R is for Room no 113

Room no 113: yes that was my room in my hostel for all 3 years that I stayed there. It was a typical girl's hostel. A "khadoos" looking warden, bechara and trying-to-look-strict type chowkidaar.
Once inside the hostel, rooms all around a central verandah, music playing in the rooms, girl's laughing and shouting in other and cooker whistling in yet another room. And girl's lingerie hanging outside on the strings tied outside each room.

And my room was on the second floor at the end of the corridor, facing the open terrace. It was also next to the common bathroom shared by 4 other rooms in the corridor. Open terrace and shared bathroom made sure I had no shortage of traffic around my room, even at midnight.

Initially, I felt stranger in my room and it seemed no less than a relative's place where I was never at ease. But then, slowly the room started to accept me and I started to find comfort in the my room. I could not wait to get back to my room at the end of the day. I even decorated it like my home. Loved my little music player with tons of audio cassettes stacked near it. Loved the little window which opened to the road that went behind the hostel. And could always spot one or more boys from the university trying to take a peek inside the room in a girl's hostel.

Whenever there was a visitor for one of the girls, the watchman used to give a call for that room from the corridors downstairs. So as soon as the visiting hours would start, girl's would anxiously wait for their room number to be called. And even though I knew I had no one who come to meet me after college, I still listened to those calls eagerly.

Ans then one day, while we were having evening tea and snacks in the dining room, I heard "Room number ek sau Terah(room number 113)". At first I ignored it thinking I was just imagining things, but then he called again and it was indeed my room he was calling. And I ran. Not to answer the call but to wash my face and change clothes. Because whoever it was, I could not just run out like that.
And when I went outside to see who it was, it was one of my seniors and one of my best friends, grinning all over and blushing.
Surprised I asked what he was doing here.
And his response:"poore teen saal me in ek baar bhi girl's hostel mein ladki ko call nahin lagayee. Aise kaise degree le leta. Socha tumse to yeh liberty let sakta hoon"
And we stood there talking endlessly for hours.

These and so many more memories I still have so vivid of my room
Room no 113.

Musical Story

Since music is so close to my heart, I am starting this new series from today.
A lot of songs have a related story/incident with them. So every time, I listen to that song, I can't help but remember that story (and then bore my husband by narrating the same incident again, which he claims he has already listened to 10 times :-)
so here's my first entry in this series:
When I went to study from Delhi to Varanasi, the course I was enrolled in had a very small batch(30 students in each year). And then each batch had very few girls. And being such a small batch,everyone kind of knew everything about fellow students(where they are from, where they did the graduation, which course etc)
So in my batch, there were only 4 girls, including me.
As a result, as you can expect, we used to get a lot of attention and "bhav" from the boys. I was good at my subjects too, so I used to help my classmates and juniors too. But apart from all these, I also used to take all sorts of "pangas" with my friends. See, till the time I was in my hometown, specially school going, I was the most sincere and punctual one in my family (or the "Gandhiji" as my sisters used to tease me)
But as soon as I came to college, and then to VNS, I had this sense of liberation, where I wanted to try every thing that is possible under the sky.
So, for a conservation place like VNS, my activities like going out to market at 8:30 in the evening or responding to the eve teasing remarks were considered very daring.

With all the studies, fun and lots of friends, 3 years just flew like whoooosh
And then came the farewell day, when the juniors threw us a big party.
they selected a title for each of their seniors and also played a song for each one of us.
So, the song they played for me was this and till date, I love this song sooooo much.
Whenever I hear this song, I still listen to it as if it is just for me :-)
Enjoy..
Dil se..