wish someone had told me this before

making a line follower robot just because "everyone is making it and if you don't then you are not technical enough/ are wasting your time in electronics engineering/ are too bookish " is a sureshot way of burning your money. four of us girls decided to make one for our techfest, partly because we wanted to know what the fuss is about. we burnt >2000 bucks total. the robot didn't run finally. we didn't even participate but stood there in a corner watching the competition. PLC made loads of money on us. we learned lots of stuff. but we could have learned most of it for free anyway. and we didn't learn enough to justify the Rs.2000+ price tag... no way.
so guys, use wisdom and good common sense before you jump into something.
but i guess there have to be some expensive lessons in life.