Day 0
It was the terrace of hall 9, around 12:30 at night. Sayan, Sourish, Anirban and I had found ourselves the best place for "adda". We were the people from FIITJEE, all one year droppers, and now in NIT Durgapur. Anirban was here last year too, but had left for the IIT bait. It was a strange night away from home for the first time. And there it stood at a very short distance, Hall 3, the seniors' hostel, their prying eyes, and stories flying around in Hall 9 about the torture they'll put us through. But we drew comfort from the fact that we were well 'guarded' and no senior could enter hall 9. We talked into the night, way too deep into the night... When I came back to my room, my room-mates were asleep (as the next day was the first day of college). So, without having the oppurtunity to know much about my room-mates, I headed for sleep too... (and, yes, I believe there were a few attempts by a few seniors to 'interact' with us at night, but proved futile, thanks to the guards. But I'm not sure, maybe I was just dreaming..)
Day 1
We were all 'dressed' up and ready to head for the college. Some 400 odd of us, all guarded by security, as if we were prisnors. We were all escorted to the Insti building by security guards. The most surreal experience I've had (that was upto then, without me knowing that more was to follow). That was the highest point of the day, as I have no recollection what happened in class. Oh, wait, actually I do. I entered (I think it was LH12) and saw these older big girls sitting. Oh, my heart just sunk to the bottom of my feet. These were the 'college chicks' I had always dreamed of. God couldn't possibly have been so cruel.
Anyways, I came back to my room, and had my first real interaction with my room-mates (who were also my classmates). Shivshanker Verma, from Kanpur and Ganesh Rajak from Durgapur were both from Mechanical Engg. (same as me) and Somnath Sarkar, from my City of Joy, was going to be a Computer Science Engineer, but before that, he engineered something else, along with his accomplice, Anirban Das. He engineered a nickname for me, which has stuck to me eversince, "Jua". Yes, "Jua" they called me. Apparently my signature on my 'trunk' read "Jua" instead of "Jha". And so, Jua it was... Jua it is.
As Days Went
And since then, the nicknames continued to flow, Somnath was "Sammy", Anirban Das was "Ani", Anirban Guha was"Ban" (we'll come to him later) and Shivshanker was "Shibbu".
(There were other famous nicknames which I will come to when the time is right.)
So, that was life in hall 9. We couldn't go out anywhere but to the college building. No Jeans, T-shirts. Just finding new people, all different from others, and the "adda" on the terrace with the FIITJEE gang. And during those addas, seniors would come to pay visit, and we would have the bird's eye view from the terrace. And then we found a big chaos downstairs. Later we were informed that someone had spit on the seniors from the terrace. And the seniors were boiling with rage. There were so many speculations, rumours of the consequences that would follow...
But the consequences were inevitable, this way or that way...
My interaction with the seniors was not a fairytale, but its something I remember everything about. So, I'll spare another day for it... untill then... keep blooging!