Welcome to Research!

A time invariant dedication to anyone into research.

My quantum mechanics teacher during our Master’s degree, one day, looked at our blessedly ignorant faces and took it as his duty to declare, ‘There walks not a single researcher on earth, who has shed no tears during his days of PhD!’ Keeping aside the debate regarding the validity of such a statement, that day I could see the scars of his past in his eyes. But back then I felt no compulsion to probe deeper.

Now here I stand-

1. after willingly humiliating myself in seven different interviews in five different cities;
2. storming and thundering inside home with passionate speech about why I want to do research;
3. convincing all my grandparents, uncles, aunties, cousins and some skeptic neighbours that doing research out of home town is absolutely the best idea;
4. trying not to envy friends who already have jobs;
5. and, as one of my previous posts suggests, escaping the deadly clutches of marriage-

as a fresh full-time PhD scholar. Already with a supervisor.

As soon as we joined we had to jump into this weird supervisor hunting game which reminded me of musical chair (with so many people in war over a few targets), only more ferocious and serious. We kept spying over each other lest someone else may steal our choice supervisors. Then soon began our course works. Amid all the hustle, the excitement of being in a new institute, new city and having new friends had worn off.

The senior scholars had started their preaching sessions. The long lonely ones who’s been here for endless summers, in search of fresh "empathisers", started ambushing us during lunch, dinner, tea-time, bed-time and any other time we stumbled upon them. At our shocked responses, they promptly assured us it’d not take long before we underwent similar transformations. Criticising guides would not only become normal but also quite good for health.

As work with my guide(supervisor) is accelerating, fear of not being able to keep pace made me cancel my long planned short trip home. Unsuccessful attempts at ongoing project and the approaching evil mid-semester exams are making me jump out of my skin everyday. Presentations, quizzes, solving extraterrestrial problems and head banging have become very normal. Waiting hours on supervisors, envying friends with day offs, actually being unable to find time for movies doesn't sound very strange any more. When I was given my own room in the hostel, ideas of all the things I would do- if I had a room alone for myself- didn't manifest due to sudden departure of my mental sanity.

Although we soon hope to master the art of researching-

1. which includes endless days in front of our computer (or tinker with instruments) without actually being productive;
2. art of playing hide and seek with our guide;
3. convincing the institute for a hike in stipend;
4. assuring ourselves that we are not the only ones who suck at doing research;
5. and fooling our supervisors into believing we’re the best they could have had-

for now I am learning not to let the most important days of my youth pass by before I had time to catch my breath.

Nights With Lights

Usually I boast of a mind far from being inquisitive. I sustain on spoon-fed knowledge, hardly very nourishing. So it was more due to want of options than interest I became a LASER specialized student. Since then I and Lasers had become intimate enemies. No amount of humiliation at laboratory viva or spooky experiments involving exorbitant apparatus were able to impart my inertial mind a touch of acceleration.

So when our teacher offered us non-compulsory mini projects last semester, I knew what I was going to do. Under his persisting insistence, I presented my best resistance and won. It was only later I was appraised of the fact that one of the mini projects might have been the 3D holographic images. A feeble flutter arose in my brain, but the looming semester exam swiftly slayed it before I could further analyse the foreign premonition.

Three months passed by with my mind safely in hibernation mode. Last week, for Reflections 2014 (a scientific event organised by our Dept. of Physics on the occasion of National Science Day), I heard, my fellow classmates were trying to develop the same 3D holographic image. My ugly conscience roused itself and sure enough my indolent brain was in deep trouble. An unusual amount of a certain kind of emotion called ‘curiosity’ started getting the better of me. One must appreciate the amount of effort I put in to say ‘no’ to my laziness. Due to the obvious demand of pitch darkness of all LASER labs, the experiments were shifted to night time. So even harder was to tell ‘no’ to my slumber beckoning me at 10 of clock. Convincing my friend to give me a lift on her bicycle (of course mine doesn’t have pressure in the wheels- credit goes again to my sluggishness), in the slightly cold night I and five more classmates gathered at the department to carry out our nocturnal experimentation.

Our guiding faculty was not one to beat about the bush. The Optical table (on which the set up was established), he told, was not a company made product- rather another Master Degree project of one of our senior constructed with barely a few thousands of rupees. He assured us of zero help from his side (being busy with the organising of the event). So we were supposed to start from the scratch, which was exciting yet not promising; especially for someone always ready to shirk from duties. With only numerous packed boxes to start with, I admit I was pleasantly surprised to see, my friends had already achieved the required complicated alignment by the time I joined them. In Laser experiments, alignment is the most important and tricky section. The first time they had tried to test the alignment, the laser beam had diverged into infinite number of beams, illuminating the whole dark laboratory momentarily. To have finally minimized them all into that one high intensity coherent beam with subtle manipulations is a sure call for commendation! Oh, how many lab classes I had let pass without any results thanks to the requirements of precautionary alignment! Forget about the lost marks.

The set up fixed magnetically on optical table, we fumbled through with cutting of photographic plates (which cannot be taken out in light other than in the presence of dim green wavelength photons as specified by the manufacturer)and clamped it in place without disturbing the object (a small cute white elephant of dimension approximately 3x2x1 cm). Forget about all the tripping over each other’s feet and the legs of the screens blocking our path. Withstanding the impending huge yawns and loud snores, we ploughed on with our trials and errors with the exposure and developing time of the photographic plate. Each failure was a little heart breaking followed by insane ideas on improvement, chitter chatter nonsense and some prophetic visions. It was all frustrating with drooping eye lids and painfully slow procedures, but we had to try once more.

One night ended with the 3D image of a beheaded elephant while the other with an elephant head without body. Eight attempts later, the third night finally produced the desired image on the photographic plate. The clinging fatigue, dark circles around sleep deprived eyes forgotten, an excited clamour followed that marked the success of our project. Undoubtedly, a huge turn up was there at the entrance of Laser lab for Reflections the very next day.

Besides the excitement of the nights, I finally got to know my friends better before I finish the course two months hence. Turned out, they are not as terrible as I thought after all.

Laser had gone and hooked my attention. I decided to finally go read the text book we were prescribed the previous semester for Laser Theory, and for once my laziness was too lazy to put up any fight at all.