Before I got acquainted with the fellows who defined the rest of
my life as I know it, they had already had many little adventures of their own.
The college started on July 29th and luck was on their side because
all of them were in the same department and section. I remember that Orkut post
where we were supposed to share our experiences about our first interactions
with the seniors. The funniest of all, to me, was the one where Arka wrote
about his and Nirmalya’s, the time they had been caught red handed in the library.
Before I proceed, I gotta tell you about the library because it’s important
to grasp. The library of our college is not like the traditional libraries you
come across, where you are required to maintain silence and you can hear a
beetle’s footsteps. Our Library is used ONLY to exchange books to a counter
that feels much like a Railway counter exchanging tickets! The counters are
barred with crosswire which I assumed was due to their fear of being robbed or
something. I personally never saw any reason to rob it because who would like
to rob Principles of Semi-conductor Devices, International Ed, a big fat boring
book by Sima Dimitrejev anyway. There were rows of long desks to sit and chairs
to put the feet on when you were sitting on desks (It was strictly prohibited
though). But there was no necessity for silence whatsoever, so it sounded like
a birdcage with thousands of different species of birds stuffed inside during
college hours.
So, Arka and Nirmalya were caught red handed in the library. They
were asked to dance in the middle. As I have known them later, I know Nirmalya
was a good dancer but Arka was terrible one like me, so all I could picture was
a hilarious duet; one with the good moves and the ruining everything and
undoing all the effort put by the first. Every time I recall the story, I end
up wishing being there. But chances are that I would have been dragged into the
thing too and it wouldn’t seem fun now in any way.
Once, the seniors barged into their classroom and started the ‘interactive
session’. Aditi and Nirmalya were the preys in the times to come and the senior’
favorite game was ‘proposing’. I don’t the story any further as to ‘how’ things
went but I did come to know that they were made to propose to each other in 15 different
occasions.
But apart from the senior interactions, they had their own little
adventures too which I only heard from them and these little adventures along
with the ones including me are my fondest memories of college.
In first year, they had no classes on Wednesday during 12 noon to
around 2. So, they usually skipped the previous class and had 2 and a half hour
of free time which they usually used to explore the wilderness around the college.
Our college was located, you can say, a little away from the town.
So, we were privy of the natural side of the earth to a great extent. There
were goats and cows mowing the overgrown grass of unused fields, little naked
kids running around if you went deeper into the terrain and then there were
straw huts etc. In short, there was a lot to explore if you had the time and
the zeal for it and these people had excess of it.
One Wednesday, during the first week of August, as they told had me
the story months later, Aditi, Arka, Nirmalya and Pratip set out aimlessly in
this terrain. They took the asphalt street and trotted along chatting and
laughing and as the road curved to the left and took them a few more paces,
they came across a vast space. The road seemed like a silk thread compared to
the watery fields on either side. It was monsoon, so the sun was busy hiding
behind the clouds and everything had traces of the rain from previous night. They
kept on walking the road towards the great yellow building. It was the Techno
Model School (a school funded by our college). They had heard of it, of course,
but had never seen it before. They weren’t as much interested in the school as
they were in the surroundings.
The road hit on the school gates and bent right sharply, still
asphalt, so they continued trotting but the talk had changed from aimless chattering
to praises of the countryside. A little way ahead, the asphalt came to a permanent
halt, showing them the partly muddy path ahead. The trees were bushier and
larger ahead. Even though, the path wasn’t luxury, but it called out to them
and a little way ahead they could see it bend along a curve disappearing behind
a shadowy green tree.
They all paused for a moment and looked at each other. It seemed
like an adventure alright.
‘Lets take it’ said Nirmalya and Pratip in excited chorus looking
at each other…
To Be Continued...
O T H E R P A R T S
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