“Hi! How are you? How does it feel when it’s all over? :-)” This is what Saikat messaged me today morning from Mumbai. And this is something many people have asked me many a times in last couple of days. To be honest, I myself have asked this question to me a few times in last two days.
It has been two days since I have left IIT Roorkee forever as a student. Yes, I am an IITR alumnus now. So, how do I feel when I know that I am no more a student of IIT Roorkee? I had heard that the feeling of leaving the campus is a hard one and it’s a bit difficult to control one’s emotion. But seriously speaking, nothing of that sort happened with me though I could realise that some of my friends were quite nostalgic about leaving one of the coolest places in the world (read IIT Roorkee). For me, it was a feeling of joy, triumph, achievement and most importantly happiness for coming out of the college as a lot more mature person than who went in four years ago. I won’t say that I became the best of engineers which IITs are supposed to produce but I can say with ample amount of certainty that every second I spent in the college added to my knowledge base, be it in the terms of learning about life, people and their behaviour, and many other things. But the most important thing I learnt was about myself. I came to meet the true Ashish Agrawal at my college only. And I would always be thankful to that place (IIT Roorkee) that it gave me chance for that, to evaluate myself, to see through myself, to know myself.
Coming back to what I feel.....well, I always dreamt of the day when I would be a graduate and I was waiting for this day for long. And hence, I felt good. And moreover, the last couple of weeks at the college were full of workload and tensions owing to project work, fuss created in the department over the faulty evaluation of the project and then finally no dues clearance. And during these times, I desperately wanted to get away from the college as soon as possible. And so I along with some of my friends came out of the main gate of IIT Roorkee for the last time, one of my friends remarked:
Chalo, finally jail se nikal gaye!!
(Finally, we came out of the jail)
And I even tossed the cowboy hat I was wearing.
Now when I sit at home and have almost nothing to do, sometimes, I think of my life at college, my friends, the people around me. I don’t know when I will see some of the faces, which are very dear to me, the next time. I don’t know when I will be able to hang out with them. May be, I get to see some of them after a long long time, may be I accidently meet some of them in some street in some city like strangers meet. And then may be I will feel the same amount of joy I used to when hanging out with them, may be...........
