ComFest 2006 - Day 2

Just back from ComFest 2006. Overall result - Dr. Virendra Swarup Education Centre (Kidwai Nagar branch, i.e. our team) were the runners up. And Sheilng House was first.

Now on to the blog.

I reached school a little late today. It had been decided that everyone will reach the school at 8:15 AM so that we may reach Jaipuria on time... at 9 o'clock. I reached the school gates at just the right time. Of course, they did not close... today was a sunday. But when I reached the school, 6 of the participants were already there. I was the seventh. And Varsha came even later than me!!

Once everyone was there, we boarded the bus with Mrs. Vinayak, and we were on our way back to the school where ComFest 2006 was being held... Jaipuria. Almost all of us were tensed. We had events, and we HAD to do something if we wanted a first position. I had two events today, X-plode and the Surprise event. In X-plode, I had to make a remix of one of the songs they provided. So I took a Digit Special (on audio/remixing) for X-plode. While in the bus, I read some of the topic given there. During the whole ride, Akshat told us facts about various things that were happening in the computing world.



On the way to Jaipuria, there is railroad crossing. Yesterday, the crossing was open, but today it was closed. So we had to wait for sometime. But as soon it opened, we were at Jaipuria! (There is a railway track right next to Jaipuria).

When we entered the main hall, I saw that the scores were being written on the score board. I couldn't see what was being written. As I proceeded, I saw CF0 written on the board (in the 1st place box for Cartoon film making). And slowly, she wrote 5 on the board... and all of us rejoiced and shouted out loud!

It was a good sign for us... we had just reached, and we had already started winning!!

Then we were requested to move to the "backyard" for breakfast. Once again, the breakfast was good: Sandwiches, dhokla, paneer "rolls", some rice like thing (I don't know its name) and tea. I don't drink tea, so I took everything except tea and the rice like thing. Vipul had a vrata (fast) and he intended to break it only after the results of Web designing were declared. All of us had breakfast. When we were returning, we saw a sweetdish... rasgullas... how could we miss those :D

After that, we sat at our chairs, and some more results were declared. Vipul came first in the Web Designing event. That was another good thing for us. And immediately the huge Vipul broke his fast!!!

Once the breakfast was over, the participants of the various events were asked to go to the places where the events would be held. I went to the computer lab where X-plode was to be held. We had just one hour to create the remix. The participants were provided with 10 old, melodious songs. We had to remix any one song. The other software we had was Fruityloops and Audacity. I had come prepared with a strategy. I hoped it would not fail... and it didn't! I won't disclose it here... as you might be of other school and you also do the same thing! Anyways, I made a remix of Jiya Jale (by Lata Mangeshkar), complete with beats and scratches. I hoped I would get a rank in atleast the first 3.

After I came out, the programming event started.

The Quiz was going on. We were not in the quiz finals, so we simply watched the quiz. The topic for the Group Discussions finals had been given, so our participants in the GD were practicing that. Akshat and I roamed about the school and took lots of photos. We even took a photo of the main audio system that was on the first floor, hidden from everyone's eyes.

The hall

We even saw the finals of Senior gaming (that I had not been able to qualify). The game looked really good... its graphics were great! I don't know its name, but it was a type of mini football with 3 players on each team. I shot some videos of the game.

After all that, we returned to our seats. There was some problem with my remixed song, so Sarthak Nigam called me. He took me to my computer. Rohit and Utsav were working on the programs. He opened the folders and my file was right where it should have been (most probably). He just said that he had understood what had happened. And I returned.

When I returned, I saw Kapoor ma'am of the Jaipuria school. She is the head of the computer department in Jaipuria. She was apologizing for yesterday's "happenings" (only a few know about it!!) She's really nice! I wanted to get her photograph, but couldn't... she was just too busy.

