The Last Mile

With just a couple of days more on campus and with end terms already hovering on our heads for the last term we the batch of 2010 are all set to cross the last mile together...just like we had first set our foot together two years back and sailed in the same boat all these days long...

It was a learning phase nevertheless.....just like every institute is...Past two years have definitely been eventful for all of us..And ofcourse I will always be thankful to this institute for helping me achieve the objective for which I had come here for...

I remember the day I had first stepped in...the newness and the strangeness of the place had been overpowering....even the sight of the stranger who had taken the group discussion with me during the interview process provided reassurance of someone known....

I remember how I had wandered into the class and sat coyly at a place with strange faces all around me filled with enthusiasm and our HR professor had walked into the class announcing marks for class participation.....which was like setting fire to a bunch of fireworks.... heart pounding mine was also one of the hands up desperate to contribute to the class...

I remember the day the first quiz was announced to be held and a batch mail was circulated with at most enthusiasm wishing all the very best to the entire batch by the students....And after three years of work I was sitting infront of my laptop ....my hand shivering to press the Go button to start the quiz....the Adrenaline rush, the fear, the excitement...

The seniors presentations in the nights which was compulsory to attend and the next day morning class where we would support each other so that the professors don’t catch us sleeping....the night outs in game committees ....the first JLT...when we were attending these it seemed that acads were in one end of the spectrum and these belonged to the other end...we would listen to the tunes of the songs playing in the JLT and bask in the glory of freedom from acads even if it was temporary...

The rehearsals we did as a group for our very first presentation in communication...with our hearts in our mouth to face a group of 60 as audience...and the support we gave each other in terms of Q&A session after the presentations....and how we have progressed to a stage where we make presentations in the class in those 5 min time when the other group is presenting and royally present it even to a panel of profs with umpteen confidence...

The very first grades which hit us all with one blow...the worry...the anxiety which has all faded with the years as we learnt to grow out of them...and laugh at glory and debacle alike accepting various things both good and bad and taking them in our stride as we went along.....

The wrath of the profs which we all together took with silent empathy for each other. The bitching sessions about anything and everything related to anyone and everyone.

Maxinations....Expressions....someone has rightly named the festival...in togetherness do we express our enthusiasm and spirit through a festival for which we didn’t mind to toil for nights together just to make it a success....and the admiration in all our eyes as each of our batchmates performed with flying colors...applauding for each and everyone...

The b’day celebrations...where the whole batch has fun at your expense and you enjoy to see them all laugh at your expense..

The silent prayers for one and all for placements...

I am not sure if I can term it Nostalgia as we count the final days to our footsteps taking us outside the campus...but I am sure there will be innumerable days when we will be sitting with a smile spread on our faces remembering the PJs of our friends and batchmates idiosyncrasies here...telling the tales of the profs and classes that we took each being an experience in itself...I only hope that just similar to the way we had all given a silent support to each other during the senior ragging sessions and class ragging sessions by the profs which were our first stepping stones...which we had probably misunderstood then and which now we understand was a way by which they made us think not as an individual but as a batch and brought us closer making us think for each other...just like that in the days to come I hope we still will silently support each other when the corporate world out there waits to rag us...with this note I bid adieu to the batch of 2010...

Surreal or Real?

I think everybody in this world lives in two different worlds...one being real with stark practicality of day to day life, where your weaknesses have no place, where everyone is struggling to make a place, where you just get up and run to keep pace with the fast moving reality, where expectations are not alive, where you are alone, you are an individual all by yourself ...left alone to face it all whether things be in your favour or not....in short its the world where dreams end and reality begins and hits in your face and you have no say..you got to take it and keep walking...

And at the exact opposite end lies the other world...its surreal...but it exists as much as your real practical world...this is the world that everyone loves because they can see their hopes alive..which are so alive that they seem to hold your hand and lead you to the path where you see your expectations smiling down at you and encouraging you to dream...soar high in your dreams...paint that surreal world which has all the colors...bright and sparkling...without a speck of dullness...And how much you love to be lost in this surreal world of yours...This is the world where you define yourself..where there is time and place for love, closeness, family, friends...there is leisure...your imaginations are free to soar...

And there is a line separating the two worlds....a thin line it is...as its very often that when you realize the reality is way different and claims to be so practical that you slip into your surreal world to take solace to console yourself saying that what if the reality is so...what if I am not allowed to expect in there...what if my dreams don’t have a place there....I can still dream and expect in my surreal world and derive fulfilment from it...And you probably still expect and still dream...and again hope...hope that this time it is the other way round and this time atleast one of the dreams from the surreal world just slides into the real world and leaves you in awe....

Afterall the mind knows no bounds...the heart has no boundaries...they still hope for that day when the surreal world is your real world...they still expect their dreams to lead them by the hand to the apex of their imaginations and each time they are proved wrong they just wonder why is that we even expect .....aren’t the two worlds in completely different planes....surreal is still surreal and real is afterall real...stark but still real...but what the heart doesn’t although the mind understands is...how to draw the line between them...how to keep them separate...how to let them be...And the larger question would be...what is it right now?...Surreal or Real?