Who here wants a candy

For the past 47 posts on Thoughtspot I have refrained myself from writing about Rendezvous. One main reason was I thought it was impossible to shrink a four year experience to approximately a 1000 words, secondly, I have seen Rendezvous as a bookish Fuchcha in first year, vocalist of IIT Delhi music team in second year, activity head in third year and events coordinator in fourth, (No, I have not picked up this line from my CV) and when you have seen something this closely you'll find it difficult to draw happy memories out of it. Lastly, there is a tinge of fear that it might paint my image as a despo. But then you see after spending 4 years in IIT, nothing can worsen your image. So.. let's do it.

As put up by Rendezvous marketing team, Rendezvous is the biggest cultural festival of north India. Which is the smart ass way of saying that we are second to Mood Indigo, IIT Bombay's cultural festival. We receive a footfall of around 80,000 per day which is growing at the rate of 10 percent, for which credit also goes to ministry of HRD for bombarding IIT Delhi with more and more students. We promise a maxima of brand visibility, which would be inversely proportional to the length of the skirt of the anchor conducting your event.

But that's all for companies and wooing (fooling) them for sponsorships. For any other guy in IIT, who has spent half of his life in front of internet and rest half dozing off in classes or taking up the last seat so that he can have a good view of the 'only' good looking girl in the class, since the almighty has bestowed this institute with a 10:1 ratio; Rendezvous is all about girls.

Rendezvous is the time when the small town guys, coached for IIT in a small city, actually get to see what girls look like. It is the time when the 2 km road between hostels to institute, the so called lifeline of IIT Delhi gets to see color flowing in it. It is the time you know that the girl in your class whom you had been admiring for such a long time had a boyfriend. There are girls in wind-t, there are girls at podium, girls at chaat stalls, girls waiting outside Open Air Theatre (OAT), girls standing alone, girls in groups, girls laughing, girls dancing, girls singing, girls, girls, girls... so much so, that our eyes refuse to seek any visual signal of any 6.5 feet, dark muscular hunk who might also be present there standing next to these girls.

If you are selected in any IIT Delhi team, participating in Rendezvous, you have a reason to be happy, because rarely any team would be without the best faces of the institute. But if it is the institute Eastern Group Song which has a high talent quotient, participants performing in kurta- pajamas and a stage that has seen the deadliest of faces singing in sweetest of voices, then you cant blame your team director for demolishing your hopes. Now if these girls prefer to go for choreo, group dance, Lifestyle etc its not their fault.

Surprisingly, all these things rarely occur to you when you are a co-ordinator or activity head managing a long three day event. There is a sponsor shouting on your head making unfair demands, there is vendor asking for a cheque. In management, it is preferred that you buy on credit and sell on cash. But generally in Rendezvous, sponsors give half of the money in advance and your supplier asks more than that as a security, so in a way you are buying on cash and selling on credit. Although everything becomes all right after the event, but before the event, you are in such a financial crunch that it appears, the poor guy managing entire Rendezvous finances would kill himself and with no cash and a 3.5 lakh event to run, you wonder how much will they give you for your kidney :P.

Do you think at this point in your life, you would have time to worry about girls coming to Rendezvous when you are making an average 3.5 hour sleep in that week. If you are the co-ordinator then you get unknown people asking you for passes and if you are foolish like me, then by the time a lovely visitor with beautiful large eyes and cutest of the smile asks you for a pass, you have already given it to your idiot friends. And what more, these idiot friends of yours think you have and unlimited supply of passes which is so untrue, and when finally you refuse to give them passes, you become the bad guy, despite everything you have done.

In first year, every IIT fresher thinks once Rendezvous comes, he'll get a girl. People think those participating have better chances. Or that if you are managing Rendezvous, carry an all access pass you have a better chance at the crowd that limelights Rendezvous. But you see actually .... NOTHING HAPPENS that way. What happens is that you see your hostel guy, whom you had labeled a good for nothing, strolling with a girl and and when your eyes meet his, you have the epiphany of what he is thinking about you, a great clear bubble rising from his head which grows until you can clearly read- 'What a loser'.