This is a topic I have long procrastinated posting, three years to be exact. I cannot be sure what exactly has kept me, lack of enthusiasm, lazyness, 'guts' or whatever. But it might just be the most controversial topic to be raised yet, but probably I am just overreacting, and anyways the blog has hardly any readers.
Well I think every IIT 'qualifier' has a story to tell, some words of wisdom to depart, except me. I truly admire people who have had to switch cities, adopt a totally new lifestyle, broaden their horizons, and gruel for two(or more) whole years preparing for the venerable exam. But first things first. How/Why did I decide to give the JEE?
It was almost an automatic decision. It was love at first sight when I saw my first computer, in class II probably, at a friend's house, and I used to be pampered and allowed to play Alladin, Prince, Wolfenstein 3d hours on end. Taking up medicine was out of the question, and that doesn't leave much left. (The blunder of taking Electical as a major, is quite another story.) It must be noted that I havn't ever had the habit of working for stuff I want, but given the ambience of the period, there was little else you could do. I still consider two years for any one exam a very silly affair, specially since everyone almost unanimously says they didn't do anything while in 11th; which might be an unfaithful answer, but thats not the point.
And so we joined FIITJEE, which meant we got to just go to a nice AC room(where we were delivered by a chartered auto), get (arguably)good education and ready made study packages, all in the name of preparing for the career. Of course the whole group at school was together there too, which resulted in regular hilarious lunch breaks(at someone's expense), not to discredit the lectures, which were equally jovial.
I run the risk of portraying myself as a arrogant slob, when I say I never considered JEE tough. In fact, one of my main motivations for preparing was actually to prove it, to flout the 'toughness'. And I still believe it. JEE is more of a hype created by training institutes than anything else. So its give by 300k people, but out of those less than 50k should even be considered as fair competition. I think if its just qualifying you are after, it should be breakfast. The main challenge is getting a proper rank. Its like people are making an effort to be stupid.
There are I would say are two defects which barr me from being the perfect candidate for JEE. One, my laziness, and two, I have a really pathetic memory, specially for numerical figures. However, these were resolved quite conveniently and automatically. One of the recurring features of the two years was my talking on the phone for hours solving people's doubts and clarifying concepts. Some of these concepts being which I had not read and hence I would ask them to explain to me first before solving the questions. This took care of my complacency delightfully, as I would always be in the know of the tougher questions and at least upto date with whatever others had studied. The problem of memory is more interesting. I am simply unable to memorise formulas or methods, and hence I had to understand the proofs and workings, making sure I found it obvious to proceed in the particular way. Although this hasn't been so successful in college, it always worked like a charm at the time, IIT being tailored with questions relating to proofs and concepts.
It did not dawn upon me until the very end the implications of being unselected, I always considered a done and out deal. The realisation came at the very end, I expect the period was after boards and before the exam, a good time to have your pants on fire.
An underrated attribute of the whole preparation phase is the importance of confidence. Confidence that you can solve a problem. That the question was made by a human, and it is meant to be solved, not handed down by some divinity and only to be touched by the gifted. This paranoia effects more people than you expect, some very good minds faltering just because of the destruction of their self-confidence.
Anyway what I pride myself of the period more than anything, is not falling for any of the foolhardy hypes or fads. It is actually intriguing to see folks just whiling away time in anonymous pursuits and then considering themselves not good enough for the exam. Well, in a way its true. Also, (and this is true for college as well, however here I find myself in the foolhardy category)another hilarious statement you get to hear is "If I study that much, I will be a lot more ahead." Right, really smart.
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