General Knowledge

As some of you know, I’m part of a foundation which sends poor Indian kids abroad to have fun and make friends.(At least that’s everyone who is not in the foundation thinks). Anyway, every year a few more people are inducted into the foundation to become trainees, and to get through they have to pass a couple of tests.

While creating question papers and organising things so that everything goes smoothly on the day of their tests is not exactly a lot of fun, correcting their papers most certainly was.
Especially the 10 general knowledge questions that were asked, just 10.. And the answers were unbelievable!

Take this one
1) Born in Honolulu , Hawaii, this person lived in Indonesia during his early years .His middle name is Hussein.a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, he has served in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004. Who are we talking about?

The answer is, as most of you know, Barack Obama. But, did you pause to think that it might have been MF Hussain, Zakir Hussain... or even better, Saddam Hussein ??! When did he study at Harvard?

Or, how about this one..

2) This 140 km structure was built in 1961 and broken down on November 9th 1989. Also known as the “mauer” it was protected by a group of people called ‘grepos’. What are we talking about?

We were talking about the Berlin wall, but apparently the people who were answering the paper were talking about other things.
The answers were.... The Great Wall of China! If it had fallen down in 1989 I bet most of us would have heard about it. Or how about the Eiffel tower? Apparently that’s 140 km long. Use your head people, there’s a reason you have brains you know.

3)What was presented by France to the United States in 1886, to represent the friendship established during the American Revolution?

Ans: the Statue of Liberty. But some people were thinking out of the box, and the answer I like the best was – a diamond ring. Apparently someone thinks France and US were planning to get married.
3) But, my favourite—what is the collective noun for whales?

Have you heard of a swarm of whales? Or a herd of whales? Or a class of whales? (Someone thinking along the lines of ‘school of whales ’)

All these answers make me wonder why do we bother to call it ‘General Knowledge’?

Connecting with Joey

Examinations bring out the Joey in me. (Joey as in the guy from Friends the sitcom. Not a tiny kangaroo.)

Here’s the situation, you figure.

Scene 1: VTU 5th semester exam

Piggy1: describe a motor and write down its fundamental points with regard to a) the starting operation..
Piggy2: What the heck? Which subject is this?? Please tell me I didn’t study the wrong thing again!!
Piggy1: hold on, I‘ve heard about the motors part..
Piggy2: motor? Generator? Starter? Rotor? Hello??
Piggy1: you can do this.. Come on ‘ a starter is something that starts the motor..’
Piggy 2: we are so totalled.

Scene1 with Joey: Joey is trying to guess the object-

Gene: You put this in your coffee.
Joey: a spoon! Your hands! Your face!
Gene: It's white.
Joey: Paper! Snow! A ghost!
Gene: It's heavier than milk.
Joey: A rock! A dog! The earth!
Gene: Pass!


Scene 2: Viva during practical exams-

Person with weird moustache: how many poles does a transformer have?
Piggy1: 2.. No wait its 4. Ya, its 4. I’m sure of it.
Piggy2: don’t make up stuff. You’ll only lose 2-3 marks if you say I don’t know.
Piggy1: no it’s 4. Go ahead.
Me: four, Sir.
Weird moustache: A transformer has no poles I say! You should be more thorough with your basics!!

Scene 2 with Joey:
Joey: Who knows what I might say this time?
Chandler: If only there was something in your head to control the things you say!


Scene 3: What I fear might happen during placements!


Joey: In my spare time, I, uh, read to the blind. And I'm also a mento for kids.
Interviewer: A "mento"?
Joey: You know, a mento. A role model.
Interviewer: A men…to.
Joey: Right.
Interviewer: Like the candy?
Joey: As a matter of fact, I do.

The Very Beginning

Here goes!

For a person who believes “when doing something, go the whole way” jumping onto the blog bandwagon is not an easy task.

For those who want to know, here is the objective of this blog in a large nutshell:

To write for my very own enjoyment. To NOT take myself seriously, to make silly mistakes and then to say that I’ve learnt from them. To try and possibly capture the funny and poignant moments of my day and transfer them in their entirety.

To put to use my camera to capture some of those poignant moments and let all of you share in them as well. To do a lot of other non-sensible things, so that my split personality can finally revel in the freedom of being as whimsical and goofy as it wishes to be.

This blog is dedicated to family, friends, food and fun- all the F words in my life!