Y is for yearbook

I was searching for some documents in our underbed storage compartment when I came across very old photos of Viv and me from our university days, when he had legendary pimples and I had legendary hair. (A classmate once remarked, "What's up with your hair? You look like Einstein." A compliment that is not.)

I also found our yearbooks! The yearbook issued by the university just had photos and course names, but the other one, the one that our immediate juniors had designed for our farewell had elaborate write-ups! Check out what our juniors thought of Viv and me back in 2002.

Viv's write-up

Legend:

GIGs - The name given to our batch by our Indian seniors. Every batch got a name, which followed this format: [first letter of choice of expletive] + IG (Indian Gang). I'll let you imagination run wild on what the G stood for.

CHIGs - Our immediate juniors

VP - Vice President

OC - Orientation Committee (lame attempt to give a formal and official name to what was essentially organised ragging)

The Baatman - Viv's computer's name on the shared network because Batman is (was?) his favourite superhero

 My write-up

Legend:

Official IG snap rigger - One of my hobbies was to take candid photos of people in the IG and 'rig' them by using MS Paint and Powerpoint to create 'stories' and comic strips, complete with speech and thought bubbles. I then used to share them on the network (my computer was called Sayesha!) for everyone. People used to actually message me asking for more! Ah, glorious days. Wonder where all those files are now.

Sangam - The annual inter-hostel culturals, which often became a matter of life and death. One of the most fulfilling parts of my university life actually.

'Scores of people think she is the most creative person in their batch' - The CHIGs got all the GIGs to vote and determine who was the funniest, who was the most creative, who was the craziest, who was the one most likely to end up in prison, etc. Apparently I was the winner in the 'Funniest female' category, which they announced at our farewell party (but they didn't mention it here, hmmph!) and came second in the 'Most creative' category, losing out to a Photoshop genius.

NTU - Nanyang Technological University, our alma mater

Tarang - The annual tooth-and-nail culturals between arch rivals NTU and NUS (National University of Singapore)

RIGs - Our immediate seniors

spine - This needs clarification. Contrary to how it appears, I didn't whack his spinal cord! The spine (there were two actually - north spine and south spine) was a part of the university building where we had our classes.

My warning message to all IGs - No, really. Our batch was NOTORIOUS. If there was an award for the worst batch ever (in terms of not studying, rule-breaking and the likes), we would win it hands down.