The GD topic, "I am God for I can manipulate genes" (you
can see it on the screen)... everything else is less important :D

After some time, the Group Discussion started. Our participants went up to the stage, and then came back after sometime. When they returned, we got to know that it was just a "photo session". And Varsha told the reporters that we intended to win ComFest the thrid time in a row!

Varsha and Utkarsh reach the stage the fastest!

After some minutes, they were again called up to the stage. The topic for the GD was "I am God for I can manipuate genes". Varsha spoke really well... with good impact. Utkarsh (no... not me, another Utkarsh) just spoke his part. Once every team had spoken, the rebuttle round started. The rebuttle was a mess. I was informed that yesterday's rebuttle (in the qulification round) was much better... it was much more on the topic. Todays GD rebuttle round was completely off the track... "Is God dead?" or "How did the universe start?" or "What/who is God?" The questions that our participants asked were sensible... the rest just talked about Dolly (the clone of a sheep)... the quality of life of Dolly and the big bang theory. There were so many other things to talk about: computers with brains, cancer treatment, improvement in life of humans, etc.

The questions asked by our participants were such that no one dared to answer them... an eerie silence broke everytime Varsha finished asking her question. And again, no one dared to ask our team a question. And if someone did, Varsha's answers were good enough to silence everyone once again. All this while Utkarsh just sat there... and relaxed!

Microphones were given to one team at a time. So our team got very little chance to speak. They raised their hand for the mic, but got it only a fraction of the time. CF03, CF04 and CF10 were the main teams who constantly got the microphone. Maybe they should have taken some more chordless microphones (there were just 2).

When that was over, we expected to be in the top 3 in GD too. After that was lunch. We had a lavish lunch today too. There were some different dishes too, and a different flavour icecream :D 66.67% of the naans that I got had ash on them. (of course, I ate just 3).

After the lunch, was our Surprise event. The last hope for us. We HAD to do something in that. When we received the instruction sheet, the assignment looked so simple! We had to morph a car using Adobe Photoshop. We remodelled a car: added a ventilator, a BMW logo, new tyres, new headlights, and a new name: Avelon. We had just one hour, so we could do just that much. Again, we hoped to be atleast in the top 4.

When Vipul and I came out (after the Surprise event), we saw that Mr. Rajani had also come. By this time of the day, we were almost waiting around the score board to get the result and calculate our rank. The results were written on the board. Our results were not quite good. Here's the final score board:

(Click it... its very high res! Our team: CF05)

All of us were highly depressed. The results were bad. We were third in programming, even though Utsav and Rohit had 2 programs. But Mr. Rajani asked the incharge at the lab to tell us why we were third. We got to know that the team who came first had submitted all three problems. The second team had submitted 2 programs, but much earlier that our team members did. So we lost on bonus points. And thus we were third.

We were first in just two events (Vipul's web designing and my cartoon). Sheling house was a fierce competitor... and it got good ranks. The victory of CF13 (Sheling house) was almost inevitable. It seemed we were no where even in the top 4 (atleast it did to me). I felt too bad... this was my last year at ComFest, and we did not win a shield.

Even during the prize distribution ceremony, we were depressed. Those speeches depressed me even further. Finally, when the distribution began, I was called to the stage just once... for being first in the Cartoon Film Making event. Milanpreet got 3 prizes.

Various prizes being given

We were still completely depressed... trying to figure out what went wrong. After individual prizes, the shields were to be awarded. We were still pretty much uninterested. But just for the sake of it, I tried to focus on what they were saying. They said:

The runners up are, Dr. Virendra Swarup Education Centre

And I completely assumed that VSEC Awadhpuri was the winner. But then Utsav and Rohit said that we were second... they had said Dr. VSEC Kidwai Nagar. They rushed up to the stage for the photograph! I was the third one to literally run up the stage! Mr. Rajani still thought that we were third. Mrs. Vinayak did not understand what was going on. But finally, everyone was on stage! And our picture was taken!

