What a good college gives us

In my blog Real cost of getting into a good college, I discussed how people like me missed out on our love stories because of focusing more on studying rather than looking to have a good time. This time I'll discuss what I learned and gained because of my studies. Most of my friends during school time used to look up to me as a person who was incapable of having fun, it was somewhat true. JEE preparation didn't allow me to hang out a lot. Discussing cartoons, solving HC Verma, and few bike rides pretty much summed up my school life. The only good thing for me back then was tuition and nothing else. 

Most of my school friends ended up studying in private colleges of Delhi-NCR. These were the people who used to look down on me as a person who is a bore but things changed quickly. Their college was just like a school with a bigger campus and a lot more chicks. On the other hand, I moved to a new state to explore life and live on my own. Their college was so boring that most of them never managed to make more than 2-3 friends, simply because they never got the chance to really hang out with their colleagues or friends. Well, I also didn't made friends, I got brothers for life, I had seniors who are like my elder brother and juniors like my younger brothers. When my real brother left for IIT-R, I didn't cry but when I left college my juniors did cry for me. I'm pretty sure that this level bonding would've been impossible for me in a private college. My school friends never got the taste of ragging, but it definitely made me a person with a lot less shyness to do embarrassing stuff. If you can do a pole dance in front of your seniors and walk with your underwear on top of your trousers, you can do a whole lot of embarrassing things that others wouldn't even dare to think. It's not that you need to do these things in later life but it definitely gives you the confidence that you can handle even the most embarrassing things life throws at you. People who went to private colleges don't even know that sometimes we used to given 2-3 final term exams in a day whereas they used to get 4-5 days off between each exam. This kind of exam pattern taught us how to handle pressure and keep our calm in such situations. Living in a hostel gave me the opportunity to be as real as possible, when you're living in a society, you do care about how your family and neighbors perceive you but a government hostel takes off that burden because no one gives a damn there how you look or dress, after all, not many girls to be impressed around. Few of my batchmates used to come to mess with a blanket or just an innerwear instead of a jacket, believe me on this, most people don't have the guts to go out dressed like that, it only happens when you stop pretending and accept your true self. To make you understand how confident I'm regarding this, I'm fully capable of asking a rickshaw puller to let me drive his rickshaw. A friend of mine once took a whole journey with his bedding on Metro's floor, he brought that bedding just to pull that stunt. Generally, people are too scared of being judged but I'm not and it's only because of all that ragging. College taught me how to live in the worst possible situations with no money and no stuff of mine. I spent weeks without having a single penny in my purse, all I had to do was just go to someone's room and pick money from their purse. I never asked for money, I just used to tell them that I'm taking their money like I do with my real brother. When your bond is so strong, you just tell your friends and they are ready to do that thing for you. Dancing like hounds, stalking girls over social media, drinking like freeloaders, talking about ghosts, pulling a one-nighter, beating the asses of our friends on their birthdays, playing cricket at 1 AM in the night, harassing people, using each other's stuff all the time, abusing like hell in hostels (some people had their own songs which was just pure abuse), eating other states homemade food, playing CS for days, watching cricket in groups of hundreds, behaving like ass holes, showing your peculiarities, abusing friends just for fun are few of the things that wouldn't have been possible without hostel life. There was this freedom to do whatever you wished to do, no one was there to tell you that you need to get up, it's 12 in the noon. I went on 2 bike trips, I'm pretty sure my parents wouldn't have allowed that if I would've been at home. You could've puked in your own bed after drinking like hell, but still, it was okay. You could've spent hours sitting in the middle of a road with no worries at all. People who never went to the government colleges don't even know what I'm talking about. This kind of freedom doesn't exist anywhere else, it exists only in the hostels. You may get a little taste of this freedom when you join a job but it's nowhere near close to the hostel life because you feel shy as you have matured up and you still live among people who will complain against your peculiarities. It's impossible to discuss the things I did in the hostel even in 10 blogs. I don't even remember half of the stuff I did, but hell yeah, it was the best four years of my life. I'm also of the opinion that getting into a serious relationship even in college's initial years also seriously undercuts all these experiences. If you get a girl in the first year it is very likely that you'll spend most of your time with her thus not getting a chance to be as free as I was. Committing to someone simply means that you can't live completely free of all bonds, you can't talk about some stuff, you can't do certain stuff because that puts your relationship in jeopardy. On the other hand, I was free to do anything and everything without bothering about jeopardizing anything. For instance, I survived on Tea and biscuits for days, just to test my hunger limit. Once I continuously used my laptop for 18 hours a day for a week, later I had to go to a clinic, but the point is, I did whatever pleased me and this wouldn't have been the case if I would've been dating someone at that time.

Now, coming to the skills I gained from my college life, I can talk about any topic in the world and it happened only because of all the discussions I carried on a daily basis in the hostel. I don't get to discuss even a 10th of that at my place. I got a whole lot of confidence and stopped caring what others think of me and this made me complacent. I self-taught myself many things during that time, now I know that I can learn anything be it poetry, songwriting, or any other skill. Knowing that you have the capability to learn and do anything on your own is not something everyone has. Most of my school friends don't even know the feeling of getting their names on an international journal. I got the habit of helping people and friends because of my time served in NSS. I was getting paid twice more than my private college friends for a similar job and it's because of the capability of handling pressure and learning things quickly which comes as a result of studying in a government college. If I would've been in a private college I couldn't even think of stepping into worlds top 100 universities let alone actually studying there. Studying in a good college gives you not only great experiences, it gives you something even more wonderful, it gives you the opportunity of exploration. If I would've been in a private college all my dreams would've been limited to get a job and survive myself, but now I have got the option to think bigger than this. I know that if I can sort my priorities I can end up landing in the biggest companies in the world or going to the world's best universities or creating some wonderful algorithm and change the world. Whether I would do that or not is a different thing but even to have these options is a wonderful possibility. I can definitely get back my missed love story but not the possibility of exploration if I would've gotten into a private college. Private college students don't have the mindset of achieving any substantial thing in their lives. This happens because of the people around them, they haven't met "Machhau people" in their lives. If you'll put me into a private college and in IIT-B, the way I'll turn out in a few years in both cases will be totally different just because of the difference in the two environments. Whenever I visited IIT-B, I felt motivated because there is something in the air there. Everyone is doing wonderful things there and this used to motivate me every time I visited that place. This type of environment may put tremendous pressure on someone but once you stop competing and start getting inspired instead, your performance will definitely improve. Few years down the line my college friends will be in a much better place to help me out financially or in terms of favor as compared to my school friends. Few of my school friends are still not able to land any job even after more than a year, they are just sitting idle. Your friends make all the difference in your thought process, IIFT all India topper is someone whom I've beaten up with slippers, another one is ready to get patents for his designs, another one has developed world's best image compression algorithm. These are the kind of people I'm friends with and they definitely inspire me a lot. These guys have achieved far more than my school friends but still, they are far more humble, sorted, caring, and understanding than those who haven't done shit in their lives.  

Love and thanks to all my friends who helped, tolerated, listened, inspired, and sustained me.