Interpreter of Maladies
Tuesday, May 17, 2005
My alma mater...my homecomingI always scorned the thought of spending another year there. The scorching heat and the chilling cold was always unbearable. I wanted to go out and explore the world as soon as I could. Never wanting to come back to the place which made me the person I am today. It took only a few months out of college to realize that I have left the safe abode of friends and teachers and have finally entered the big bad world outside. No sooner had this recognition hit me, that I wanted to run back, to go back to the place which gave me so much. This time, I went back to visit college because I missed it. I missed the ambience, the carefree attitude, the penniless but happy faces and the serenity which is irreplacable for me. I won't say that I miss the people the most, but yeah the way this place transforms pedestrians into brilliance in flesh, I miss that. This weekend, when the sun was at its shining best and the summers were at the peak torture point, I had the good fortune to visit school once again. Walking inside the gates, I realized the sudden spring in my step, though it was unbearably hot, and there were no rickshaws in sight. It welcomed me with the same open arms that it did 6 years back when I was an awkward girl looking for a foothold in the academic echelons. When I passed out, with the cap and the coat, two years back, I was a different person, somebody who had been chiselled and shaped to become a complete individual.
Though entering those gates is more difficult now. The guard on the gate asks for my id card. And yes, I am no more a student now so I give him some stuff about me being an alumni, wanting to visit, blah blah. He is not very convinced; maybe I have changed over time. From the bespectacled, reed thin and horribly dressed girl, I have graduated to a more refined version. Time, you see, changes everyone. This is vacations time in college, so there wasn't even a soul on the street to the academic area. Made a pit stop at the computer centre. The walls are still the same. The badly shot photograph of a lion still adorns the main entrance. The gates to the CC are still the same, squeaky, push pull. But most of the labs have closed. As the new building has come up, this one has been downsized. So there is change, somewhere, to some extent. The new CC canteen is miles ahead of the old canteen, with the Nescafe hoardings and neat little benches.
The lib reminds me of many more things rather than the journals or the reserved section. I was a regular at the lib, though the hours spent at the lib never reflected well on my grades. Change is evident there too. There are now notices on the gate that request students to switch off their mobiles before entering. But yes, the lib incharge still remembers me. It just feels like home inside. The same stale smell of books and the nerds lurking in the corners of the reserved section.
Meeting my teachers and visiting the same old lab which tolerated my experiments with science a couple of years back, brought memories alive all over again. The lab is still the same, though new desktops have replaced the old ones. My course notebook from the last semester still adorns my professor's room-it somehow reminds me, I was amongst his best students. Homecoming to my alma mater also boosts my belief in myself and my confidence in the intellect that it has passed on to me. A brief lunch at the campus restaurant does not seem sullen and grime as it used to be, two years back. Even the oily paneer and watery curd seems gourmet cuisines. True, the place sure does something to you. My friend and I confer that even after two years the prices of most of the dishes have stayed the same. The only difference is that now I leave a generous tip. A stark contrast to those student years when a tip was entirely out of question.
Walking out, I felt there was so much more to see and I want to stop by and touch everything, visit every place. Just that, time runs faster than my memory does. Going out of those hallowed gates, I wish I would come back. Back to home and back to my alma mater.