My depressed and hopeless state immediately converted into an extremely happy state! This was completely unexpected!! We actually came second! The Lucknow branch of Jaipuria was extremely confident that they were second! But once again, they were right below us... they were third! We didn't even look at Sheling House getting the first prize (please don' t mind it if you're from Sheling House... we were so excited)!!

Then we shouted... Three cheers for Dr. VSEC! We shouted as loud as we can! We shouted even louder than Sheling house!! The entire hall echoed with our voices!!

But Vipul was still upset. Our rank in the surprise event had been very low... 7th was way below our expectation. Vipul requested Naman Dalmiya (JCC president) to show the morphs the other teams had made so that we could know why we got a low rank.

But on our way, we met Sarthak Nigam. We asked him to show the morphs the others had made. But he refused. He explained to us that it was against the rules. While we were talking, the National Anthem was played. So we stood in the Attention position. After that our conversation continued. Finally, we understood why we had got a low rank. We had misinterpreted the topic. We had remodelled the car. But we had to MORPH the cars.

It was a good thing that we got to know why we lost that event. Or we would have been tensed all our life that we made the best, yet got a low rank. Now we know that we made the best remodelled car, but it wasn't a morphed car.

After that, we quickly packed up. Everyone had already left, they were waiting for us. We boarded the bus. The bus took a route so that Mrs. Vinayak could reach her house faster. On the way, Milanpreet also got down at Govind Nagar. And as soon as we reached the gali of the school, we all once again cheered for VSEC. And then, when we got down, we again did that. It was fun. We'll do that in the assembly too!

Anyways, that was today's post. Its super long... thats why it took me 4 hours to write it down! I'll upload the hundreds of photos I took in a few days. Till then... keep celebrating our victory!!

Tomorrow is our English Language exam... and I haven't done anything. Let's see what happens.

ComFest 2006 - Day 1

I've come to the computer as soon as I can so that I don't forget anything. So, here goes...

Today, I reached school at the normal time, 7:30 AM, and directly entered the computer lab with my bag. I was the first one to reach the lab... even though I was the last one to enter the school gates!!!

Utsav and Rohit doing some programs for
the Programming and Debugging event

We had classes today. The first hour was computer, so all the computer students assembled at the lab for a practical. While everyone made programs, I played games! Gaming was one of my events, and I had never played such visually stunning games ever before. So everyone continuously stared at my computer screen as I fragged Ranger in Quake III Arena! After that we had 2 hours of practice at the lab... no one to disturb us. I tried to start a multiplayer game, but the network wasn't working quite well... there were problems... if the network worked, the computer did not run the game! If the game could run on a system, there was no DirectX.

Me and Vipul in our lab. And you'll see more out of focus pictures.

Vipul practised making his website for the website design event. Akshat practised Adobe Photoshop, and others practised their stuff.

At 10:15 AM, we started packing up. Principal ma'am told us to try to get the first prize... the third time! And then we boarded the school bus... bus number 3. Mr Rajani did not go with us. Mrs. Vinayak went with us this time. For the past three year, Mr. Rajani used to go with us. But this year he had some appointment, so Mrs. Vinayak went with us.

The entire team: (from the teacher, anticlockwise) Mrs. Vinayak, Akshat Wahi, Rohit Singh, Utsav Kesarwani, Varsha Saha (the little face), Milan Preet Kaur Bhalla, Utkarsh sinha (thats me), Himadri Roy, Utkarsh Agarwal (that's not me), Rajat. Picture taken by: Vipul Agarwal.

At 10:27 AM, we left the school and started our journey to Jaipuria. I don't know why, but we took the longer route. In the bus, we had a lot of fun. Vipul took a lot of photos, and I did some magic for everyone. We reached Jaipuria at 10:51 AM.

Leaving school the first day

On our way...

Me and Vipul... yet again

From the outside we could see a marching group. We thought we would be welcomed by that group. But they did nothing as we entered. Maybe they were there to welcome someone else.

Finally... we reached the place... Seth Anand Ram Jaipuria School.

