By Ipshita Chatterjee, Batch of 2018
So there you are, all bright-eyed and sorted, expectant of what this wonderland called college holds for you. Let me take this opportunity to bore you (or not) with some possibly life-altering philosophical gyaan, which you might just be giving away, this time next year.
Life, my dear little fuchhas, is an enigmatic dilemma. Two roads are always diverging in that yellow wood and you are always at some threshold or the other. If you thought that your quota of life’s tough choices ended with, supposedly, the most important choice between DTU and NSIT (which, I may add, is a remarkable choice you have made), you might want to rethink that. There will be bigger and more significant choices to make in college – to bunk or not to bunk, to join XYZ society or not, Zayca or McCain, chilli potato or chilli paneer, to sleep or not to sleep (yes, you read that right. Just a few more weeks before that becomes a reality) and for some, to bathe or not to bathe (to each their own).
Another of these seemingly life-altering choices which you will have to make will be the unofficial fresher’s party. Come the first week of August, your classrooms will be flocked by the messiahs of naive fuchhas in this college, your seniors, who know all the nooks and crannies of this mind-boggling jungle, who will teach you all the ropes of acing college life and who hold the key to attainment of ‘moksha’ in NSIT (They do. Believe me, they do). They will promise you things which your JEE-blunted, or maybe JEE-sharpened brain is unaccustomed to processing – interaction with seniors and classmates, fun (Oh! What an understatement), food, the best DJ, great dancing and more interaction. You’ll be confronted by a choice between at least three parties in glitzy clubs, each with better publicity than the other, each offering better interaction than the other and also, sometimes, more food (I can see your eyes glinting).
You’ll be tempted. You’ll be swayed. You’ll be asked to make a wise choice. Moreover, you’ll be asked to make a united and unanimous choice as a class, all under the name of building class unity. Your class WhatsApp group will see the first of those many long-ranging debates, and in some cases downright fights, which should eventually result in a solid decision. But ,as you will soon see, 300+ messages down, ten people leaving and reentering the group, the group name indicating the pointlessness of the ongoing discussion, decisions are a far cry. Your lifeline in this college, a certain Facebook group, will be inundated with queries about the numerous parties, pros and cons, opinion polls, memes, trolls and absolutely anything else which human imagination permits and a regular NSITian is capable of.
Remember that you are now college students living on a budget and you must make the most out of your money. Try to choose a party which promises the best experience, at a reasonable price. Consult your faithful Internet resources like Zomato (and this article of course), for reviews and ratings of all the clubs. Ambience, space and services are things you might want to look into. Also, don’t forget to consider pivotal factors like location and distance, safety of girls and hostel timings. Most importantly, choose a party where you think you will enjoy the most. All else will fade into oblivion and only the memories will remain etched in your minds.
Wading through the barrage of posts, messages, trolls, reviews, seniors, posters and passes, this once unfathomable dilemma, too, will pass, like everything else does. You will heave a sigh of relief, or maybe a wheezy breath or two, owing to all that dancing. Then, dear fuchhas, you will lay back and benignly smile and chant the ultimate mantra those blessed messiahs taught you – “Sab moh maya hai!”