Getting in touch: The hard way!

The world starts with a ‘hi’ and ends with ‘take care’. In both the cases we usually don’t see anyone saying ‘I or me’ in the first case, or ‘you’ in the second. In either places, it’s only one person who’s starting/closing the conversation. I was just thinking aloud; what if the conversation was left incomplete and someone or something would have come in our lives without any reason or left without any reason too. There are two completely different dimensions of emotions that strike to our heart that sing a whole different song.

The Happy Song: When I entered MICA!

When I came to this new island of “Creative Souls”, I was all pumped up to see those new faces and the first day at MICA was like an augmented dream. I expected a HOsTEL and I got a HOTEL-like room. I was all excited because the room was for 2 occupants and I was the first to enter. I had the independence to choose any side of the bed and I took my own sweet time. When all the others joined in, I started interacting with everyone and I was already famous with the term “Manipulative Bug” because I was trying to explain the features of a bug that camouflaged itself in the room, and I accidentally quoted the word ‘manipulative’ which was so much uncalled for at that point of time. All other friends slowly started checking in and among the guys I started feeling a bit out of place because I didn’t smoke. Everywhere I’ve gone till now, smokers have their own community of being regal and that’s quite legal. I’ve never objected any of my friends from not smoking, but I’ve not tried either. I was now hunting to find that one crazy creature who’d match to my level of insanity and I found a faculty who was just “The One!”

I never actually had an intention to be obnoxious in his presence, but I’ve always competed with him in cracking the most disgusting PJ’s and we’ve succeeded every time. During this course of humor, I motivated few other friends too who joined me in my craziness and have almost surpassed me. The guys’ gang was never happy unless there were few sexy girls around. I think so ours is the first batch where the girls were more than guys. We were just 10 and there were 14 girls. Statistically, every guy had a chance of winning a heart of 1.4 girls and the girls have also been quite sweet and lovely to encourage this effort of ours. Those initial days in February were the most comfortable days when there was a thin air of chill flowing all around the campus and we had a nice time waking up early every morning and enjoying the sunrise. I fell in love with photography from that moment and I still take pictures every day. Girls have always been my subject and I’ve instructed them to wear a smile always because my candid camera may open its shutter any moment. It’s only me who savor their lovely smiles and make them look good even in their night-dresses and meal-plates. Other guys have their own way to share their connections with each other, but I’ve always been a ‘Silent Observer!’ I know that I can’t be like others and I am not ready to give up my 26 years of belly property come-what-may.

I’ve learnt new ways of seeing and listening with which I can see something more than that’s visible and I can hear something more than that’s audible. I assure you that I am not spying on anybody and I do not have any super-powers. It is just that I am trying too hard to be one, but failing miserably. All these things that I wanted to learn, and that I’ve learnt wasn’t part of the curriculum, but the surroundings taught me, the people taught me and apart from all this, the faculties did teach me what was there in the curriculum and also taught us to learn and not study. One can stop studying for years, and yet make a life, but one can never stop learning and yet make a living.

The Sad Song: When I’ll close the chapter of MICA here itself!

Among all these people who are my friends here, the guys are not my enemies because they never like my jokes or because I don’t smoke; the girls are not my lifelong friends because they’ve always been sweet to me and posed for my every click. Every person has a distinct connection with me and I can now tell confidently that I’ll be losing a lot of years in my life if I forget each one of them. I’ll never get to smell the ‘Clove Mix’ in my room; I’ll never be able to enjoy the Maggi with all these chaps; I can’t be sure if I can click their photographs even after we go out of this campus; I can never crack such deadliest PJ’s in front of a Creative Director and expect him to applause and give me a high-five; I can never stay awake all night and yet do nothing next morning; I can never play badminton as rigorously as I play here; I don’t know if I’ll be playing pool again. Most importantly for all the guys, we can never be able to see 300+ girls wearing shorts and coming to the mess to have breakfast.

Life will all take an exclusive turn when we start focusing at our careers and ‘move on’ with our lives. For me, the phrase ‘move on’ has always been paradoxical. We can never “move on” when we “move off” the ground. The reason we all are here is because we were not able to ‘move on’ with our ‘normal’ lives and we wanted a twist in the tale. After the course when we find our way and start our journey towards success, we tend to bump into each other at some point of time somewhere. At that moment, we all need to have something to cherish and talk about for hours together. If the conversation ends with, ‘bye… take care… keep in touch’, you’ll know what it means. There is a greed attached here to meet each and every one of them regularly, but alumni meets have always seen a poor turnover. Mumbai is supposed to be the dream destination to most of us, but life always been a bitch. We always keep dreaming most of the times and fail to wake up and make them true. For those who live there, it’s their homecoming, but for the others, it has always been thanksgiving. Going away from friends has always been my worst curse ever and I’ve been living it since 12 years. A tribe can never befriend any civil society because he’s never one of them. Luckily for me, I’ve been meeting all other tribal people who have their own song to sing. I’ll never be able to understand why I am the target every time. The day I am a close friend to people, is the day that we are supposed to depart.

The chapter of MICA in my life will never close. This course of 6 months is just a foundation for me to start a new life from a totally new perspective. Though my focus has never changed, but changing views will definitely bring change in the beauty of the way we see at people, things and relations.