When we reached the registration desk, I noticed a drastic change. We were not given a folder, a paper pad and a pen as. I had expected that we would get at least those things (I had went without them!!) We got just one thick pad, one pen and some information about the various events. We also got some ads... for the BEEP BEEEEEEEP BEEEEEP (no advertisement in the blog!!)

The familiar setting

CF 05 - Dr. VSEC Kidwai Nagar

We moved to the hall I had been to thrice. The seats had been arranged for our team. And a tag was hung behind a chair that clearly showed our school code - CF05. After sometime, the topic for the topic for the Website Design event was declared. The drivers of the digital camera were also installed just before the breakfast.

And after that we had to go for breakfast. The breakfast was good... Liked it a lot. But Vipul did not eat a thing... he had a fast (today is Saturday).

The chief guest

Once the breakfast was over, the competition began. There were some opening speeches and a song. And the events started. The events started late... about 15 minutes, at 12:45 PM. My event was one of the first events - Cartoon film making. I had seen some tutorials at on the internet. But none of them came into use. The topic was Alien and Earth-tech. We had to make a cartoon film on this topic. I made one... but the result was still unknown.

I just made the cartoon film. And in the last 15 minutes, I added some sounds. I used Macromedia Flash MX and Fruityloops 6. There were some more softwares too, but I did not use them... it would be a waste of time.

While I was working on the cartoon film, they started showing a movie, Lage Raho Munna Bhai All of our team members had already seen that movie (read an earlier entry: Did not get the time to post yesterday...), so everyone was a bit bored on hearing the same things again.

When I came out, I got to know that we had lot the Junior gaming event. Junior gaming has never been our strong point. The Quiz prelims had also taken place while I was in the computer lab, making a film. The collage making event also took place.

All these events ended at around 2:30 PM. Then we had to go for lunch. This time, the lunch was a bit more lavish than the previous years. :D But Vipul could not enjoy it... his fast. The head of the computer department in Jaipuria, Ma'am Kapoor, personally came to Vipul and asked him if they could arrange some fruits for him. So nice of her! The lunch ended at 3 PM.


Then there were some more events. The group discussion prelims. That event started at 4:30 PM. I was bored. So we just moved around and I took our my deck of cards and [omitted]. The contestants of the GD returned, and then it was time for snacks.

Then I had another event. The Senior gaming event. This has been our strength just once - last year, when Ahmed bhaiyya was the gamer. This year, the game that was selected was Need For Speed - Most Wanted on a PlayStation 2 console! I hadn't played games on a computer... and now I had to use a remote.

The organizers tried to start the game. But the game would not start initially. Later (when it did run), the game crashed in between. So the game was changed. We now had to play Tekken - the game in the junior gaming event.

The event was taking place on a PS2, so there were two remote controls. The game was being projected onto a screen. The room had been darkened, so it was clearly visible.

When the game started, I had to select my player. I thought my player had been selected, but actually, that player was my opponent's player. My player was some girl. So when the game started, I was extremely shocked, that I had to play with a girl... and in front of her was a muscular hunk. No match. My opponent won 2 consecutive round. Then I won one. But finally, he won another round so he was declared the winner. I did not qualify. So we lost the senior gaming event.

Then we again roamed here and there for some time. The web design event had started. So had the programming event. And the strangest thing of the day happened. Our teacher escort, Mrs. Vinayak was [omitted].

Finally, we left Jaipuria at around 7 PM. While leaving we met Mr. Khanna. And there was some peon who had asked several times if Mr. Pankaj Gupta had left the school. I came to know that he was now in Delhi.

We boarded the bus again, and we were on our way back to school. A lot was discussed about [omitted]. Then Vipul and I sat together. He told me the things he did and didn't in the web design event. And when we were back in school. All of us went back together. We'll meet tomorrow again, at 8:15 AM.

Lets see what happens tomorrow. I have two event - Surprise and X-plode.

