DAY 2

12^th Aug:

Day two started off early at the Boy’s hostel. I was woken up by 5:30 Am by the sounds around. I got out of my bed(A mat on de floor) around 6. I was surprised to see people busy studying and discussing. There was mayhem everywhere. Thank god I wasn’t in CSE/IT. We got ready by seven. The mess was serving some sort of dosa. I decided to stick to my regular diet of biscuits.

It was 8:15 Am and we had reached the entrance of amriteshwari hall. There was a large group of people already present there. They were busy signing some paper. We waited for it but were rushed into the hall. We got it later at the hall. The hall had a seating capacity of around 500 people. It was teeming with activity with people hustling around. The girls had already reached and were seated upfront .We picked a nice cozy place for ourselves. There were a few amritapuri studens sitting in front of us. They seemed to be all excited about the prospect of getting placed in HP. The air conditioning was perfect. It had multiple exits similar to a movie hall. All these clarified my doubts of why placements happen at Coimbatore!!

The interiors were well crafted with sound proof walls. The lighting was perfect and complemented the grand interiors. Around 200 people had come down to get themselves placed in HP. The stage was huge enough to make the person on stage feel important. But no one used the stage!!! Probably the HP guys wanted to be down to earth with us. The program kicked off at around 9. Surprisingly there was no customary lighting of lamp or prayer. At Bangalore every small program starts off with a prayer + lamp lighting. Some technical expert started off with introducing of his colleagues. A mix of HR managers and technical experts had come down from HP. After a morbid seminar about life,career etc at HP for 45 minutes, we were segregated into groups according to our preferred domain(C,C++,Java). A few IT people had taken Java. Majority of them went with C. I some how hated the printf,scanf lingo in C so I opted for C++. Ananth and sumukh went for C. Myself, smitha,deepthi & neha took C++. We sat close by just in case any copying was required.

There were some 5 sections spread over 2 and half hours. There was no negative marking. The first section was on programming ability. There were 15 questions to be answered in 20 minutes. We were supposed to determine the outputs based on the algorithms given. I guessed my way out. Next up was analytical ability. There were some basic questions like finding odd one out and stuff. Then came the areas which I had never ventured into. C and data structures was too tough to handle. OS and networking, I spent time only on networking. The final section was the domain paper (C++). I was tired of the barrage of questions. I marked a few answers. Then we were given another section called WET(Written English test) which tested the grammar and written skills. That brought the test to an end. It was 1 PM. Sachin had been calling me for the past half hour. I called up to enquire. He broke the news that college had shut down for ten days due to swine flu. I was surprised that we got 10 Days holidays all because of a flu outbreak. This was something I badly needed. A break from the boring college. The result of written test was going to be announced at 2 PM. We rushed to the mess. Had a sumptuous lunch and got back to the hall by 1:45 PM. 31 people were selected for the technical interview. 2(swami and sriram) from ECE Bangalore were selected. Now that we were done with the placement obligations we were free to further explore the campus. We decided to take a break and then venture out. We got back to hostel . Played UNO for some time. We had booked our return tickets for 13th morning , now we were thinking of leaving in the evening by bus as some of them felt there was nothing much to see over here. But we decided later to stay on and leave the next day as there was no hurry now that the college was shutdown. We regrouped at the cafeteria around 4. Sriram had come back from the interview. We enquired about the interview experience. The interviews were being held in a guest house and the interview room was a dining hall!! Myself, ananth and sumukh went to the welfare department to find out if we could arrange a bus for dropping us at the station next day. He asked us to get a letter from the placement officer . We came to know that he was in guest house. Enroute we came across some AWESOME sceneries!! We met swami on the way. He was rejected in the interview and he was leaving back home. We wished him luck and moved onto the guesthouse. The guesthouse itself was a grand one.

We managed to enter the guest house. There were a few CSE girls eagerly waiting for their friends result. The placement officer advised to go by auto instead of a college bus and if we wanted to get a college bus, we were supposed to write a letter listing out the names of people who want a drop. We realized that it was not a good option of going by college bus. The girls were going for a stroll. We decided to join them. Sumukh was tired and he needed some rest before he went for swimming in the evening. Myself and ananth went on towards the swimming pool .we met the girls midway. They were going to see the swimming pool. Boys weren’t allowed at that time so we got back to the cafeteria. Sumukh was waiting for us at the cafeteria. We spent sometime there. Most of them at hostel had already left for home. A few CSE guys were there for company. We went to the pool around 6:15 PM. The scenic backdrop was worth a million. I spent most my time admiring the beautiful surroundings while sumukh enjoyed a dip in the pool. The swimming pool closed by 7 and we were off to the mess for our final dinner at ettimadai. Post dinner we went for a walk to the main gate and enquired the guards about possible modes of transport to drop us at railway station the next day. We didn’t get any concrete information from the. We decided the safest bet was to arrange a private taxi. With help of a friends help we got a quails arranged for dropping. After that we got back near our hostel . After the long walk , we were tired . We sat under the tree near amriteshwari hall. After about half an hour chatter we got back to our rooms. We played UNO for sometime.Now that most of the rooms were free, I shifted to a separate room. We slept by around 11 PM.