Mathemagics!

I have always loved Mathematics. Mathematics, in turn, has always hated me.

It started somewhere in Junior school, somehow of all marks in my report card & of all test-copies that were to be signed by parents, it was the maths column/copy I hated the most, & my father waited the most for. I was a scorer in Science, Economics & English & my eagerness for the English grammer & literature test copies was matched by my papa’s for my maths one. I remember fervently praying before I even opened my copy…even as I type this, I can feel the flexible copy between my fingers…I can smell it K

My earliest introduction to the subject dates back to those dumb(YES DUMB) dodging exercises in school. For the unenlightened, dodging was an exercise to rewards the magus   of the batch…those who by-hearted the multiplication tables n puked the answer as soon as the “13*9” escaped the teachers mouth… There was no time for the 9*3, carrying over the two n adding it to 9*1…I hated dodging…I dint have a choice L

After these pre schooling years, Mathematics graduated to another level. The next memory I have is of HCF & LCM (HAHA :D) I always forgot which one is which… & resultantly, many a times calculated HCF correctly for LCM problems & vice versa. They said I was careless…I wasn’t. Even in grammar I could not tell past perfect from present participle…but I got those correct. Unfair again…I dint have a choice L

Then arrived unitary method, time & work, percentages & linear equations!!! I loved them. They made sense to me! And papa was happy with the scores. Come standard 8^th & the choices I did not earlier have started to show. I did not like the teachers I got & they helped kill the remaining interest I had in the subject. I liked geometry & algebra, I did geometry & algebra. Period. Needless to say, my basics got all ruined by the time I reached standard 10^th. Lemme digress a bit here & discuss about my reading habits. I was a voracious reader (once upon a time) & comics of the like of chacha chaudary were never a part of my life, except in the early years of school life when socializing meant eating mango bite hiding one’s face during a class & exchanging comics. So things like “chacha chaudhary ka dimag computer se bhi tez chalta hai”, “saabu Jupiter ka niwasi hai”  were not hot favourites with me. Anyways, coming back to the topic, it was during my standard 10^th board exams that ghosts from the childhood came to haunt me. And what better time to choose than when I was sitting struggling with my exam paper. For a moment I felt everything was going darker… “din me tare…” situation from those comics came alive in front of my eyes. I went blank…!

I was surprised when I reached a decent score (even half convinced my paper got mixed with someone else’s!)  Anyways, being left ‘starry eyed’ shook me bad. I decided to make scores even with mathematics J I took up maths in 12^th. As they say history repeats itself. Horrible teachers, topped with focus on engineering competitive exam levels shook my confidence yet again. I even copied homework once from a classmates notebook L

Have you ever heard of guardian angels? No? I saw one! Two months before my exams began, a lady who just shifted in my neighbourhood decided to teach me of her own accord. I distinctly remember…she had asked me, “How do u like Vectors, should we start there?”,and I had replied,  “I do not know Vectors, you can start wherever…”  She wasn’t startled. She taught me. And for the first time in my life, Time fell short for answering that standard 12^th paper. I was happy J

I also continued with Mathematics in my graduation (thanks to that teacher) liked it, & moved on. Then XLRI happened…& QE happened alongside it L The teacher was a fine one, he loved his subject, appreciated it, but I lost it someplace, & never caught up…I was wrong, I never raised a hand to say I don’t know. Mansij taught me, those were the first night outs in my life…crazeee…Mansij, Karishma & me, huddled in our room… (No. 310) solving solved examples :D: D Now when I think of it, I can’t help grinning!!! Life is funny!!!

Why am I going on & on about Mathematics & I today? I was trying to solve an equation :P after an hour’s struggle I figured what variable was wrong where…& I thanked my stars I never wanted to be an engineer! One of my dear friends has a set of fancy statements he makes two among those are: “You would have made a good engineer”… “Mathematics is beautiful…its like economics”  I can only (stage)manage some expression before I purge the first statement from out of my head…as for the second is concerned, I don’t agree! (We can discuss this maybe if u happen to read this!)

Now I don’t know how to end this long account. Maybe I can quote another instance that just struck me! :D

Once, I got so enthusiastic about solving fraction addition, subtraction & division, that I solved all division questions like the addition one’s (you know, took a common denominator & all) Gosh! I hope my employer does not read this :D :D :D