Today started off very normal. Nothing unusual. But the day ended very unusual - I showed magic to a MAJOR personality - Mr. Ashish Vishnoi.

Today was our maths coaching. When I reached there, the class started earlier than expected. So my plan of showing magic to Mr. Neeraj was foiled. Today's class was quite interesting - graphs. Liked it a lot!

When the class was over, I decided that I would show magic to Mr. Neeraj now. I asked him, and he cheerfully replied, "Yup"! He positioned himself under a light so that he could clearly see what was happening. And then I started the magic.

As soon as other students saw cards, everyone flocked around Mr. Neeraj and me. Both of us were surrounded by students! Did the magic... and everyone was literally stunned. The two cards he was holding changed right in his hands... and I never touched them!

Earlier I had thought that I would not be able to do the trick successfully... I was surrounded completely on all sided... but I was extremely surprised that I was able to pull off the trick wonderfully!

Anyways, Mr. Neeraj had some work, so he left. After some time (while I was keeping my cards back), I saw Mr. Vishnoi coming near his car. It was completely unexpected. I just asked him... "Would you like to see some magic?" It was wonderful to see the expression on his face - completely surprised! But he cheerfully agreed to see some magic.

Let me introduce you to Mr. Ashish Vishnoi. He teaches us maths. He is very tall... maybe around 6 feet 5 inches. A really good teacher with a good sense of humour. He has been interviewed on Aaj Tak too!

I had thought that he would frown or do something else and not watch the magic... but he smiled and accepted my "proposal"!!

Then, I began. I asked him hold is hand palm up. And placed a card (Ace of spade) in his hand. Then he placed his other hand on the card. Then I took another card (Jack of diamonds) and waved it over his hands. And presto - the card that was inside his hand was in my hand! And the card in my hand reached his hands! He was completely befuddled!!!

Then he asked me...

Kis school ke ho? Appearing ho kya?

(You are from which school? Are you an appearing student?) To this I told him the name of my school... and told him that I was an appearing student!!

Then he said...

Toh tum IIT ki taiyari kyun kar rahe ho??

(Then why are you preparing for the IITJEE?) I just smiled back and took it as a compliment!

Then he asked if the pack of cards was special. Of course, it wasn't! Then he "challenged" me that these tricks can be performed with only certain cards... not all cards can be used.

Immediately I spread out the cards in my hands and and asked him to pick one - any one. But it was by chance that he picked one same card again... the Ace of Spade. Using that card, I did a trick in which the same card keeps jumping back to the top! Not once... but thrice the card jumped back to the top after being placed in the middle!

But then he checked the deck to see if there were any duplicates... and there were none!

And then he went back to his car for some work... and I reached my van. There were some people there... all of them asked me question about it... but I was too happy to answer properly!!

One of the other vans was not starting, so they used the battery in our van to start it (it did not start by pushing). That took about 15 minutes. We stayed there outside the coaching. Then we returned back... on our way back, our van's back tyre got punctured. But luckily, we had an extra... so our driver quickly replaced it!

And I'm here... writing this blog! Extremely happy!!

PS: It seems that Orkut's "Today's fortune" is true. My fortune today is

Your present plans are going to succeed

So, maybe I should start trusting the fortunes! Link: http://www.orkut.com/





Happy Deepawali everyone! Enjoy the holidays!

Joke of the week

A man shoos away a mad dog and hence saves an old lady in the US...

Journalist interviewing titles his report: "US CITIZEN SAVES OLD LADY FROM MAD DOG"

The man replies "I'm not a US citizen"... The headline is changed to...
"FOREIGN HERO SAVES OLD LADY FORM MAD DOG"

After a short interview... the man says... "im from PAKISTAN"... The headline in the newspaer the next day read: "TERRORIST ATTACKS LOCAL DOG"!!!!!!!

Okay everyone... our school magazine Juvenilia is almost ready. The magazine is currently being printed and we will most probably receive it before the Diwali holidays.

