IIMK- Thank God It’s Friday, and it’s over.

a. Last day of classes
No nostalgia, no senti feelings. Coz I remember the last time I felt bad for end of classes, it didn't turn out so well. Less than a year later, I was back in classrooms.
Anyone for whom this was a ‘return’ to college would agree to this being just another phase, just a passing cloud.
b. I would not miss my friends
I made just a handful of friends here. (plenty of acquaintances, though) And there's no way I’m going to miss them. These people are going to hear from me, soon and often.
What good are friends if you stay out of touch long enough to start missing?!
c. I’m glad it’s over
To me this has been 21 months of rushed up everything. Sitting groggy eyed in the classrooms, some real boring lectures, pretty bad food, and a few crappy people too- it was an effort in itself to keep sane.
Given a chance, I’d want to sit through a select few of classes with some very good professors and learn some worthwhile stuff and hang out with some real good people- not because I have to but because I want to.
d. Experiments have just begun
When I came here, I made one conscious choice- just one- that I’d experiment with everything under the sun that came my way. And I did. The list is long and I’d rather keep it to myself. Some have been astounding successes to marvel at and most have been abject, miserable failures.
I’m not going to trust anyone who says failures are lessons (or any such crap), coz they haven’t seen real failure. Failures SUCK. And unless you are strong enough to rise up after the fall, you better stay away and survive.
e. I lost myself
In all the chaos here, I have transformed. So much so that I am not the same person that walked in here 20 months ago. Is that good? Not entirely. Is it bad? Not exactly.
From what my friends say (in the testimonials), I figured that I’ve retained some core of my former self. But for me, it has been like living through a typhoon. Oh well, I’m glad I survived.
f. There are better things to look forward to
Hey, I got what I came here for. What I wanted. (Most of ‘em, at least). That’s a good enough reason to celebrate the end and look forward to the new beginning.
After all, I’m not old enough to fill even a quarter of my biography yet. If this remains the best part of my life- I’m sure it’s not a life I’m ‘living’.


PS. To all the people flooding my fb wall with ‘last XYZ’ messages- it’s not the last of anything. The world is round, the end is only the beginning…

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

We are the roles we play

“All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many parts….” -Act II, Scene VII, As You Like It, William Shakespeare, We are defined not as a set of characteristics or traits, not as a sealed package by others. Instead, everyone sees us for the discrete, granular roles that we play in their lives. The ‘package’ that we see in our own heads is our own perspective of all the roles we play in the lives of all the people we know. You may be a caring child, a sincere student, a loyal friend, a passionate lover, a dedicated employee, a pleasant boss, a doting father and a responsible citizen: each of these roles call for a set of characteristics and need you to act in a manner that suits the roles you choose to play. Ain't that why someone we hate from the guts is liked by some others, why some fall in love with people that just don’t care, why some people buy goods t...
Read more

Tomorrow Never Dies... or does it?!

A recent end-of-year retrospection showed me that as years go by, my activity on this blog here is turning sparser than ever, and so is the site traffic to my posts. This was only expected since people have moved on to alternate content formats - picture sharing on instagram, short format videos on tiktok or reels, and micro-blogs on substack, conversations in the form of podcasts (cringe!) or god forbid, revolting wisdom spewed on LinkedIn. What's more, blogging platforms themselves may be shut down sooner rather than later, as companies are caught between a dwindling audience and increasing costs to keep the tech running.  While the world may have moved on to shinier new stuff, I find myself in an alien world - where folks don't have the attention span to read or listen to what I have to say. And yet, the written word is something I can't break ties with.   I have recently found myself with a little too much time on my hands- more than I know what to productively do wit...
Read more

Would I do that if I were paid so much more?

“Who smokes beedis these days!?” said my friend. “Quite a lot of people that can’t afford cigarettes…” I replied automatically. We were in a corner booth at a quaint, charming place called Koshy’s early this morning. This place is quite popular with the locals for its English breakfast, but I noticed how much the place looked like your typical eatery scene from the pages of an a British novel. It was quite early in the morning and we barely beat the church-crowd by just a few minutes to get a seat in this deli. On this occasion, that strong beedi smell that intruded our senses came from a few night watchmen we just passed, catching up during their morning tea breaks. As we made a quick arithmetic, we realized that those watchmen must be making no more than 4000 bucks a month and probably had quite a large family to fend for. A simple pack of cigarettes (at 200 bucks) is almost 5% of their monthly wage and it was obviously a luxury they can’t afford. Now, I could go on givin...
Read more