It seems like yesterday, when I first stepped into this college, Jaypee Institute of Information Technology. Though it doesn’t cover much land of the Noida Electronic City, but its infrastructure is appreciable. Aryabhatta Bhawan, Academic Block, Learning Resource Centre… all very well planned. I was actually surprised to see that this small building has 3 big lecture theatres, so many classrooms and labs, library, faculty rooms and it is not at all congested.
Ok… Enough about the college.
I was actually scared as I entered the academic block. I had joined this college as a lateral entrant and I was the only new student in second year CS/IT. God!! So many people… I knew nobody. Following the college map, which I got during registration, I reached LT-2 (Lecture Theatre -2). Everyone was standing outside the hall as the previous lecture was still on. Everyone looked at me as if an alien had just came out of nowhere. Well, I was actually an alien to them. A cute girl came to me and asked “Haven’t seen you around. Are you a new student?” I nervously replied,” Yes, I just joined. I came through the lateral entry exams. Can you help me? My batch is B-9 and I know no one around here.” She then said, “Oh… You are in my batch then. Hiiiiiiii… I am Sprih.” Ohkkk… “Spree!!! As in… that’s it or is it a nick name???” I made a bad start with my batch mate. But she was sweet enough to take it lightly. “No.. hehe.. That’s it, Sprih Harsh.” I gladly shook her hand, “Hi, I am Disha”, I said. I must tell the readers why I emphasized the ‘Hiiiiiiiiii’. Well, this is the signature entry of Sprih. No matter how much one tries to imitate this, it’s best done by her only. Well, it was a nice start as far as the acquaintances are concerned. Next , I met the two dudes of my batch. Sushant, with a goatee and Ankur Thaploo with a wrist band. Lolz… Sushant greeted with a decent friendly smile and said “Welcome to the college.”, whereas Ankur gave a smug look (Which has now become a typical of him… Lolz) and asked, “New Student?”. I just nodded a yes. Then he gave an o-h-k-k nod back to me. All this seemed nice but didn’t allay my nervousness. Then as we moved into the lecture theatre and I met Varsha, Shruti, Chhavi, Kanupriya, Himanshu, Manoj, Shailesh, Utkarsh… (well there were 30 people so m sorry I can’t mention the whole list… But it was a pleasure meeting all of them). Then I met Angad. It may sound funny, but this was the first time in my life that I met a Geek!!! He wore his typical no-smile serious expression and I think he said “Hi…”, Lolz. He was a damn quite guy. I came to know through Shruti that he is a phodu(brilliant) programmer. Cool!!! Then I saw Pulkit. He, greeting me with a quite smile, sat in the row just ahead of me. It was a relief to see Charu in my class as I knew her from school. Though we never had a conversation in school but I wasn’t formal with her at all. She further helped me settle into the batch. Then as the First Lecture wrapped-up and we all started moving out… Someone from our batch shouted, “Chugh Saab!!!”. I turned to see who is this Chugh Saab. This was Tarush, a jolly guy and a total philanderer. Lolz.. Everyone gave me a very warm welcome in the batch. All my anxiety faded away. As time passed I made new friends who were not from my batch. Veni, Nilay, Deepika… I real good bunch of people. With time my bond grew stronger with some of them. Varsha became Lambu, Deepika became Mullu, Pulkit became Uncle P, Sushant was now just Kaura and Thaploo was for Ankur. Angad became Dangar, Himanshu became Bau, Veni became VT and Nilay became the google guy!!! Sprih, Charu and Tarush also joined my indelible group of special people. I have learnt a lot from all of them and special some really special moments with all of them. Some of them can be seen in these pictures.
How I wish all this didn’t end so abruptly and we could have some more of it. But this is our destiny. In a few days, we all will be walking our different paths, towards new destination, to a new life, but these priceless moments will stay in our hearts forever. I get so scared when I think that one day I’ll wake up and I’ll be alone. None of my friends will be around and I’ll be left reminiscing…
Love you all and wish you all the best for the life ahead.
D