What's new in the magazine? Everything. The entire format of the magazine has been made livelier. Each page is a coloured and glossy page. And guess what... my photograph will be there on the first few pages!! I'm one of the editors of the magazine!

The photograph of the editors was taken last Saturday. There are four editors: Shefali Porwal, Saumya Gupta, Varsha Saha and myself. We were not told that the photograph would be taken that day, so we did not have ties. So we borrowed some from the school stationery. Saumya was absent, so Mrs. Bhattacharya called her. She arrived at school at 10:30 AM.

All of us were told to reach the lobby at 10:30 AM. But when I reached there, no one was there. So I hunted around the school for everyone. And finally when I reached the lobby once again, I saw everyone there hunting for me.

Anyways, the four of us were led into the Principal ma'am's chamber. Mr. Goyal positioned Mrs. Nandi, Mrs. Bhattacharya, Mrs. Bhatnagar and us. The short Varsha and Saumya in the middle, the long Shefali and I on the sides. :D The teachers were in front of us.

Then, the lights were setup. I have been to Principal ma'am's room quite a few times, but I never noticed the number of small lights in the room. Mr. Goyal switched on some of those small lights and turned on the tube lights. Then, he took 2 shots with his digital camera.

After our photograph was taken, we went back. We returned the ties... one of which was not used... Saumya (who was absent) had brought her tie. And returned back to class.

I did some magic at school again... cards, coins, and the levitation. I did it for Sahu ji too... he was quite impressed. Today I did a levitation for a few teachers. They were all (as the Americans would say) "freaked out"!

Comfest is approaching. Today's 13th and its on 28th. I'm not in web designing. I wanted to be in that, but events clash. :( More participants should have been allowed as the number of events have increased.

Plus, there's an inter-branch and inter-school Online Computer Programming contest! More on that later... its too late...

I've received a lot of positive feedback... thanks everyone! Thanks for taking the time to read the blog and letting me know what you think about it!

Today was our assembly. And the singers prepared the song just yesterday.

It all started in the English hour just after lunch. No one remembered that it was our assembly today. When we reached the conference hall, Mrs. Bhattacharya "mocked" at us. She told us that she had prepared what she would speak, but we had not prepared what we would do.

We had already decided the theme a month back... umm... I should say circumstances had decided the theme when someone in class had lied to Mrs. Bhattacharrya. Yup, the theme that was decided was Honesty. But all of us convinced her that the theme of our assembly should be Mahatma Gandhi.

Just after the English hour were 2 practical hours... the singers practiced the song during those hours... the song was "Bande mein tha dum... bande matram" from Lage raho munna bhai. I just don't understand why our assembly always has some "filmy" song! Since 8th class, the assembly of our class has always had a song from some movie.

During those two hours the speakers prepared some speeches.

And we did the practicals. It was a titration experiment in which we had to find the number of molecules of water of crystallization in ferrous ammonium sulphate. The experiment was interesting and was fun to do. After all of us had done the practical, I did a simple trick for our practical teacher. I placed a coin in one hand, and it travelled to the other hand! She liked it!! Also showed it to Sahuji!

Back to the assembly. The assembly was ok. Not too good, but ok. But Mrs. Bhattacharya still spoke on honesty!

Blog super-update

I've added lots of hi-resolution photos to my blog. I had taken the photos a couple of weeks back from Mr. Goyal, but I couldn't find time to upload those huge photos. During these holidays, I've finally uploaded them. From now on, I'll try to post something everyday.

Here are the links:

Teachers Day
Dance competition
Spic Macay

Guess what... Comfest is coming closer... its on 28th of October, and today's the 2nd.

Gandhigiri

Bole toh... Gandhi jayanti hai aaj! Aur saath mein Dussera! Ahinsa aur hinsa ek hi din par... mast hai baap!

If you've seen Lage raho Munna Bhai, you know what I mean! Enjoy the holidays!