My fascinasssiiioonnnnn

My fascination with Civil Engineering began on 8th Feb 2003 - 6 years ago today, or was it that walk in KBR Park-wayyyy back when in school-when dad explained to me how dams function and how hydroelectric power is generated? Anyway, when I first came to know what Pre-stressed concrete was all about and got to see girder casting at various stages, the whole concept of manipulating materials to get higher and higher load bearing capacity structures blew me away. Way back in 10th class when I wanted to be a doctor and was completellyyyy fascinated by the whole I-can-help-save-another-person's-LIFE seemed to be the most noble thing in the world, I remember asking my mom what is that noble about civil engineering anyway it is just roads and buildings it isn't so vital. Ignorant little sneha!!! Mom replied that the roads we built helped people get medical help, help farmers transfer their produce in time etc etc... I got the point, but was never completely convinced. Some time later I did decided to do engineering anyway since I "couldn't study sooooo much!!!"

I joined civil engineering anyway 'coz I fell in love with it and besides, as I did rationale much later, I disliked coding and working on a comp for hours, anything microscopic didn't really get processed in my head, everything had to be macro, and I didn't like mechanics as much... I pretty much had no choice. Well all that reasoning came much after I joined civil engineering. though I still don't understand how I thought I'd be a civil engineering without liking mechanics.

Once in Civil Engineering every subject I learnt (after the 1st year) made me realise how important it is in the society today. True computers might have made life easier and more comfortable... But almost every other comfort of a CIVIL-ized society comes from the drawing board of a civil engineer. Safe drinking water, water distribution, rain water drainage, water for irrigation, canals for irrigation, disposal of sewage, homes, schools, hospitals, offices, stadiums, theatres, roads, highways, expressways, bridges, airports, runways, sea ports, railways, dams, hydro electric power, power transmission towers, cell phone towers on and on... It actually blew me away how we are a part of everything that goes on in the world today. From water for crops to eat and water to drink and then safely disposing the waste created, hi-fi places to live in to smooth roads for your sports cars to zip by, electricity for your computers to work and cell phones to cover your network where ever you go... Be it essentials or luxury... ever at your service!!!

What one doesn't see is that behind all the hi-funda glossy stuff is the dusty yellow capped site engineer or an engineer back in the office turning over a million ideas in his head and making sure you get the highest priority of safty! Though all this hit me in under-grad and I went around feeling I was in a pretty much noble profession after all. Wondering how many people my designs would touch some day...!!! It took my grad class of High Speed Rail Engineering at UIUC and ONE map to make me realise what Civil Engineering is all about...

When high speed rail ~ 300Kmph can make one whole country seem like one big city... Just imagine!!! Just imagine what it does to your country's economy. You could be living any were and working any where. Your cities don't get cluttered up any more and your population is more distributed. Imagine what you could do with more living space per person! That helps you provide better basic amenities to everyone. Need and demand will not be limited by distance any more. You wouldn't have to migrate in order to survive. The wealth will also start trickling down to the grass roots. Well that's just my obsession with High Speed Rail now... But that is the same with any good transportation system - your local trains, subways, busses or even airplanes!!!

Then, there is my earthquake engineering class. Prof Elnashai keeps quoting in class that it is a science dealing with forces we don't completely understand, about effects we can't really predict, in a way the client doesn't know. He also says that after going through the earthquake characteristics we would get absolutely demoralised as to what can we really do about it?! True... totallly true!!! But we do go ahead anyway... To try and understand to make it a little better. How amazing that we are actually attempting to put up a fight with the forces of Nature!!! Woah... but hey... we have to do it! 'Coz quoting Prof Elnashai again 'when you have the whole crust and decide to build on a fault you deserve what you get' but we can't be that heartless now can we? We build your world after all!!!

as 'Random' as 'Musing' can ever get!!!

Every one is not the same… One of the easiest assumptions in life is that if I am like this then how can the rest of the world not be the same. If I feel so much pain over something everyone also must feel the same in the same situation. It is when they fail to react the same way that most of the hurts, fights, tears spring up. It is the most difficult thing in the world to place ourselves in another person’s shoes. I wonder if it can ever be done. Each of us is an end product of different water cement ratios with our own unique combination of admixtures; compacted to a different degree and placed in our own mould. How can we ever transcend all these differences and understand why a person behaves such and such???

So, did Hitler never feel guilty for all the atrocities that have been committed because of him??? May be the wonderful thing called conscience was never in his recipe at all. So he probably never thought of it that way. Like Alfred says in the Dark Knight “Some men just like to see the world burn”. The world around us offers us so many choices. So many paths we can take. I believe destiny has our own picked out way ahead of us… we get there some time in life. It is only the longer or shorter path that is in our hands. Well may be we also have this emergency button of totally shipwrecking our future also within reach. So, how much of who we are meant to be is really in our hands? If the right ingredients are left out then even the best of opportunities may not help us make the right future.

The only way to understand the present is to know the past. This was one theory I picked up from my uncle (Ravindranath Kola) when he told me that caste was kind of important even today because it gives us a broad idea of how people of a certain caste tend to behave in a certain way. So knowing what a person has been through explains his attitude and thinking at the present moment more then anything else. But then I am caught between thinking if their past excuses them for the present or is it a “so what? They should learn to get over it!” situation. I tend to lean over the former most of the time… unless I am too angry and then I wonder why they shouldn’t get over it. Then, when I mellow down I tend to think ‘well, not every one has the fire to get over big obstacles in life.’

Getting over our shortcomings is a difficult task. It is the task of life time I think. Though it seems that getting to know our shortcomings is the major hurdle I think it is mustering enough determination and courage to actually begin to change your own self. It is those rare individuals that do that that enter the historical records of great people admired and slightly envied by the rest of us common folk. I know I have contradicted my own statement many times… but then again there isn’t a universal right or wrong is there. It is all a matter of perspective… and each situation calls for its own set of rules to play with.