ACM ICPC

23Nov07

i cant seem to be able to blog regularly, but will make it up now with two (mostly) meaningless post!! Coming up is an account of our trip to IIT Kanpur.. to participate in the 2007 ACM ICPC Kanpur Site .

The online contest was held on Sept 22 or so. We looked at problems from the previous year and decided tat only a miracle would get us there. But one of the problems was about our beloved ABO blood group from twelfth standard (zoology portion) !! [ The problem is a 2007 world finals problem by name 'Consanguine Calculations' ]. As always, we manged to goof it up.. we were the first to submit from our college (by 10.30 or so). We had given up by about twelve o’clock when mit vijay asked us if we had handled the file input part correctly.. Drat! Changed the code and submitted at around 12.20.. The worst (or maybe the best) part was that they did only offline evaluation of code.. no status, no information about whether you got acc, nothing…!!

What followed was a tense two days ( not to mention one of the costliest xerox of our college life) .. we had little hopes of getting through when aruna found out it was a WF problem and our code gave WA!! Our talk had shifted to amrita icpc when results came and we were in!! Not only tat, 4 teams from our coll got through.. 8 girls and 4 boys!! We were a bit apprehensive at first, but what fun it turned out to be

It was a 2 night 1 day journey to Kanpur and the train was late (something that happens everytime with that route, we’re told). We had come to enjoy the trip, no doubt.. but we were more than lucky.. IITK’s cultural fest Antaragni was going on at around the same time and what a place it was. The college came to life only at night.. A complete show with so many food stalls ( we came back every night for the aloo chat!! slurpppppp!! ), a Salsa workshop, a nice stage (our banners do not come anwyhere near theirs) and to top it all, no stupid dress regulations.. what more could anyone ask for? Other stalls worth mentioning – Kanchan’s accessories.. it made Jhillmill’s prices look like a bargain; dart game – vinisha was the only one to give it a try; candy shop – shanmu bought something for 50 or so rupees and we decided our 50p orange mittai taste better!! :p

Then came the inauguration (with sumptuous snacks – the biggest gulab jamun i saw in my life, dhokla, kachori, something like the ‘kunukku’ they make at home and there must have been some more items i have forgotten) and the pratise contest. We are always lucky in practise contests.. we submitted the prblem as soon as they enabled the judge.. Everyone must have noticed the first team – Chocolat – tats us!! :d

We had the contest dinner that night and again what variety ( for the tongue as well as the eyes )!! what wouldn’t i give to get a double demotion and go to second year now?! sigh..

And at last the D Day.. we had no idea about how to solve the previous years’ priblems and were only looking at not coming out too soon. But looking the questions, most of them were as simple as 2006 amrita’s icpc. Thre was one on fibonacci numbers, one for which i used bfs, one about a chess board and one problem similar to the Play on Words problem at SOPJ and some other easy ones (i remember only these two). We solved 4 of these on first attempts, 1 took two attempts and we had no idea about the other two – problems A and B. We later learnt problem B was about maximal matching. Just like last year, we were continuously moving downwards in our ranking – we ended up 12th overall and 1st from our college. That was good enough – this was our second contest; but thinking of the previous years problems, i dont think i can complain.

The best part was that they called every team onto the stage to get their certificates – something that amrita dint do last year (one person distributed it to a crowd amidst much confusion after the function!!) Guess where we went after the function..? yes for our final ‘aloo chat’. Antaragni was ending that night.

