Apologies for my lethargy. May the story roll on.
Since that fateful day, it had been a topsy - turvy life. Classes had started full throttle and suddenly life was full of tasks and classes. It was full of forms as well, as we filled out form after form for our Identity cards, library identity cards, hall identity cards and well .... whatever.
I don't recall much of the classes in my first year. I never found them stimulating or thought provoking except for the Mathematics tutorials which always had a nice unique flair to them. The fact that those were arranged in the G.S Sanyal School of communications helped as the classes were quite modern and had a nice view out of the window where one could stare on for ages. Vikramshila complex was awe provoking with its air conditioned auditoriums equipped for seating quite a lot of people. Life was trudging on, we had about 5 odd subjects to study (discounting English for communications and NCC).
It was almost a week since Papa had left, I had managed to drag myself on, constantly goading and motivating myself and keeping myself occupied all the time. But somehow life was too boring and the grey skies did all their bit to keep my mind dark. I was yet to gel with my neighbours in the hostel. Abhinav kept mostly to himself. I knew a person from Bombay, I had met on the train. He was the only other company. It was then God smiled and introduced me to some of my very good friends.
I had come back from the mess after having an evening snack. It had been a terribly long day with lectures from 7.30 in the morning till about a couple of hours after lunch. I dropped on to the cot, lousy and sullen. And then I heard someone singing (used for the technical sense of the term. No sane person would label that as singing, but). However pathetic that song or wail was, the singer sure seemed to be happy. He was screaming/braying at the top of his lungs. "Now who is this", I pondered. The voice seemed to be coming from just outside the space people call as a balcony(it was shamelessly small to be called one). I opened the door and was just able to fit myself in it. I glanced around, it did'nt take long to discover the source of the brays.
He wore spectacles. He had a round chubby face with a fair complexion. He saw me and stopped singing (or screaming). I wondered how could he be so happy in this godforsaken place. Time to start the introduction I thought. "Hi, I am Karan", I started. He followed and the conversation flowed after which we knew our respective departments, courses and our sections (which turned out to be the same). "Good", I mused. There is someone who will help me with the tutorials and the exams. We came out of our respective balconies to the much better relative comfort of the corridor. May I take the pleasure to announce the Third Idiot of the group. Puneet Jain (aka PJ, Puneet 'G', SAAND, Sylvester and ...... a certain unceremonious word) a native from MP(We used to pull his legs a lot over this). With him, our trinity is completely defined. We were all in consecutive rooms. I was in ME-305, followed by Puneet ME-306 who was in turn followed by Abhinav.
Now it is not that we three were recluses. There were other animate beings in ME too. The first who comes to attention is 'Tukai' aka Bandar. I would dearly award him the epithet of being the fourth idiot (unfortunately I can't). He was AIR-45, which made us look at him with awe (though it soon evaporated). He was queer, I shall say. He was (?) an ardent devotee of Sri Asaram Bapu, with all the devotion wares present in his dirty and filthy room. He was a vegetarian (uncommon for a Bengali, I thought). He was and is a very good friend and so will feature regularly in our exploits.
Next to his room was the toilet(aha, this hath it's own tales). Next to the toilet lived a 6 feet giant called 'Kaal'. He was a quiet guy and kept a bucket of water in his room all the time. I confess I had few conversations with him so this is all I can churn up.
Next to him lived 'Babu'. Now this is some character who genuinely stumped me when I met him first. I remember the Saturday evening, when he first knocked on my door and gestured to a problem in Shantinarayan's text on calculus. He told me he'd tried a lot but wasn't able to get through. I nodded and told him I would surely tell him if I solved it. 2 minutes later, I was in his room explaining him the solution. Now, I don't attribute it to my brilliance, I attribute it to the fact that he was a moron. But he was a good guy at heart and frequently the object of our torment. He loved flaunting his buffalo like body curves moving around clad in a towel. But we reformed him later.
Next to him lived Sakya, a Bengali from Kolkata. He used to remain holed up in his room or his friends'. He spoke hindi with difficulty with a heavy Bong accent. I used to enjoy seeing him and Puneet converse.
Next were we three. After that lived 'PC' the person with the first personal computer of the wing. He was a happy go lucky dude, who too remained holed up in his room and killed Abhinav due to passive smoking. He had the maximum amount of visitors to his room. Quite popular I thought, with his obsession for strumming the guitar and playing 'Summer of 69' at the slightest opportunity he got.
'Unknown Citizen' lived in the next room. He is named after a russian poetry in the textbook of our english course. Much about him still remains unknown, even after all these years. But so was he.
'Gabbar' lived next. He was followed by another personality known as 'Daaru'. He was the mischief monger of the wing. He'd decided he would have another crack at JEE. His room was also known as the entertainment room. The guy never disappointed when it came to that. It was the best to watch at the time of exam, when all of us splattered our ass on the course notes and he used to peacefully watch a film or come and give us Gyan. He was the one who rechristened Abhinav as 'Pandit G'. Overall a good hunk but lousy when it came to taking bath. More will follow on him.
'KKR' was the last. He mostly kept to himself. Below us resided Doctors (real ones) who were pursuing MMST. They were mostly reticent and made sport of a Black Dog, with a stump for a tail, who used to frequent ME. ME was directly above the mess, so for a year, I was plagued with the stench and the din associated with it.
Introductions over. I spent my first year in this wing and fondly think of it. A lot of memories are associated with it and I hope to pour them out. At last, I was sprouting roots. Kgp didn't appear too terrible now. Puneet, Daaru, KKR and me shared the same section which helped(mostly Daaru, as he copied our laboratory readings with leisure).
