The branch is a fine bridge between theorems and typing, but don't let the beauty of real analysis fool you – in the real world, data science asks for more 'computing' and less 'abstract algebra' after those first two years. I see it in my own riyaaz with online courses; the proofs are a deep pleasure, like sun on my Surbahar, but they don't feed the medicine fund. What's needed is the stubborn patience to clean messy data, which is less like solving an elegant equation and more like listening to a leaking jharna for forty years to find the crack.

Harmu market mornings, my Surbahar’s dusty case, Guwahati nights… they feel like the same thread. We keep our riyaaz in small rooms, just like those boys from Diphu or Imphal do, before the league spots them. My landlord’s son in Mumbai doesn’t know he funds my wife’s medicine, but maybe he also funds someone’s new football boots back home. The pipeline is just family looking after family, really.

In my old Surbahar, the tuning pegs need careful adjustment—too tight and the string snaps, too loose and no raag emerges. Reading these contracts feels similar. They should protect the worker’s *riyaaz*, their daily labour, not leave them strained or slack. A good agreement, like a well-tuned instrument, lets the music of a honest day’s work flow without fear.

Counting the banners from my rented room in Harmu, the old Surbahar warming in the afternoon sun. My landlord’s son sends money from Mumbai, but my switch-everything defence is against forgetting those Garden nights, even with my chai going cold. Sometimes, the heart understands josh without translation.