Those were the days... Chapter III (The semester of new friendships..)

Readers wanted masala in the Chapter 2 but I can't add any for the readers.Chapter 2 was more about how I made up my mind to land up in BIT.. I don't think there will be masala in this chapter either.. but there will be masala in chapters to come..

There I was standing in the mess...met Bose and we found another thing in common.. The Key Chain..both of us had the same key chain..well after the tea and hot pakoras, Bose introduced me to Gaurav, Mishra and Ayush.. so to say the Delhi gang.. spent some time in the evening with them..discussing branches, schools etc.. Of these only two of them stand-by me till now.. cassi and kundan ( he comes later in the story).. There also is Momo (met him after dusshera)...
Then it came to the dreaded topic of freshers in college...

"Ragging".. there were tales and stories which people had heard from others.."Seniors make you strip"...'No, They can't do that. they can't go physical".. "they make you kiss each other".. etc etc...though the College authorities had provided adequate security. Anyone from outside had to make an entry and no senior was allowed in the hostel. but we all knew it was inevitable. Me n Bose were scared the most as our room (6D) was the corner most room and anyone could enter anytime.

But there was an added advantage of the room. It was the room facing the insti and while sitting in the room you could see everyone going and leaving the main building. The whole gang use to sit there and wait for the girls to pass-by in the morning, afternoon and evening.. it had become the hub of activities

Then there were places like telephone booths where you couldn't avoid seniors. It really was a terrifying thought. We decided to hang out together, follow the instructions of wearing formals and lay low. We all use to go together to attend or make calls... It was really funny.. If we have to leave hostel anytime, we were supposed to wear full formals with shoes. We were not allowed to visit the canteen..Once Bose and Mishra tried after getting fed up with the food and landed up in the senior's hostel playing ping-pong with the balls....

The favourite pass-time was playing UNO at night and cricket in the evening. This was the time when I met the Cricket gang of Dhaka in the college.I was immediately recognised as the lefty fast bowler and was always given the first over. Those matches used to be real fun.
I vaguely remember an incident that scared the gang. We were sitting in my room playing UNO (Kundan has been introduced as Ayush's roomie and Ishan too has joined the college). Suddenly power failure.

Few of them had gone to get the candles and the door was open. Suddenly a guy with long hair and beard enters the room with 2 others.(later we realised that was true to LEO Clubs image) We were shit scared and terrified.. (Beta aaj tho gaye.. ragging tho hogi hi and seeing them you can't imagine what thoughts went in our heads)..

Senior1 : "You guys are playing card. Don' you know you aren't allowed"
Bose : "No bhaiya, we are not playing cards. Its UNO"
Senior2: "Bhaiya?? You don't know how to address your senior!! What UNO?? All are cardgames"
Us : "Sorry Sir. Won't repeat it again"
Senior2 : "What sorry!!...."
Senior1 (interrupting) : "Jaane de yaar. Now we are in final year. leave it for 2nd year. Givethem the poster"

They handed us the poster and asked us to put it in Hostel Mess.We were also asked to come for the party. We did attend the party (Senior1 turned out to be the President of Leo club) and it was real fun though the turnout in LEO party was very low as compared to Rotract.That was our first encounter to any club in the college...

All the guys went through the ragging.. Bose, Cassi, Kundan, Mishra.. Doing the chawani-aathani dance, playing TT, acting as couples on honeymoon, etc..somehow i managed to escape it in the first semester..

From there on we used to have different clubs coming to hostels and talk about what they do and why should we join them. Rotract and Leo had their rivalry going on. With Rotract known as the hep and delhi gang while Leo having the image of "Bhaiya club" and lower class. There were IEEEs, IEEs, UNESCO, ACM SPICMACAY.. none seemed to excite me in the first semester. Mishra had zeroed on IEEE and ACM. Ayush was impressed with Photo Soc.. Bose was into Fine Arts.. Kundan was another losser like me..

I was more busy with studies and crying over my decision to join BIT and also all of the clubs asked a certain membership fee which I couldn't afford as my this stay wasn't planned. I still remember the names given to me in the first sem..Daanu, Salim were the favourites and I carried a rough image.

Another incident which makes me laugh till now was Me and Majumdar catching Kyunki in the TV Room. Both of us used to watch that serial. The series had just started and we were kinda hooked on to Tulsi.No matter what we use to catch the series and both of us had gone famous for that.. batchmates use to never argue and leave the room.. I can't believe that I used to do that.

A famous story doing the round was that our hostel was built over a kabristan and that a student had committed suicide in the hostel and it was haunted. It had scared the shit out of us. Around the same time people had started seeing figures in their lobbies.. At nights me and bose use to go to the loo together or in a gang. There were many pranks played in the hostel with people seeing some random figures dressed in white.. It really had turned a haunted land..

Well Dusshera break had arrived and we were all going back home.. It was a time we all were waiting for... I was more than desperate because for last one month I had been wearing the same trouser....