The City of Nawabs!

As I stated in my previous post, we moved to Lucknow. It was a decision my father took for my sake. He had been offered to undergo a course for further promotions, but staking his career, he decided to take a study leave for the sake of my studies.

We had our own house in lucknow. Dad had bought it in 1996. Its location was quite good. It was inside an army society. The only problem that i faced was that there weren't people of my age. Since I was changing schools after 11th class, finding a school was a task in itself. Quite a few schools rejected me despite of my class 10th and 11th scores. Finally i got admitted to Chiranjiv Bharati School. It was probably the least reputed school in the whole of lucknow. But I thought that may help me concentrate on preparation for IIT-JEE.

After finding the school we set out to find a suitable coaching center. Luckily FIITJEE had opened a new franchise center in my locality. So i took their test and got admitted there. I had heard a lot of good things about FIITJEE and was quite anxious to study there.

My session in the school started as did the classes in FIITJEE. Soon enough i had figured out that i didn't have to do well in school, but only clear JEE. Since that was the sole aim, i took school quite lightly. I made only a few friends in school and hardly looked at girls, I had to concentrate only on JEE at that time. One of my good friends in school was Anshul. The thing i liked about him was his happy go lucky attitude. He was very supportive and a true friend. Later on i befriended the best student in class, Binny. He was a very simple guy. He never thought ill about others. I didn't face any problem with studies at school.

At FIITJEE the scenario was different. On the first day itself, i got a mild shock. The batch that had been selected comprised of about 40 students. Out of them only 3 or 4 were 12th appearing, the rest being 12th passed. That made learning a tough job. The teachers always assumed us to be at the same level as them. So it was difficult to meet the expectations of the teachers. At times, i thought of giving up. But i simply couldn't. The very thought would make me feel ashamed of myself. I had always been a fighter, how could I give up?

I made a very good friend at FIITJEE. His name was Saket. He was like a guide to me, always helping me understand difficult things. I must say what i got after class 12th was half because of his help. He not only helped me with acads, but also helped me focus and not to give up. I remember one of his sayings which I'd like to quote, "Being a 12th appearing student, you have a better chance of clearing JEE than any 12th passed student." We used to live quite closeby so we went for the test series together. I remember that whenever we used to get out of the exam hall and discuss the paper, we found that we had attempted all different questions. We used to say, "If we sit in the JEE together, we'd definitely get AIR under 100!"

The thing that made it even more difficult for me to perform at FIITJEE was that a 12th appearing student was sharper than any student in class. Her name was Arushi. She somehow knew everything and was the best candidate for JEE from our batch.

During my year at school, I won 2 computer quizzes. One of them was an international event at MacFair International at City Montessori School. It was an amazing feeling, I actually got to talk to Barry O' Brien after the quiz!! I even had my photograph printed in a local newspaper, though it was a co-incidence. Things like these kept me going and motivated me throughout for JEE.

During my stay in lucknow, the only places i travelled to were, my school, FIITJEE and sometimes to a restaurant to have dinner with the family. I remember the restaurant called Aryan's was the best in the city. It served amazingly delumptious food!!

Finally the boards arrived. I did quite ok. Maths and Informatics was as usual good. English was so-so. Rest were all fine. Then there was JEE screening in April. I was shivering while leaving for the test. Dad dropped me to the place of my test. I started the paper, and when i came out I thought I had done reasonably well. But later after comparing my answers with those posted by FIITJEE's website, I thought I wouldn't make it. Later when the results were out, I got a big shock. I had cleared the screening test!!! It was an amazing feeling! Probably the best I had ever experienced. The test which was still left was the JEE-Mains exam.

Not taking any chances I had applied for AIEEE, BITSAT, Orissa-JEE, VIT and merchant navy as well. I took these tests in the time span between my JEE-Mains test. On 22nd May 2005 I sat for the JEE Mains test. I had never thought that I would actually be able to see the three differently colored question papers of the JEE! The test was fine, but I did badly in maths. Chemistry, which was my strong point, and physics were fine. But i had a notion that I wouldn't make it. Had i appeared a year earlier I would have made it...but then that would have been an altogether different story.

Now I had to decide where I would go for graduation. The options in my hand were not many. I had cleared VIT but had refrained from going for its counselling considering the distance and other factors. In AIEEE my position was not very good as I had appeared from U.P. I had an all India rank of 8000 odd. While my state rank was 1400 odd. It was quite disappointing. The options that I was left with were BITS, Orissa-JEE and Merchant navy at TS chanakya(which took on the basis of IIT-JEE).

After a few days, I got my result for BITS. I was getting MSc Chemistry(hons) at Pilani. I was overwhelmed. At first though my reaction was not very good. This was because, I wanted to go for Computer Science. But the reputation of the institute was unparalled. In a later iteration, I got Civil. I was happy. But something happened that day. My call from TS Chanakya/MERI Kolkata also came. They had their counselling 3 days after the joining date for BITS. I was confused. I had absolutely no idea about what I wanted to do. How can someone expect a 16 year old to decide for himself a career at the outset? My father guided me and told me that BITS would be a better option, although merchant navy offered immense opportunity for earning big money, the life wasn't all that good.

So I decided to go to BITS. That was the end of my stay at lucknow, though my family continued staying there for a year. A completely new and wondrous journey was about to unfold....do keep reading!