Ingenuity

Ingenuity (noun):

1. Inventive skill or imagination; cleverness.
2. Imaginative and clever design or construction
3. An ingenious or imaginative contrivance.
4. Something WE don't have.

I sit in class. I look around. Save a few, all I see are zombies - studious zombies, flirting zombies and sleeping zombies. I don't imagine any of us are sitting here out of fancy or interest (I'm certainly not). We are enduring it to finally land a safe job. We shall wrestle with our books and toil with our will (or not). We shall tread the path set in front of us, like so many before us. At the end of the day the bills are paid, heads held high, luxury and then some.

But none of us nourish our finer skills. And by 'skills' I don't mean dancing and singing. There are seven types of intelligence. Most of us are using less than one (and most likely the wrong one too). For all I know Sreejith would have made a great lawyer and Salmaan has the makings of a good orator, to speak of a few.. Likewise there are fields where we can perform a lot brighter but sadly not with as attractive a paycheck. The end result is that we end up hating what we have to do and sucking at it. The best thing we can do is use our creativity wherever we can under the circumstances. For example I've nice writing skills (I think). So instead of jotting down a few miserable points in the Chemistry exam I gassed it up with all lots of stories, poetry and linguistic knick knacks. I'm sure I'll get at least 5 marks extra for that (I hope).

Here's example of when we DON'T use our creativity: Remember the tagline for last year's 'Elecronite'? It was "Invigorating the Languorous Souls". WTF?! That's not creative; that's a guy looking through a thesaurus for sophistication. A great tag is one which is creative and which a non-Cambridgite can understand. Like the tag for iPod Shuffle: "Give chance a chance". Now there is a tag. Of course I can't ask us poor CETians to better Apple's marketing geniuses but I sure can challenge you. Speaking of Apple, the company was recently ranked the third biggest smart phone manufacturer in the world. Last year they didn't even have a smart phone section. Yet the iPhone fought its way to the top. There cannot be be a finer example of success through innovation. We had touch screens before that. We had all the hardware but it took Apple to bundle them all together to make the hot product it is now. Of course hard work is very important but creativity is irreplaceable.

I knew a boy once who had memorized the whole of R.D Sharma!!! He knew every answer from that book yet if you asked him how to do it, he'd go "ba ba ba". Ultimately he got into NITC for CS! The hero in this story is none other than our very own Principal's son (No surprise there!). I think in a way, we're all toned down versions him. Classic example: Manu. No matter how sweet I try to put it, what I have to say about Manu sums upto.... He's an idiot! (Sorry da Manu). He's robotic in his studies. I bet Manu studies harder than anyone else in our class. Yet the answers he write..... For instance: Manu didn't study 'Manufacturing Processes' in BME. So he didn't even attempt 'Advantages of Casting'! Ethe pole gas adikkan eluppam ulla oru question illa. Another example: Manu finished the portions for first series one week in advance. He ended up failing in 2 or 3 subjects!!! Ethengane?! Despite all this Manu has a big heart and he's very supportive. But I'll tell you who does use his head: Jery Altaf. Jery is an interesting character to talk to (partly because of his slang). Jery doesn't bluff, he means business. I sense that spark of creative thought in him.

What I'm trying to say is: think outside the box. Athu parayan aanu ethreyum kashtapette. I know where we all apply at least a little imagination - Maths. Sometimes we have to think outside the box to tackle difficult problems. But 'Engineering Mathematics' kills even that. All we're doing is clerical application of formula and theory. Only problems from the text will be asked for the exam (I'm in fact thankful for that, being a Math hater). After we pass out we're gonna land a job that's as clerical as we are. What's gonna set us apart is going to be our unique thinking. Else we'll be IT cattle for a long time. So I guess it'd help if if we nourish our imaginations starting now itself. How? Start with the little things. Make a joke, draw a picture, write a story or even better write a TechProp! That's how you work out your brain. Cultivate a good critic within yourself. Eventually you'll learn to grind your output to perfection. And finally, presentation. I'm sure everyone one of us will have to do a seminar sooner of later. Presentation ois as, if not more, important that what you're presenting. But..... I suck at that. So go figure.

Try it some time, at least for my sake coz it took me a great deal of effort to compose this post. This is me being creative. What about you?

Go on, Invigorate your Languorous Soul (whatever that means!)

EDIT: I don't mean to offend or ridicule anyone with with what I've written. Count it as a fool's rant if you must. I'm just tired of this system we're following. But, like a wise man once said, 'Only he who swims against the flow knows its strength'.