Spriha in Solapur!- episode 3

Sorry guys I kept you waiting for a long time. Was a bit down on the creativity front recently. Lets see what quality I deliver this time anyways.
The Ragging:
My views about this ancient form of welcoming a new batch have changed considerably since the days when I used to suffer it. But the story is interesting nevertheless.
There were certain rules in the girls' hostel that all juniors had to follow:-
1. Wear salwar kurta for 24 hrs. Not even pajamas at night. (Those who know me would find it hard to believe that I ever wore salwar kurta. But believe it or faint, I wore them 24x7! Of course, I had pockets in all my kurtas.)
2. Address seniors as mam.
3. Wish every senior when you run into them according to the time of the day by bowing exactly 90 degrees.
4. No TV. (There was one in the mess. No cable. Only DD1. What a useless rule!)
5. No wandering outside your room.
6. All long hair to be oiled and tied in a tight plates. (I have short hair.)
7. All short hair to be oiled and clipped or pinned. (I never did that.)
8. Wear a bindi. (Now that was it! I straight away refused saying that unmarried women don't wear bindis in my religion. That was the only time in my life that my religion proved to be of some use.)
9. No aprons to be worn in college outside the labs.
10. Obey every thing else seniors had to say.
Well, the first day when we were ragged, I hardly knew what human beings are actually capable of. So I tried to be my normal self (which by the way, is not so normal). I didn't feel nervous at all.
We all were called in one of our own batchmate's room. First thing they always asked us to do was to stand in the anatomical position! For the non-medics, we had to stand straight with palms facing forwards, feet making a V, chin up, but eyes down. (Thats not anatomical.)
I tell you, that position is definitely not physiological. We would get so tired by the end of each session.
Oh yes, we had many sessions of ragging. Whenever they found time, they called us to entertain them. And they weren't so busy at the beginning of their own terms.
After scolding those whose anatomy didn't permit them to be in the exact anatomical position and teasing sarcastically the rest of us, they'd ask us to introduce ourselves. Now the introduction had to be given in only one language entirely, either Marathi or Hindi. Not even English numbers were allowed. I knew as much Marathi as I knew Hebrew, so my intro went like- "Mera naam kumari spriha pandey hai. Main Mumbai mein rehti hoon. Mere pitaji....blah blah.... meri mataji....blah blah.... Mujhe sarv sadharan pravesh pareeksha (CET) mein paanch sou iktalisvaan sthaan prapt hua. Barahvi ki pareeksha mein mujhe --dasamlov-- ank prapt hue...." Phew!!! It went longer than this. If we made any mistake anywhere or used any english then we were made to repeat the whole thing again. If people said any inappropriate word in between like sheh! or shuh! then they were made to end all their sentences with that word or phrase! I remember once they asked me where do I hail from. I said, "I'm basically from Kanpur, UP, but I've been..." I was interrupted ,"So where are you from acidically?" "And neutrally?" Aargh! I told myself. They would catch us on any silly points like that. They asked me my hobbies and talents. I never had one of those stuff. I'm hardly evolved. First time, I went too inviting and said I like to think. Thinking is my hobby! Made a total fool out of myself. They gave me stuff to think about and talk on in the next session. My batchmates must have been thankful to me that I ate most of the time of that particular session.
Next time I told them that I like 'songs'. (Why didn't I say music?) They asked what kind of 'songs'? I said, 'soft songs'! So what are hard songs? What are firm songs? What the hell! I ended up singing Rafi's 'mere mehboob tujhe' that time. They asked me to sing 'ud ja kaale kawan' from Gadar. I hardly sang the first line when they interrupted, 'haan haan, ud gaya chal, kawwa ud gaya'...
It took me hours of humiliation to understand that reading is the most benign hobby. They knew my talent was to entertain them with my dumbness so they never got inquisitive about that.
After the first week, they started making us all do stuff during the sessions! No, it never crossed the boundaries of decency but never entered the area of sensibility either. Mostly we were called during the evening or the night. But it hardly went on after 10.30 ever.
So the stuff they made us do was this. We could choose between dancing and 'thumka'. (This is what I call it.) In thumka, one had push the pelvis on the right when seniors said 'atthanni', to the left on 'chavanni' and jump on 'rupaiyya'. And they went on randomly...atthanni, atthanni, chavanni, attthani, chavanni, rupaiyya, chavanni (Ouch! Hip dislocation!)... I couldn't imagine myself do that!
I was still a virgin at dancing then. (All those people who laughed at me when they saw me 'dance' during socials, I'm trying!)
So when my turn came I decided that I definitely won't do that atthanni, chavanni thing. I liked to look into my eyes every day in the mirror. And I cannot dance like these other girls, even if I try. They let us choose the songs we wanted to dance on. So I said I'll dance on 'ande ka funda' ! While they sang, I did this- Held an imaginary egg in one hand and moved the opposite leg from side to side. They asked me to change the step. I shifted the egg in the other hand and moved the other leg from side to side! But somehow they were happy about the choice of my song. Along with my supportive batchmates, they started clapping on the tune. And I have a very faint recollection of that moment when I went a little delirious out of nervousness, but I think I danced like Rani Mukherji, in Black! (*blush*)
It was hilarious! Actually, I felt like bursting into laughter when many of my batchmates danced, but we were forbidden to give any expression unless asked to. (I was once asked to demonstrate 'sharmaane ke paanch prakaar'.) Few of them had an evolved cerebellum to not make it look like chorea or GTC. Tanmayi is a professional odissi dancer.
My seniors once made me and another girl play imaginary badminton in the room on the beats of 'dhal gaya din ho gayi shaam'. They often asked me to comment on them. What do I think about each one of them. I don't know why...
When we saw Dil Chahta Hai, they asked six of us who'd gone for the movie to do that famous step of 'woh ladki hai kahan' in unison! We asked Tanmayi to teach us before going to the devil's durbar. Apparently all of them got it except me. So, the six of us are standing one behind the other (myself behind Shweta), they sing the song and when the part comes I start moving my hands up and down violently! Suddenly all other dancers turn around and I'm face to face with Shweta who was almost going to explode in a laughter when I also turn around flapping my upper limbs as if I wanted to get rid of them! And I heard the seniors sitting on the beds say, 'spriha ko dekh, look at spriha, spri...ha ha ha ha...' They were doubling with laughter.
While going back to our rooms I asked Tanmayi if there were leg-steps too...
The ragging continued for about a month or so. Then our immediate seniors arrived. By then, we were pretty used to it. We let them have some fun too.
How muchever humiliated or exploited I felt then, when I think about it now I feel that that was an experience of a lifetime! I would have never ever danced on 'ande ka funda' in my life man!

