Why Me?

FY Submission- Deepika Khanna

The first year of college is said to be the most awaited step of life after completing your high school but who knew a pandemic could manage to make it a misery. The year which was supposed to be a fresh start, entering into a new world, meeting new people, experiencing new things and making loads of memories turned into online lectures, making virtual friends, hosting online fests and what not.

What were supposed to be the best days of my life seem like a faraway dream. It aches my heart thinking that I won’t ever be able to live the first year of my college the way it is shown in movies and books that I have longed after since I was young enough to spell the word ‘college’ itself. People say the first year of college is a glimpse into the real world but how do you experience the real world through a screen as it puts a pause on all my dreams and moments I had hoped to experience.

From visualising my first day of college, my first event, my first time walking down the corridors of the college – everything seems so distant at this point of time. Having no one to sit around me during lectures, not being able to enjoy the canteen food, all those small bits of my college life I had dreamt of is at the other side of the door. The door is wide open and I can see what is waiting there on the other side. Yet somehow, I cannot walk on through to the other side to live my best life. Perhaps, the entire year will be spent simply standing in the doorway, stuck and stifled. Missing out on all these magical moments of my life makes me question what I did to deserve this.

SY Submission- Ritika Soni

Being an outstation student, I vividly remember the first day of my college which I had entered like an alien on a strange planet. There were people talking about fashion and then they were some who were models themselves. There were more crowds sitting on stairs than people actually climbing it. A random group of students was laughing in the middle of the corridor after successfully bunking lectures. A girl was sitting at the window; lost in her own thoughts while a committee was buzzing with new ideas like a freshly elected government.

By the end of the first year, this strange land had become my home. I had my own group which talked about food if not fashion, and with whom I preferred to sit on stairs rather than in lectures. I became part of committees, members of which felt like family. As I dreamed of taking up posts in committees and going apartment hunting with college friends in my next year, I couldn’t have seen the coming of a virus which would demand separation from people I had just gotten attached with.

It is believed that the first year of college is the ‘year of adjustment’ and that the third year is the ‘year of future planning’. In other words, the second year is the only year in which you truly live in the moment. This was the year when I was going to explore different places and food. This was the year wherein I was going to welcome and guide my juniors. This was the year in which I was going to travel without getting lost. This was the year for which my calendar was marked with trips and parties.

Unfortunately, none of these things are possible now, because a virus decided to visit Earth exactly when I was supposed to write the most beautiful chapter of my college life.

TY Submission- Muskaan

The aromatic smell fills the entrance, the class welcomes you to a room called home where the giggles of your friends are heard as you walk through the door. Nostalgia hits hard when I suddenly realize that I am sipping a cup of coffee while the screen is my class.

The third year, the year where your dream is provided a ladder to reach higher, where your ambitions finally take a shape, where you are glad you made it till here and emotional knowing that you will be walking to this college for one last year. It all seems to take a pause when the virus hit hard, the juicy gossips at the canteen with friends, running behind teachers when exams are near, the massive corridors where you will plan for all your nerve-wracking projects, the crippling fear for the job interviews and then eagerly waiting for the graduation and farewell at the end. This year was supposed to be about learning and taking every bit that the college had to offer, to roam around every single nook and corner of this extravagant campus, trying delicious dishes of the canteens that surround us, to build a network of similar individuals and interests, and attend Lit fest for one last time.

I wonder if the other students are the unlucky ones or us? We who have adjusted our last year to the screen due to this invisible enemy standing in front of us, making us miss the exhilarating vibe of the physical lectures and the bag full of life hacks the teachers could have rendered before we are finally left into the real world.

This never-ending nostalgia and regrets make the infamous proverb “You never realize the value of something until it's gone." fit so apt for us after all.