ACM ICPC 2011 (2)

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Onsite Competition Registration

Once you are selected for the regionals, the college is supposed to pay a registration fees of Rs. 3500/- which is for 5 people 3 contestants one reserve and a coach. This fees includes the accommodation and food for 5 days. The fees is to be sent by DD. After having a terrible experience with the Online registration I dint take a risk of being late for the Onsite one. I sent the amount as soon as possible. The money was paid by College. Registration was accepted. We were supposed to fill online registration forms for travel and accommodation. ICPC this time also took care about those students travel expenses, for those whose colleges could not sponsor it (Our college did it for us... ;)). You can even get guests to the venue subject to availability of accommodation and at their own expenses. As i mentioned earlier, we could not register a reserve due to technical problems. We registered him as a guest. So 4 of us. Me, Shreyas Damle, Rahul Dange and Gaurav Deochakke. were all set for the Onsite Contest. Our coach couldn't come for she had work in college.

Railway Reservation

Had a tough time with this one. I already knew it since i did Google a few blogs which did mention how previous year students had problems with it. Well, so did we. We booked Kanyakumari express, waiting ticket  and 2 nights and 3 day travel. We obviously didn't wanted this. We checked again for other trains from Mumbai and found Kerala Kranti Express from Panvel to Kollam 18 rs travel and seats available. Cancelled the previous tickets booked Kerala Kranti ticket for 8th December and mailed ICPC that we will be coming a day earlier cos of unavailability of proper reservations. Not to risk the return journey booked a return ticket as well. Netravati Express for 15th December Kollam to Panvel. 

Train Journey

The best journey i ever had. Thankfully all the passengers in our berth were cooperative and talkative too (or i guess we were too social... :P ) Made friends with almost all of them. One was a teacher in Kollam and one of them was sitting with his Mom was working in Punjab, and one was a student just like us. Clicked pics with all of them throughout the journey. Got down from the train at every signal at every station, bought everything at every station. Pretty sure people admired our appetites...:P

When train reached Kerela, we were not sure if were supposed to be picked up cause we were a day earlier than expected. Called up the Technical Director of ICPC (which we were not knowing earlier, else would have never dared to do so, for such a cheap reason). A very polite sounding gentleman recieved the call and ensured that a team will be recieving us on Kayankullam Junction. Kayankullam was one station before Kollam. Thereafter got numerous calls from ICPC volunteers to check as to where the train had reached. The volunteers were standing outside the station main gate in orange ICPC T-Shirts as they had already informed us over the phone. They welcomed us. Happy lot of crowd I must say. Although I feel sorry cause I forgot their names. They took us to their Hostel.