Spriha in Solapur! -episode2

Two days before my college opened, my whole family came to Solapur. They had to leave the same night...leave the place...leave me...
To tell you frankly, I never thought how much am I going to miss my family before shifting. I was so involved thinking about how I am going to settle in this new place and more importantly, this new profession that it never occurred to me what it would be like living all on my own. Therefore, I never got the hostel blues until...
Well, we spent the whole day in the market shopping for me, actually, buying things of daily need. I don't call that shopping. We went to the zoo in the noon. Suddenly forgetting where I am and what had to come (or rather go) later that night, I re-found with my brother (then 13) my amazement of how magnificent the Bengal Tiger is! My God! They were scary huge! In the evening we went to the Siddheshwar temple. Its lord Shiva's temple and a very old one. Its kept very beautifully though. Its located in the middle of a lake. Coconut trees planted all around. There's a small island in the lake with a single coconut tree too! Wow! I remember so much of it. The breeze was intoxicatingly pure. I started liking my new place.
Finally, my mom, dad and my bro said goodbye to me. They left me at the hostel. those who know me know that I don't express my sentiments too eagerly and overly. So no one cried. My dad called from the station. He told me that my mom was crying. I didn't even talk to her. (Okay! I am what I am and I love my mom!)
Then the feeling started sinking in. Suddenly, I started feeling that I was choking. Someone had left and I couldn't even wait for them! I sat down and wrote some crap in my dear diary. Then I went outside my room and sat on the elevated border of the "aangan". My room-mate hadn't come yet.My neighbour from room no.1 came and sat next to me. She was Shweta Surana from Pune. She told me that she lived in a joint family and thats why she always wanted people around her. I thought, I didn't! (Yes, I am unsentimental and rude!) We talked for a while about our likes and other stuff. I slowly began enjoying the conversation.Then she started telling me the ragging-stories she had heard about this place. A rebel started stirring in me...
Our talk was interrupted suddenly by two seniors over-looking from the railing of first floor. I guess they were reading outside their rooms. One of them shouted aloud and said that juniors are not supposed to be out of their rooms! We went back into our rooms.
I realized that the heaviness I felt few minutes ago was gone. 'This girl's amazing!' I thought. Bloody seniors...!
I fell asleep soon and had a refreshing sleep that night. I guess I was actually tired.
Next morning, I started my first day there. Well, to put it concisely, there were three bathrooms. One didn't have light. Another had a choked drain. The third one was occupied forever. I went in the choked one. I filled up drinking water for me. Went to the mess and had my breakfast. I guess it was poha and tea. (I never eat poha at home.) Seniors ogled at us there also with hunger in their eyes and spoons in their mouths!
I met Shweta and few other people my mom had introduced me to the previous day. Strangely, I didn't classify them as urban or not urban then. I was really raw. ( Now I'm rotten!) I'll tell you more about my batch-mates later.
There was a bus meant for first yr students at VMMC. Seniors had two-wheelers. We all went and sat inside the bus. Then the boys of my batch came. Whoa! I'll describe subsequently. I spoke to another girl called Vidisha Mahajan, again from Pune. I had learnt from last night that one should talk to strangers in a strange place. Earlier that day I had been spoken to by Tanmayi Dhamankar from Pune. She was really sweet and all I could say to her was, "Are you satisfied by the hygiene standards of the toilets?"
These girls I'm mentioning went on to become my best friends later.
In the college, our dean Dr. Yemul addressed us for the first time. (What is it with deans and Y's?) He was young. He spoke well. He was funny. He wore denim.
We had many introductory lectures that day. The lecture halls were named after ancient Indian physicians- Dhanwantari, Sushrut, I can't remember more. Our bus brought us back to the hostel where we had lunch. I didn't like it. The food at my mess was too spicy and oily.
We went back to the college. We were taken to the dissection hall then. I didn't feel a bit uncomfortable looking at the cadavers lying 'naked' on a dozen tables. I looked at Shweta. She was 'staring' at one and her face showed utter disgust! She told me that she's a Jain, so its difficult for her. We were told the basic rules of the dissection hall. An introduction was given. I was really impressed by the professors out there on the first day.
When we returned to the hostel in the evening, we were quite tired. I thought I'll have something to eat and take some rest later. We never knew that we had been waiting for by our rulers...

