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Hostel life - Phase 1

Batch Unity
Respect for seniors
No eye contact
The golden rules u can’t go against
Lest the pangs of fire u’ll taste
So began our first semester
This is how we entered dear saat number

The first two months of the semester seemed like a lifetime in kalapani. Homesickness was at its pinnacle, phone calls seemed too short, the urge to run away was high on mind, home a distant dream, …….on these notes began our first year in the hostel. No matter how much we laugh at those days now……..who can ever forget the constant fear of seniors, the dread of calls at unearthly hours (and who was absent and why), the names list forgetting syndrome, the room plan mess-up, the never to be taken off your mind “funde”…….Mornings began with dress checking, days saw us through sleep inducing lectures in dull class rooms, evenings were spent in memorizing name lists, room plans, birthday list (which till the last day none of us could learn by heart), nights would bring in order for attending calls and late nights were time for writing impositions. Obviously the rest of the time had to be managed for batch meetings, completing lab manuals, attending calls n all sorts of personal work (if any) besides the daily routine.I often wonder if there were only 24 hours in a day then. If these were the common dislikes of the whole batch, can we leave out the wonderful days of ……….more than five people sleeping together on two beds, running away to LG’s for the weekends, the putting of oil on one another’s head as if to drown the hair in oil, the eating together of the whole batch, the chori chhupe trying to watch TV in the mess, the batch meetings every night, the birthday parties, the endless use of the landline phone to talk to loved ones, looking at boys (in spite of the rule “looking at people belonging to the opposite sex, except for professors, in an offence of the most serious nature”) and even talking with them in class (of course, we didn’t know what stuff these guys were made of then), n also the fun times at calls. This was our first few days in the hostel. Of course these days were spiced up events like the whole batch’s being ostracized by seniors, an infamous suicide attempt. Then came the much awaited day when we were freed from the prison to go out on our own. Remember our going to the lake for sight seeing that evening, when we couldn’t give up our habit of walking in straight lines n counting the number of girls present. Was the fresh air delightful? I now think what stopped us from going mad with happiness that day………maybe we had forgotten the actual use of brains.

Anyway, our batch was destined for experiments (whether others tried them on us or we ourselves, we always were the trend setters). Do u remember how we girls ran away from the hostel by toppling the back wall (although we were caught). Nevertheless, we did do for the first time what was hitherto unknown…….Boys used to run away every year, but we girls had done it for the first time. This attempt to escape eventually let us have the much sought after holidays extending from October to November. I don’t remember anything interesting taking place after we came back, except maybe for the freshers’ party where seniors wore ten times more make up and jewellery than us. And yes, we did organize a grand party on the eve of new year, where we danced like crazy all night. Days flew away and before we could realize it was PL and hence time to face the grill of exams.

Exams had a new face. Here everyone was equally prepared and unprepared. Whatever happened we just got over with the exams. Anyway, the brighter side was that very soon we got to go home again. And boy was that a long holiday. I think looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong suits it better. January to March………..Jan was officially semester break. But feb-mar we assumed on our own for watching the World cup. Bless guys, for being such devoted fans of the game most girls loathe so much. At least we got to stay home so much that we started missing hostel.

Hostel life - Phase - 2


The spell of GT is cast
Classes are things of the past
Back to the days of jeans
Moving out of teens
First Techno, Farewell and Signature
And a new director
This is our second semester

The second semester was as short as one can imagine. I think it was too short to be even called a trimester. We came back by late March while most of the others arrived only by early April. Classes began around 7th or 8th of April. I don’t remember having enjoyed classes so much before. Mainly because they were so few. I think our branch never came to know what a class of second semester in the second half was like. Anyway, remember the time when the gradation team visited our campus for ranking the different departments…….. how every lab was shining, how all equipments including CRO’s started working and that too properly, how the food in mess suddenly resembled food ( no need to recite prayers before eating), roads mended, lamp posts fixed, even flowers in the garden which spring seemed to overlook in March………..Aah!!! what a show we put up. The single most amazing fact I observed was growing up a garden in one day.But it did pay off as most of the departments got an A. There’s one regret I’ll always have……..missing out the first Technosearch. Anyway, we had a great time arranging for the annual fun festival of our hostel Signature (which, unfortunately, doesn’t take place any longer). This was the first time we got the experience of looking on our own for tent house, the halwai (for mass order), etc. That was the first time most of us were seeing a beauty contest in reality. It was also the first time we were participating in a this peculiar race which I don’t which of us had thought of. Remember we participated in pairs and one had to go over the other by turns.

I was very angry that there were prizes only for the first ones. We had come second but didn’t have as much as a chocolate. But, it was great fun seeing girls jumping around like frogs. Few days later, the third year seniors arranged for the farewell of the final years and we first yrs had to pay for it heavily (even our hearts were heavy). While expenses were already touching the skies, some of you girls had to go your respective meets. Man! What a price to introduce yourself to your seniors( now don’t give me those looks….I know deep down, everybody wanted the rates to come down.). well, anyway……….remember the farewell and the confessions……..Some of them left most of us with mouth open enough to let two gulab jamuns inside. I now think even our batch would be having some such shocking revelations. But those were the innocent days when we would not know if someone had even passed a comment on us, non-veg jokes were blushed at and not laughed, crushes not to be discussed openly. In short, we weren’t really out of the school girl mentality. But I think it was this semester which saw the birth of some of the closest friendships in our batch, actually most. It seemed like all the extra work we had done during RP bore its fruits for us in the second semester.

