Lull Before the Storm

Completed all my registration formalities yesterday. It was pretty painless considering the dreary and treacherous hours spent in queues in COEP with weird coloured chalaans in hand. This most importantly was in a seated position, and with much cooler climes – something which I totally approve of!

Apart from that, there is not much to do currently. A majorly hectic day is planned tomorrow as I mentioned in earlier posts. Another extra lecture (which begins at 9 pm) and which apparently is meant to tell us about IIMC. I do not mean to be sarcastic or anything, but why does that make me feel like another big yaaaawn coming my way?

We did get a white, jute-khadi jhola yesterday with IIM Calcutta written on it. But it was on the inside. You actually had to open the bag fully before anyone could make out that it was an IIMC bag. Hence most of the time after registration as spent – with the aforementioned bag being the butt of all jokes. The jokes mainly made use of 2 facts

1. IIMC actually shies away from branding. This apparently is the reason why IIMA has a better brand than IIMC, even though IIMC is older.

2. How typical that in Calcutta we should get a jhola. Many people searched for kurtas too, to complete the look but that item of clothing was missing.

A bunch of people went out yesterday evening. We took the bus upto Behaala, then a sharing rickshaw up to Kalighat metro station and then a short Metro trip to Jatin Das Chowk Metro station where we got off. We generally started walking and everyone was so hungry that we stopped and ate at the first decent restaurant we could spot. It was a Punjabi placed owned by a surd,(Tandoori something it was called, I forget …) and the food was petty decent. We came back via taxi, stopping for some rasgullas on the way. Very very nice indeed ;)

Macro level observations from this place so far follow.

1. This is the first time I’m staying on hostel. The only word I can describe that experience so far is “sane” – or at least “saner than I thought it would be”. Seniors are generally very busy, and one hardly sees them – and if you want you can sleep early (say by midnight) peacefully. There is no noise/shouting/fun and games at night, or during the day.

2. Seniors (in the generally less-hectic second year) are found only trotting from college to room or vice-versa. Everyone by now has made the assumption, that its going to be a lot tougher for us.

3. There are a ton of amenities here to use. Billiards table, TT tables, Gymnasium, Badminton courts, a lovely swimming pool complex. However one hardly sees anyone using these. That is another worrying sign pointing to the fact that you hardly find enough time.

However, I have a feeling that the “sane” image is about to change soon. There are a lot of stories we have heard about stuff that happens here, and the calm is most likely a factor of seniors / freshers settling in, and of ice-breaking and unfamiliarity issues.

That is all I can think of for now. More updates soon!

(PS: Dont hold your breath because the course in some sense begins tomorrow, so updates might be less frequent and shorter!)

(PPS: I have no patience to proofread this. So forgive any typos/errors/non sequiturs)

June 19th, 2008 / 0 Comments / Tags: musings, lull / Trackback