---The welcoming corridors of Feb & March---

Day 261- 'Finally the end of March. Time to stand at ease...' (monthstone reading: 4 months)

So finally comes the admit/reject season.  It didn’t start all that well. First disappointments were news from Carnegie Mellon and University of Washington, which came in on 12^th Feb and 14^th Feb respectively. By the time I could get my thoughts off the rejects, I got 2 more negative replies from University of Toronto and UC Berkeley on 23^rd March. At the same time, I couldn’t be too upset as all colleges were very highly ambitious in nature.

 

Then came the morning of 28^th March. I was supposed to leave for Amritsar in the night. I woke up and zombie-walked to my laptop and did the routine fishing for any relevant emails from the universities. I stopped at the email that read ‘ GT MSCS decision available’. My pupils narrowed and a thought brigade transcended barriers somewhere inside my mind. Containing myself and my emotions, I opened the email which simply stated that the decision was available and asked me to log in to the ‘application status checking’ page. Why couldn’t they have revealed it in the email! Aren’t they aware that the anxiety levels are already at their tipping point at such a moment. I followed the link, logged in and opened the pdf doc that read ‘Your decision letter’. The Pdf opened at a leisurely pace as I prepared myself to accept whatever came on the screen. The screen opened and the words read:

“Dear Siddhartha:

Congratulations! On behalf of the College of Computing at Georgia Tech, I am delighted to offer you admission to the Master of Science program in Computer Science for Fall 2013…”

I didn’t read further. The two fighting forces in my mind had made peace. I was relaxed. It was the end of my March and these words sounded like orders to a tired soldier to ‘stand at ease’. Once I informed my folks about the news, I came back to my seat and re-read the decision letter 10 times just to be sure that I wasn’t hallucinating. I wasn’t. As William Forrester (character from the movie ‘Finding Forrester’) would have put it, this was a season of faith’s perfection.

 

Alright, that being said, here is my current road-map and timeline for the last 2 months:

 

Road-Map
GRE (done)

TOEFL (done)

University Applications (done)
Financial Documents (partially done)

Admits (one- Georgia institute of Technology, Atlanta)

Visa Interview (remaining)

 

 

Timeline:

 

·         7^th and 8^th Feb- One Globe 2013 conference. Two days of informative talks on education from highly distinguished speakers from all over the world.

·         17,19, 22^nd Feb- Attended music recitals by Vidushi Kankana, Ustad Abdul Rashid Khan and Ustad Shahid Pervez as part of the Jashn-e-khusrau event

·         23^rd, 24^th Feb – Birdwatching at Keoladeo bird sanctuary at Bharatpur.

·         Rest of Feb- courses at coursera, codeacademy.org, creative mathematics by ViHart at khanacademy, experiments with mobius strips, 'Scramblewithfriends', a full sunday spent reliving childhood through puzzles, contra, castlevania and bomberman.

·         2^nd March- 6^th March – visit to Qutab minar, Rajaon ki baoli, Tibetean colony at Majnu ka Tilla; hostel roomies reunion with Chuba and Prajakt; Norah Jones live@Siri fort.

·         Mid-March- Read ‘The Fountainhead’ by Ayn Rand (highly recommended)

·         March 28^th – GeorgiaTech admit; Launch of my photography page- ‘BeyondFrames’

·         March 29^th-30^th – Trip to Amritsar- Sushant’s engagement and Golden temple visit

 

So that I don’t spoil the flavor of this post, I will not talk about any tips and recommendations in this post. Though, will post it soon enough!

 

Stay tuned!