Here, I would like to mention something very special. I hope we all remember those great times when tests were times of implicit GT. God!!! What good days those were! I remember once we had gone to give a test on basic mech I think and found that the teacher had not brought along the question paper as he had thought we wont be coming. Another time a branch decided to bunk all classes of graphics till the exams, so that tests could not be taken. All these took place within a span of 1 n a ½ to2 months. So, once again before we knew what was going on PL had started. We were like “mercy, but the semester just started”. But, then we got over with the second semester as well. While the exams were going on, the new director took charge and brought in his new ideas. On the last day of the semester exams , we were asked to assemble in the SAC for discussing the new GPA system. I still think that it was a blunder to have agreed to it. But then ………forget it!!! I think none of us understood the system properly then. But at that time we were so happy to be over with exams that discussing such an issue was an obvious waste of time. With this we left for home again for only one and a half months this time. At the time of leaving we had no idea that when we come back things would have changed so much. But then as they say “all good things come to an end”, so did our second semester.

Hostel life - Phase - 3

The advent of juniors
The disappearance of a routine so familiar.....
Renovated canteen, but still the same mess
Some things to cheer up, some to depress
The GPA system…its induced stress
And our trying to regress
Etched in our memories forever
This is our third semester

The first few days (for me they were a little too few….) of the semester resembled the days of the second semester. But very soon everything changed. Just about everything. First came the shock of introduction of the proper test system wherein there would two sets of tests in every semester, which you can’t skip as they marks were to be added to your main score. If this was not enough, there were marks for attendence. And the icing on the cake was no sessional marks (which used to be a blessing for us). Life became a virtual hell the first few days….as we were so out of the habit of attending all eight periods. The advent of juniors brought a bit of relief. And we began to make our grand plans of introducing them to the life which we had been living for the last one year. But here too our luck failed us and the new anti-ragging rules were seriously imposed. Then came the time for the first ever minors we gave. I don’t think I need to mention that they brought upon disasters on most of us.

That was enough for us…..we desperately needed a break. And what better way than organizing a strike against the college authorities. I am not sure if we really supported the cause but we did join in just to miss classes for a while. Aah! How sad I was when it ended in just two days…..I was expecting it to last for a week at least (I think most of us were). If the GPA system brought us innumerable troubles in the name of new rules, there were a few reforms which delighted us. I think the best amongst those was the canteen. Not only did it have a new look, it also had a new menu, new furniture, new work force…..and for the first time in the history of our college girls started going to the canteen. Most of us fell in love in love with the canteen on the first day itself (because they were serving free burgers and coffee on the first day;) . That became the latest craze with most of us during the breaks (remember those days we used to have two breaks in a day) . Most of us have spent some of the most memorable times there. Well, I don’t think I should go on more on that (you already know what a food freak I am). That reminds me of another thing.

I think it was the third semester when we started all our culinary experiments. Maggi was not affordable all the time owing to the perennial financial crisis which we used to be in (and still are). Mess ka khana remained the same, though new furniture came in……..remember the dal (it came in two layers – runny dish water with a yellowish tinge that was the top layer and then there would be the yellow glue-type layer…..am I overdoing it, I don’t think so), the kadhi served on Wednesdays (I never knew kadhi could taste so………wonderful that my taste buds start shouting “don’t torture us”), the vegetables served in the name of seasonal vegetables….could you really distinguish them( at least I always had to ask someone “what’s this”) and then there used to be the hot favourite breakfast on Saturdays upma (I think they should have named it Uff Ma). Most of the times my and my roomie’s stomachs would start yelling “what are you doing, want to turn me into a chemistry lab” . I think the same applied to most of you too. That was the time when we decided to come into action and cook whenever food didn’t remotely resemble food. (Please note the word “remotely”…..it never fully resembles food except when the faculty is visiting us). Whatever be it, I discovered that there were at least some people who could have played sanjeev kapoor-sanjeev kapoor on a smaller scale (and some who were definitely the farthest from kitchen on God’s mind during creation). I think no more on food. Anyway, third semester stopped one dread for us…..GR.

I hope you remember what that is or was. What a relief it was, to be free at last…totally. That was the semester when the trend of getting mobile phones was catching up. The entire block used to be abuzz with missed calls (mostly from unknown numbers), SMS’s dropped like raindrops, the terrace at nights would be full with people talking endlessly over phones, numbers spread like wildfire and ringtones became more popular than songs themselves. Coming to songs this was the semester when we found ourselves a song which first gained the status of folk song (most of us would be humming the tune), then became a bhajan(we would listen to it every morning and evening) and finally went on to become our anthem(a part of our lives , we were so attached to it). I don’t think I need to name our anthem( if you don’t know, don’t ask me….).

We desperately needed such means of timepass to stop us from collapsing under the pressure. We didn’t even get to home during Puja ( there were minors to be written)…not even during Diwali and Id (the semester exams were not knocking but banging at our doors then). Somehow, the absence of sessionals seemed like a rose amongst a thousand plants of cactus. Finally we were done with the exams and left for home (thinking about what the next semester had in store for us….). Third semester really saw the new look MANIT where girls from any department could step into the classroom in jeans without eyes popping out of sockets, the new computer center(where we have spent many a happy hour) started functioning, the main gate was completed and so on and so forth. Changes were too many within a short period. Like I said towards the end of the last part….nothing remained the same, just about nothing. But , maybe this was the first time we felt like we were studying in an NIT….