Spriha in Solapur! -episode 1

I am Spriha Pandey. Jabse hosh sambhala hai, I've been living in Mumbai. I hail from Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. I have no relatives in Maharashtra outside Mumbai.
Solapur is a fairly large 'townish' city in the interiors of Maharashtra (towards South, if at all you care to know...) which is inhabited by mostly Maharashtrians and people from Karnataka (what are they called?). It has one big luxurious 3 star hotel, two 3 star restaurants, two good ice-cream parlors, a few good Chinese food hangouts, a zoo, a lake, the famous Siddheshwar temple, a bunch of ROTTEN movie theatres, few engineering colleges, one MEDICAL college, lots of cyber-cafes and innumerable donkeys!
I lived for over 3 months in Solapur, alone!
It so happened, that when my MH-CET results were declared for the 'first time', my rank was 545. It was suggested by the after-results-self declared-career counselors that I must go to a government medical college if I'm getting one, even if its situated on 2003UB313! Solapur's Dr. Vaishampayan memorial medical college; est:1956, has a good reputation. There are several trains Mumbai-Solapur (an overnight journey). So it was on my list and in my destiny. On the day of councelling, it was on my selection letter.
The very next day, me and my dad left for the place where I was to live the next 4.5 years of my life. The moment I stepped outside the railway station, I thought I'll have to go back from here, I mean, when I'd visit home- a very trivial background thought, but I remember clearly. We reached there early in the morning.We needed a place to get fresh. Just outside the station, there were several lodges. I dunno what else I can call them. It had rained there and the area seemed pretty busy. So it was dirty.
We chose the least dirty looking place for the couple of hours we needed. All I remember of that room is that it was dark, dirty, stinking of vomitus, dirty, the bed was damp, the walls were stained by paan ki pichkari, the loo was dark, dirty and had the weirdest architecture ever! (I've learnt about 13 types in PSM, believe me!) We had to leave the same night so we didn't waste any time and...*gulp*...adjusted.
We ate wada-paav and caught a rick to the college.
The smell of the vomitus got stuck in my head.
My God! The college was huge! The hospital was situated on the other side of a road dividing the two. It was a district centre. A tertiary centre.
The office wasn't open yet so we decided to go to the hostel.
A hostel? I am going to stay in a hostel? I was struck by the full realization of this fact only when I saw it. For the first time since my CET exam, was I nervous.
The hostel was located at about 10 minutes distance by a rick from the college. Don't be surprised. It was a huge campus, with several double storied buildings and lots of greenery and it was shared by the police's colony. We had the comissioner's office just behind our hostel and our dean's house in front.
The building for UG girls was the first one. It was a quadrangular building with rooms on the sides and open space in the centre. Two badminton courts were built there. (Sporty, you said? Girls used the nets to dry their clothes!) There was a huge mess opposite the entrance. (Mess= a place to eat where you cannot choose the menu.)
The smell of the vomitus...
My dad wasn't allowed inside. We did the paper work outside.
The rector (I always found this post funny!) asked me to choose a room. I thought room number one was closest to the entrance and the phone so that would be good. (Mobile phone revolution hadn't occurred yet.) But it was already booked so I gladly settled down with room number two. (Mistake # 1)
My dad requested the officials over there to allot my room to someone form Mumbai or Pune. It was a two-seater. I don't know what my dad was thinking, but my room-mate to-be was beyond anyone's imagination!
I took a round of the ground floor. I spoke to a senior (probably, final year) about the place. She was a PMTite and fine. Some other seniors passed by, looking at me with hungry eyes. Some stared from the first floor. And I looked straight back into their eyes! (Mistake # 2)
We met my local guardian to be- Gauri Kulkarni studying in 3rd/2nd, i.e, a senior! She was from a place called Tarapore where my family used to live till I was four. ( My dad works in BARC. Tarapore has two atomic power plants.)
She was very sweet and refrained from ills like ragging. I felt safe talking to her.
We opened a bank account, came back to the college and did all the required work. I got the idea that the office people are going to be someone I'll have to see often and whom I'll have to tolerate the most. The smell stayed with me whenever I sat down to eat. The day ended uneventfully and we returned to our home next morning, without the smell..
(to be continued...)