First Impressions

'109 new mail messages' Firefox smacks into my face when I boot my comp in Bangalore. After one month of virtually no computer usage, my semi-decent comp in bang is geek-nirvana.

NITK has been great fun. Learnt a lot of new things.

One thing I want to write about today is how people aren't actually what they seem to be. I've met a number of people in NITK and in many cases I've made wrongful judgements about them when I met them. As time goes by, it becomes painfully obvious I was wrong. Pride and prejudice can be thick smokescreens.

There's for example this one dude who's geeky. One would expect him to be shy. But he happens to be one of the best speakers in class. One lecturer actually asked him to talk about something to the class when she had nothing more to do. He gets a lot of negative feedback. I, for one, least care about whatever he speaks about. But what inspires me about him is his detachment from other's opinions and his courage. For me, that's real courage, not suicide bombing, not going to war.

Then there's this other person who seemed arrogant and possesing way too much 'attitude'. Nope. Turned out to be one of the coolest guys I've ever met in my life. This fellow will go WAY farther than others.

Then there's a fellow who I thought was extremely modest and nice but turned out to be, quite frankly, an asshole in many ways. He's ok, but he's still an asshole in many ways.

The point of the fire is that first impressions are almost always a pile of crap. The thing is the phenomenon of 'first impressions' is a subconscious process. It happens, whether we like it or not. People can easily put up a front and get a good face for himself. It's hard to wipe it off sometimes.

That's all I got to say about that.

Getting a cold when it's sweltering hot outside sucks - major time.