Typical Study Leave

We used to get about 25 days’ study leave before every semester exam. This is how mine would go.

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At the beginning of the study leave I’d think I still had a lot of time to revise the chapters, so I would not be very serious about preparation. Then, after two-three days I would work on a detailed ‘study plan’. I would write dates across the list of chapters in the syllabus book, very confident that I would finish studying those topics on the earmarked days.

It’s time to start studying. Lot of breaks was taken in between. My idea of taking break was to help mom in getting groceries, teach bro Trigonometry even if didn’t ask for any help with the subject, watering the plants and paying bills; plan how to spend the vacation following the exams. And this “planning” consumed quite a lot of time and effort! I’d be in great disposition to do everyone favours. During that one month, I’d be an achcha baccha at home.

My endeavor followed Gaussian curve peaking at the middle of the study leave (with quite a good a good bandwidth). Ten days into the study leave was the time to burn the midnight oil. A cup of tea kept me awake through the night. My best friend and I used to exchange text messages every hour through the night keeping each other awake and going. She would diligently study and I would listen to radio Indigo which played great music all night; but I did study between the music. And I’d like to thank the dogs in my locality who barked at regular intervals to wake me up in case I dozed off on the text books. Some days I went to sleep at the break of dawn with the birds’ song for lullaby.

During an all-night study, when it was time for a break, I’d join dad to watch a black & white movie and term it “classic”. Then I would discuss with him the movie’s finer points like an expert critic. After the break, back to serious studies. Certain topics were beautiful; some interesting; some challenging. The beauty of certain subjects held me glued to the corresponding books. Also, I have felt like tearing away few text books.

We had two kinds of text books, the prescribed ones and the ‘Indian author’ versions (read VTU version). A lot of the prescribed books were good. But I feel it would help a great deal if the university prescribed better text books and asked sensible questions than requiring students to mug up lengthy derivations and solve huge (pedestrian, though) numerical problems on Laplace transforms, Bessel functions etc that are given ‘very well’ in the Indian-author books. 'Very well' here means ‘how to arrive at a solution and score grand marks in the exams’ and not necessarily ‘the actual meaning of the concepts and problems’.

I have studied from some of the finest books, form the ISRO library. The way they have presented topics keeps the student’s interest. These books explained what the transforms and functions actually meant and why we need them.

(OK, enough of the outburst now :) )

When it was about a week before the exams began, I’d feel I had studied quite a lot and there was no need to study all night now; slow down the pace, it’s ok. You have to relax before exams. Stress can act negatively you see. So, back to the initial phase before the peak :)

Just before the D-day, sunset looked brilliant, music sounded better than ever… but I had to revise…

This episode played eight times :)

PostScript: VTU – Visweswaraiah Technological University aka V torure U :D