Of Chapels and Leture Halls

Monday, October 15th

Had two lectures in the morning, as usual. QM was boring. REL was fun. Went to Shivam's and practiced some more of the Hallelujah Chorus. Had some bits of last night's dinner that was left. Then I went to Trinity and booked a music practice room for an hour and tried out the notes of the chorus on the piano. Pity I didn't have the score with me. Tried to figure out the chords so that I could play at least the chords during the audition. Went for the audition at 1:15 to Queen's College. Didn't go very well. I was asked to sight-read a piece, which means you have to sing by reading the notes a bit of music you may never have heard or seen before. Failed miserably. Was told they'd be in touch.


Tuesday, October 16th

Woke up to a cloudy morning. Sneaked a jog before it started drizzling. Trudged through the rain to the department. Had a comp phy and then a thermal phy class. Met Dave Green for projects during the winter. He didn't have any. Almost forgot we had a Theoretical Physics - 1 (TP1) class at 12. Rushed to class 15 minutes late. Discovered that the class had also begun 15 minutes late.

Had lunch in the cafeteria (pasta again, terrible and expensive). Then we had a TP1 examples class, where we were supposed to solve problems given at the back of the handout and ask supervisors if we got stuck anywhere. Just like a supervision, except that the whole class was together. That was fun. Managed to solve 7 of the eight problems, before 4 pm. It rained all day today. Came to college at 4:30 and studied a bit. Met Nandhini at 8 at St. John's and we made peas and mushroom, gobi-aloo, dal and rice. Good food.


Wednesday October 17th

Got up at 6:15 to find it was raining. Went back to sleep blissfully. Missed the morning jog. Today we had QM and REL again. Slept in QM. REL was nice. We discussed dipole radiation. Got a mail from Queen's saying thanks-but-no-thanks and that they had been looking only for tenors anyway. Didn't have lunch. Shivam left for eddies and I hung around the department until 1:30, when Dr Rachael Padman (comp phy teacher) was holding her research review meeting. Attended that and then left for college. Made pasta and soup here in college and lunched at 4 pm. Tried to study a bit but wasn't too successful. Booked a music practice room and practised from 6 to 7:30. Came back and stared a bit longer at the REL problems when Nandhini came knocking.

Went to Sainsbury's and bought some shelled corn and 5kg of potatoes. Went to John's and made some delicious beans-aloo-makki, rice and dal. Came back and went off to sleep.


Thursday, October 18th

Went for jog today. Had baked beans for the first time in the hall for breakfast, along with customary cereal. Not bad. Went to the Cavendish for lectures in comp phy, thermal phy and TP1. Then had lunch in the cafeteria. Lamb pasta bolognaise. Today is the last time I am eating there. Small portions of horrible food for exhorbitant prices (Rs 210, if you wish).

Then we had the first compy phy practical class. We just had to sit in the computer room and pretend we were doing something useful. Actually, even that was not necessary. There were supervisor-like people floating about and you could call one if you wanted help in something. The computer room is nothing but a bunch of computers, which students use to check email and stuff. So there were people doing different things on the comps and not just people from part II Physics. The entire thing was not bad - we just have to show our face once a week there. Lasted three hours. Just came from there.

Will have some bread and beans-aloo-makki I saved from last night for lunch today (but didn't take it this morning). Then practise for the Trinity singers rehearsal tonight. Then the rehearsal itself. Have written to the Corpus Christi College CHapel Choir incharge, on a suggestion from the Queen's chapel choir incharge and arranged for an audition tomorrow afternoon. My fourth audition here. The previous three for the Trinity Chapel choir, Cadenza (acapella singers) and Queen's Chapel choir being unsuccessful. Let us see how it goes.

Have to finish the REL and Quantum mech questions also before supervisions on Monday and Wednesday respectively.

More soon.
Tanmoy