Life & Times @ NIT
Sep 04,2007
NIT Trichy
I"m Neo.
Today was my first Cycle Test.I wonder how soon these things come & go, even after being postponed. English - the most easy, yet most dreaded, and two chapters for that. So it happened that, now that I feel a free soul after my screwed roomie discontinued talking to me, in consequense of a brawl that ensued between him and my friends two days from now, which ended quite discourteously(to him,of course,not to me)-I entered the room last evening thinking it to be in my interest to know what I"ve to write the next day. I won"t say that I completed it at a stretch- knowing that being in the room for more than half an hour with my stupid roomie may prove to me unhealthy- but learning from someone that the test is in forenoon rather than in the morning,I winged it right up and went to the cafe,after which I watched TV in the common room until 4:30a.m. when I thought I might be up late for breakfast.
* * *
"Fuck the breakfast!",something sounded in me as my alarm started its cacophony 7o"clock in the morning, and I snoozed it down.That"s the difference between my alarm clock and my roomie.
* * *
A rumbling in my room woke me up. Several guys were discussing their muggings.11:30a.m. I brushed hastily,emptied my bowels,and went for lunch.That messed up mess!I had planned to save one hour at least for finishing the heck.A full stomach churned as I saw the clock on returning-1:30p.m. Everyone around was leaving for the examination hall.I dashed to my room,got the bucket underbed,and bathed as fast as I could.The corridors lenthened themselves,the clocks speeded.The hostel got empty,and the sound of my steps spanning the corridors reverberated.I left the hostel, as always, hastily clad, at 1:47, and ran to the lecture hall complex.I took the book with me so that I could glance at it -the thing I had not done since buying it- at the last moment.The complex was empty too!Passing the corridors,I came across a notice headed "SCHEDULE FOR THE FIRST CYCLE TEST, SEMESTER I." There,following the schedule,in thin font was:
"Venue: Section A,B,C: 301, IT Centre."
I stood there a moment, two eyes wide open, cold sweat drenching somewhere round the neck, and a mandible touching the floor. There are times when you feel God doesn"t exist at all.
"Where"s the IT Centre?", I asked, rather shouted at, an archi coming out of Coral.
"I think it"s in the Octagon",said he.
"Fuck you",said I.
A second year passing by, as though he had seen something uncommon, turned his kind gaze,"It"s in CompSci Department, over there".
"Godspeed",I resolved.
Climbing the stairs of the IT Centre three at a time,I wondered for the first time what to do with the book.I reached for the familiar place between pants and socks, but the socks were not there.This was not school. I had to be content in putting it beside the waist, where the loose shirt may hide its contours, but from where, however, it can"t be retrieved.
The answersheets were already distributed, and the question papers were in the process of being so. I asked for an answersheet, searched for my bench, and reached it just in time a question paper arrived.There, on the top, below the usual headings, was written:
"Textbook titled "Technical Communication" by Meenakshi Raman and Sangeeta Sharma is to be used in the test hall."
There are times when you feel God is always there to save your waist.
* * *
"Five minutes, students. Tie up your sheets", the stunning blow came from one of the invigilators, just when I completed two out of ten parts of the last question.