I am now relieved. Tales of tomfoolery and moronics to follow. I only wish I could relive that time again.
Since that fateful day, it had been a topsy - turvy life. Classes had started full throttle and suddenly life was full of tasks and classes. It was full of forms as well, as we filled out form after form for our Identity cards, library identity cards, hall identity cards and well .... whatever.
I don't recall much of the classes in my first year. I never found them stimulating or thought provoking except for the Mathematics tutorials which always had a nice unique flair to them. The fact that those were arranged in the G.S Sanyal School of communications helped as the classes were quite modern and had a nice view out of the window where one could stare on for ages. Vikramshila complex was awe provoking with its air conditioned auditoriums equipped for seating quite a lot of people. Life was trudging on, we had about 5 odd subjects to study (discounting English for communications and NCC).
It was almost a week since Papa had left, I had managed to drag myself on, constantly goading and motivating myself and keeping myself occupied all the time. But somehow life was too boring and the grey skies did all their bit to keep my mind dark. I was yet to gel with my neighbours in the hostel. Abhinav kept mostly to himself. I knew a person from Bombay, I had met on the train. He was the only other company. It was then God smiled and introduced me to some of my very good friends.
I had come back from the mess after having an evening snack. It had been a terribly long day with lectures from 7.30 in the morning till about a couple of hours after lunch. I dropped on to the cot, lousy and sullen. And then I heard someone singing (used for the technical sense of the term. No sane person would label that as singing, but
He wore spectacles. He had a round chubby face with a fair complexion. He saw me and stopped singing (or screaming). I wondered how could he be so happy in this godforsaken place. Time to start the introduction I thought. "Hi, I am Karan", I started. He followed and the conversation flowed after which we knew our respective departments, courses and our sections (which turned out to be the same). "Good", I mused. There is someone who will help me with the tutorials and the exams. We came out of our respective balconies to the much better relative comfort of the corridor. May I take the pleasure to announce the Third Idiot of the group. Puneet Jain (aka PJ, Puneet 'G', SAAND, Sylvester and ...... a certain unceremonious word) a native from MP(We used to pull his legs a lot over this). With him, our trinity is completely defined. We were all in consecutive rooms. I was in ME-305, followed by Puneet ME-306 who was in turn followed by Abhinav.
Now it is not that we three were recluses. There were other animate beings in ME too. The first who comes to attention is 'Tukai' aka Bandar. I would dearly award him the epithet of being the fourth idiot (unfortunately I can't). He was AIR-45, which made us look at him with awe (though it soon evaporated). He was queer, I shall say. He was (?) an ardent devotee of Sri Asaram Bapu, with all the devotion wares present in his dirty and filthy room. He was a vegetarian (uncommon for a Bengali, I thought). He was and is a very good friend and so will feature regularly in our exploits.
Next to his room was the toilet(aha, this hath it's own tales). Next to the toilet lived a 6 feet giant called 'Kaal'. He was a quiet guy and kept a bucket of water in his room all the time. I confess I had few conversations with him so this is all I can churn up.
Next to him lived 'Babu'. Now this is some character who genuinely stumped me when I met him first. I remember the Saturday evening, when he first knocked on my door and gestured to a problem in Shantinarayan's text on calculus. He told me he'd tried a lot but wasn't able to get through. I nodded and told him I would surely tell him if I solved it. 2 minutes later, I was in his room explaining him the solution. Now, I don't attribute it to my brilliance, I attribute it to the fact that he was a moron. But he was a good guy at heart and frequently the object of our torment. He loved flaunting his buffalo like body curves moving around clad in a towel. But we reformed him later.
Next to him lived Sakya, a Bengali from Kolkata. He used to remain holed up in his room or his friends'. He spoke hindi with difficulty with a heavy Bong accent. I used to enjoy seeing him and Puneet converse.
Next were we three. After that lived 'PC' the person with the first personal computer of the wing. He was a happy go lucky dude, who too remained holed up in his room and killed Abhinav due to passive smoking. He had the maximum amount of visitors to his room. Quite popular I thought, with his obsession for strumming the guitar and playing 'Summer of 69' at the slightest opportunity he got.
'Unknown Citizen' lived in the next room. He is named after a russian poetry in the textbook of our english course. Much about him still remains unknown, even after all these years. But so was he.
'Gabbar' lived next. He was followed by another personality known as 'Daaru'. He was the mischief monger of the wing. He'd decided he would have another crack at JEE. His room was also known as the entertainment room. The guy never disappointed when it came to that. It was the best to watch at the time of exam, when all of us splattered our ass on the course notes and he used to peacefully watch a film or come and give us Gyan. He was the one who rechristened Abhinav as 'Pandit G'. Overall a good hunk but lousy when it came to taking bath. More will follow on him.
'KKR' was the last. He mostly kept to himself. Below us resided Doctors (real ones) who were pursuing MMST. They were mostly reticent and made sport of a Black Dog, with a stump for a tail, who used to frequent ME. ME was directly above the mess, so for a year, I was plagued with the stench and the din associated with it.
Introductions over. I spent my first year in this wing and fondly think of it. A lot of memories are associated with it and I hope to pour them out. At last, I was sprouting roots. Kgp didn't appear too terrible now. Puneet, Daaru, KKR and me shared the same section which helped(mostly Daaru, as he copied our laboratory readings with leisure).
I am now relieved. Tales of tomfoolery and moronics to follow. I only wish I could relive that time again.
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