One Moment of Pride

The ragging days were hectic but memorable and it was damn fun. Initially everyone was scared and uncomfortable but gradually after frequent interaction with the seniors we realized everyone is too cool, just like us. After overcoming the fear factor, we really enjoyed the remaining days.  Ten days after joining hostel we got to see a new face, he was quite tall and used to wear specs. Looking at him I thought we might get some dose tonight. The guy approached us by himself and he seemed to be quite friendly.  He said last year he took admission in JEC and after enjoying the ragging period there he transferred to AEC. Cigarettes were band for the entire fresher’s during the ragging period but after meal I usually used to visit his room for some drags. 

He was quite well known for his peculiar personality. I would like to say about his typical day schedule we had observed during our stay in hostel. He was from mechanical branch, as all traditional branches in AEC used to have regular classes, he never used to miss his first class. He usually used to wear jeans, full sleeve shirts, leather shoes and his trademark was his neck scarf.  That was his dress code irrespective of any weather any season. After classes he used to come to hostel during lunch time and would usually catch the 12:50 bus. One afternoon we saw some of his mechanical friends in hostel and asked them “You guys bunked your class?” They said “no, we don’t have any class today” I replied “but I have seen your friend got into the 12:50 bus, I thought  he might be going for his class” They started to laugh and replied “Hey! forget about him, everyday he would go somewhere. Even we don’t have any idea where he goes?”  He would come to hostel in the evening usually by 7:40 or the last bus. After dinner we always saw him in the common room wearing his same morning dress and of course with his typical neck scarf. He used to play TT for around two hours and finally at around 12:30 AM he would go to his room. At the night when he used to open his leather shoes, my goodness, the freshness would immediately spread to the entire block and sometimes even the guys in the adjacent block would also feel that freshness.

One night he wanted to buy some cigarette and the shop near to our hostel was already closed. He asked our company to go a little further near our college, as one of the shop there used to be open 24/7. So I and Nair went with him to buy some cigarettes. On the way he repeatedly asked the same question “Will I be able to get a girl friend?” When we replied “Yes, why not?” he asked “why?  What qualities I do have? Give me 10 reasons why I will be able to get a girl friend?” We tried to convince him a lot but he was not convinced. He discussed on the same topic on several occasions for few more days.

During our time we used to have awesome farewell feasts in hostel. Usually few hostels organized farewell feast on the same day, just to distribute the traffic J we never experienced any feast in hostel-8, although hostel-8 boarders had the courtesy to visit each and every hostel during the feast. Their visit in hostel was a moment of pride for many of the seniors. Now our scarf senior was also one of them. When it was their time to say good bye they had also given a wonderful feast and as usual invited all the other hostels including hostel-8. On that particular day he called a hostel boy and cleaned his room graciously. We asked him what happened? He replied “tonight our hostel-8 batch mates will come for the feast” we had a small laugh and asked him “what if they don’t visit your room?  As one of your friends is also cleaning his room” He became quite upset on that and we could see some kind of anxiety on his face.

Hostel-8 boarders actually visited like a flash. Very few among us had the opportunity to see them live. They had to go for their courtesy visit to each and every hostel which organized feast that day and that too within a limited time frame. May be they didn't want to break any heart in those final moments. One of my friend asked “How can they feast on so many places within such a short time?” someone replied “they might not shallow at every hostel, they just came for a courtesy visit” But few friends claimed that they have seen them eating nicely.  At around 9 PM the scarf guy came to our room screaming and proudly said to us “Yes, I did it, I just did it man” We wondered, suddenly what happened to him? He replied “I just did it man, today 10 hostel-8 boarders visited my room” We said to him “wow, so nice, congratulations to you” He said he never gave the other guy any chance and escorted them directly to his room. They had a chat for few minutes and then he took them to the dining hall, after dinner they again came to his room, chatted for few minutes and then they left for their courtesy visit to a different hostel.