Night As A Hostelite

It was just another day when I left at 8 am for my college. It started raining cats and dogs. Everyone was in a state of panic including one of my close friend Kunal, who was unable to contact his parents. He took the decision of leaving the college in the hope of reaching his home by any means of transport available. Due to waterlogging, Kunal thought it was safe to ride through a public transport bus to the railway station. Kunal reached the railway station safely but unaware of the worsening situation, Kunal then realized that his decision of leaving college was a big mistake as all the trains were cancelled.

Worried for Kunal’s safety I called him to know how he was. I suggested Kunal to return back to the college as college premises was much safer than water logged areas. But due to worsening conditions, Kunal was not able to make his way back to the college premise.

Time passed by and in the evening, rains still continued. Some students returned back to college as they were not able to find any means of transport to their home. Some professors were also stuck with us in the college. The students who couldn’t find any means of transport and returned back to college were drenched due to rain and were freezing with cough and cold. Seeing them suffer the hostelites lent their extra clothes, towels to those students in need. I had a talk with Kunal again and I came to know that he was still stuck at the railway station. I made him talk to one of our Professor and the most feasible solution for him given was to be calm and sit at a corner on the skywalk at the railway station.

So, we all were given hostel accommodation. As college had just begun, most hostelites had decided to extend their vacation resulting in a lot of unoccupied beds. We were accommodated in a room that could house 5 students. I thought other students were tired as they were stuck in rains and came back to the college and would sleep early but that was not the case. Almost half of the hostelites gathered in our room and started introducing themselves. I must say ,I got to know some amazing people and their hidden talents like there were people who could beatbox, some were wrestlers, great photographers.

After that a hostelite came running upstairs saying that the warden is on a round to check whether all the students who came today have slept or not, hearing this within a blink of an eye all the hostelites returned to their respective rooms and we were given some blankets and made to act as if we were actually sleeping. When the warden came to check up on us he found everyone was sleeping and the moment he was gone, we sprung back into action. All the hostelites returned to our room and the talks continued. Everyone was hungry as the hostel food was not quite liked by us localities who were used to eating homemade food. So, the hostelites prepared noodles for us at midnight and I must agree it tasted awesome. It wasn't because we were deprived of food for so long that the Maggie tasted extraordinarily delicious, nor was it the fun of eating hot, steamy Maggie in cold, rainy weather, but it was the unique experience of eating Maggie late at night with other hostelites, laughing around and making precious memories before we even realized it. After having some great talks and eating noodles at midnight I thought finally everyone will doze off but it was not the case as some hostelites who were fitness freaks did something that was no one would have ever expected. They made 2 hostelites sit on the bed and were actually pulling up the bed to perform exercises. The hostelites then told us the reason for doing such unusual things for exercising was that there was no gym nearby and they were habitual to exercising daily and weightlifting so they found this unique way.

I made many friends that night but there was this particular guy Prathamesh who belonged to Pandharpur and we both had some great converstions. Prathamesh mentioned as he belonged to a rural area, he found it difficult to understand and converse in English and asked me if I could help him out. I agreed to it instantly as he seemed to be a hardworking guy and I got a great friend. Conversations continued and no one came to know how time passed by. We all went to sleep by 2 am or so and woke up early morning as we had to leave for our home respectively.The first thing I did when I woke up early morning,was call Kunal to know how he was doing.I found out that luckily, last night he got in touch with a few of his distant relatives and he spent the night with them. Rains had stopped and the waterlogging had also been cleared up to an extent which indicated that it was the time to return home.

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At the end I would just like to say that this incident was an experience of lifetime as I made some great friends and came to know some secrets about hostel life. Also, this incident taught us that

Good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from bad decisions.

Its been a year to that incident and still whenever it rains heavily some of us remind of those experiences and wish could relive those small priceless, adventurous moments.