Heights of Perfection

While I was traveling between pune and chennai, few thoughts were flowing in my mind. Here it goes… We were traveling at around 36,000 ft and we just rely on the machines designed by a human. Those machines were supposed to work with zero error. Any minute glitch will cause the devastation. I was just wondering how can anyone design such machines with utmost perfection. If it is a train, car, or bus…nothing will happen and the vehicle comes to halt. But imagine what will happen to a flight which is traveling at an altitude of thousands of feets. I guess designing zero error machines  will be taught in aeronautical engineering course . Thats really fantastic to learn abt them. When I am discussing with my friends, the thing that came up is that each flight will be operated by two machines to make it redundant. But I still wonder how the fail over takes when one machine fails. How are the uncertain things will be taken care by the pilot while traveling is still a mystery to me. Hopefully I will catch a guy who has roots in it and get more information regarding it.  I wish I would have been a pilot to experience or an engineer to design those kind of machines.

 

Fate of my Flights

Its no wonder when my last flight journey canceled after I received a short notice from my friend at IIT. Reasons cannot be explained here though weird. So I have to cancel the ticket. Last time I traveled to chennai and it is so pain to travel in sleeper class especially in summer. So this time few days ahead I booked air deccan flight to chennai as per notice from my prof.  Three days after that I canceled. This has not happened first time that I booked and canceled. ACtually this is the third time. First time I booked for my synopsis meeting to reach chennai. Everything was set and I got a short notice that It has postponed nearly one month. So I have to reschedule it . So thinking for almost so many hours I scheduled my journey to Hyderabad on aug 14th. This is to enjoy the holidays that includes aug 15th holiday also. But due to unforeseen and unfortunate circumstances I have to cancel this also.  So I have booked flight journey 4 times in my life so far and could able to travel only once and rest the three journeys canceled and of course with bonus of money loss also. Next time I have to go to chennai, I am not going to book flight. I will book train so that I wont disappoint even it gets cancelled.

 

Escorting CSTM-Chennai Express

Hey..dont get surprised by the blog title, how cum a software engineer escorting a train. Dont gets confused and just go thru the following. This is about a 2 weeks back where I have recieved a call from Chennai that I have to be in chennai by 21 may for presenting my synopsis. Generally if a call comes from chennai it 90% sure that we can expect it to not to be happen. Dont get stuck if u dont understand the previous sentence…just leave it n go ahead….So I went to the reservation counter for booking a ticket. It is as usual these days we dont get tickets available even before 15 to 30 days even by flight, train, bus. I felt it is even very easy to get an IIT seat when compared to seats in those means of travel. So stood in a long queue and waiting for my turn to get ticket and gets astonished by the waiting list number it would have. Unfortunately it was a big number 76 from Pune to Chennai in CSTM-Chennai Express. I thought it was still ok atleast I would get RAC. …………………………..day of my journey came before and started packing my luggage. checking very often in the website to know the status of my ticket. Finally after too many clicks at 3.00PM it stood at 48 and chart is prepared. Alas….what to do. No way….mind turned blank. Immediately approached frds to find out what to do as the train starts by 6PM. Frds told just board and give money to the TC to get a berth. So started early and waited for the train. I prepared myself look like a poor man. The more poor we look the less money the TC demand. This was my general opinion. But my gold chain twinkling in my neck. Who will believe ur poor? thought myself and covered my shirt against it. With lot of fear I boarded the train as soon as it entered the station. There are more number of WL people than those whose seats got confirmed. Finally when the train started accelerating I approached one TC who looks like a north indian. I could able to put somehow my word in hindi that I I need a seat. He hardly understood and the prompt response was louder NO. Oh my god………how to travel for 24hrs…..going to be very difficult. The fellow passengers whose seats are confirmed are not willing to accept us standing as there are many doing so and compartment was full. After a while a drunken (looks like) TC came and slept on the immediate berth next to me sweeping off people sitting temporarily there. I approached him and asked, Can I get a berth? NO …even louder was the reply……I kept silent and after sometime I figured out he knows telugu. I put the same words humbly in telugu. He got melted by my expressions and said ” go to S7 and sit in 60(dont remember exactly). Thank god and finally got it. After a while he came and demanded 300 bucks which I have to spend to purchase my sound sleep for that night. Started sleeping off…as soon as I got berth……..hours gone. I heard a sound at around 2PM in the midnight. When I woke up there was a bag beside me and there is a man who is in police attire just going beside me with a long latti ( stick). I hardly open my eyes and slept off. After a while he came to me and hit with latti on my legs. Immediately I woke up………..he told me “This is my berth………please vacate”. “I have paid money for this berth”..I replied. ha ha…… ha ha ……….he laughed and asked me “how much do I pay”. I said 300. This happens every night. They will sell the seats which are supposed to be occupied by the person who wil escort the train. I gave space to him and waited for the dawn of the next day sacrificing my sleep ……………………………