’ve been busy hunting for the perfect match. Hopefully, I shall be getting a new laptop within this week and that is probably the date this post goes public. Till then, I can only .. errrr….. do nothing but wait.

This post was written on 16th March while enjoying the weather in the Queen’s Lawn. And this post going online means that I’m now blessed with a new laptop!

Very quickyly, just before the end of the day, I’d like to wish all readers a very happy square root day. The next such day will come in the year 2016! I had no idea that such days were celebrated until I got a Google tweet. Digging deep, I found that March 14 (03/14 in US date format) is the PI (3.14) day! And guess what? Albert Einstein was born on Pi-Day 1879.

That’s all for now!

1. A grad student in procrastination tends to stay in procrastination unless an external force is applied to it.
2. The age, a, of a doctoral process is directly proportional to the flexibility, f, given by the advisor and inversely proportional to the student’s motivation, m. (a=F/m -> F=ma)
3. For every action towards graduation there is an equal and opposite distraction.

Reproduced from PHD Comics.

The first and the third one are so true!! The third one can probably be verified by a doctoral student, however it does apply to courseworks as well