Thanks to Jayasree’s cousin, we visited Rave 3, a mall at Kanpur.. the only place worth visiting, they said. And you woudnt believe what 8 naughty girls did. The counters for the cine halls were right there at the entrance (our luck!) and the very first poster we set our eyes on was that of the super hit bollywood movie of 2007, anurag kashyap’s “No Smoking”. Aruna and Jayasree started jumping at the sight of him (Am i missing anybody’s name here? They were single handedly resposnible for dragging us to **THAT** movie, right?). So we halted right at the counters – 2 were jumping around, trying to convince others; 4 were thrilled at the prospect of going to a movie – Jeevitha, Jayalakshmi, Vinisha and I- I was going with people my age after a long time, so i was one of the first to join them; Pavithra was reluctant to come – she was only for sight seeing. But the most important reason we went was this Shanmuga priya. (Heard that the people who were really responsible for this mishap are still getting pothu mathu from other hostellers.. that gives me some pleasure ).

So that was it – a fitting end to our memorable trip – a movie with a title that attracts girls (**ahem**). I am still wondering what the movie tried to say. The Bipasha Basu song at the end of the movie was the only relevation. We were in a theatre with only 6 other people and this was only the 4th day from the movie’s realease. That movie took all our time, we had to gulp down a domino’s pizza (they would let me order a black olive topping, boo hoo!) and rush back to the hostel to check out. After a tasteeee cutlet at the railway mess, we boarded the lucknow express to home sweet home.
The train journey was the usual stuff – cards (Ass, Pick two, er and other names.. i forgot), thattai, biscuits (those hostellers would let us have a bourbon biscuit, ), oranges and apples (yo could tell those apart, they were equally bad). This train was no better, though it seemed to be running all the time, it was 3 hours late. Our own Chennai central at 13:30 hrs. We were back.

Our culinary experiments did not stop with the train (ground nut chutney, yuck!! ) or IIT. We had lunch at Saravana Bhavan before bidding each other adieu.

What we did at Kanpur – in chronological order:

Wed, 24th Oct – boarded Raptisagar Express at Chennai Central. It is the worst train i have travelled in, so far.

Day 1 at IITk – Fri, 26th Oct

Till 4.00 pm – Our fears that we would have to stay on platform from 8.30 am (the trains actual arrival time) till 3.00pm (when they would start providing accomodation) were not realised. The train was late, we reached the campus at 3.00pm only.
4.00 pm – Accomodation at Visitor’s Hostel. Heaven on Earth. A five star hotel would lose. Two per room. I am afrain of ghosts, but now i had to put up with a second one – my room mate. [:((]
6.00 – 8.00 pm – Our first visit to Antaragni 2007. Our first aloo chat.
8.00 pm – Dinner at boys mess. There was a brinjal-stuffed-with-tomato something, a roasted potato delicacy, some red syrup that only aruna claimed to be a soup while others thought differently [:d].

Day 2 -Sat, 27th Oct
Morning – Missed mess breakfast. Had to eat left over manchurian rice at Anatargni site. The inauguration, snacks & tea, contest environment and rules.
1.00 – 4.00 pm – Practise contest. We came first!! [bah, some consolation that]
6.00 – 8.00 pm – We have come back, Antaragni. Aloo chat ( with dahi for some and sans it for others ;D). I think i took videos of ‘clothes at IITk’ (thats a better way putting it!).
8.00 pm – Contest Dinner. Plenty of Google t shirts, dunno where they are being sold.

Day 3 – Sun 28th Oct
10.00 am – 2.00 pm – 32nd ACM ICPC. Came 12th. Ranklist is here.
6.00 pm – Prize distribution. NITT’s KIllAll were the winners.
Think we went to Antaragni after this. Not sure, will have to wait till someone reads it and tells me.

Day 4 – Mon 29th Oct
Till 4.00pm – Unforgettable. I’ll never see a movie for its hero. And i will definitely not come if shanmu is choosing the movie. No smoking.. bah. The scurity at the theatre asked us as we came out if we liked the movie!!

7.00pm – Lucknow Express to chennai.

30 Oct - journey by train. Groundnut chutney, yuck yuck.

31 Oct - Home sweet home.

and what did i bring back from Kanpur?

a…aa….aatishooo!! excusez-moi, i am back in chennai.. but with common cold.

cheers,
anusha

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