** This post was originally titled, JMC - FRIENDS and Mannat :)
I’d like to dedicate this post to a very special friend. Just how special the friend was, that I discovered only once we parted ways – for our post graduation. No, no.. I always knew what a fantastic person she was. Or more like.. as three years of graduation flew by like a dream caressed by a sweet breeze, and we were reaching the end of the final year .. it just started becoming visible to me that 99.99% of my JMC memories would be centered around this one person. Well, we were a group (others would use the term ‘gang’ :) ) of 10- steady, together, and symbolized everything positive that our batch could boast of- from laughter, fun, work, creative work, events, competitions, academics, leadership, teamwork, responsibility, integrity. Practically everything. Each one of us was a little bit of something, and a little bit of everything. But together, as a WHOLE, we were the best thing that happened to me in those 3 years. We were everything that F.R.I.E.N.D.S stands for. In fact, we were ‘F.R.I.E.N.D.S’! – only, I realized this fact only once the parting drew nearer.. and even post JMC.
There is a sharp contrast with my post graduation (which of course was beautiful in its own way.. it was a multitude of things- good and not so good). In JMC days, college was LIFE. I woke up every morning looking forward to going to college. Never once did I feel like bunking, ‘taking leave’… I would choose to go to college even in heavy rains … no matter if classes were to be cancelled (in fact, that would be welcome!) .. I would just want to be there … all of us .. talking, laughing, idling away.. sometimes indulging in productive, creative pursuits, debates, discussions. In fact, even the journey to and from college was something I looked forward to, everyday! I would walk till the bus stop near my house.. maybe meet up with Stella HP (A fellow JMC-ite whom I met at the bus stop, and we discovered our common passion for HP, which none in my group had! We always remained bus-friends. But we bonded well and those occasional times we ran into each other at the bus stop, we had GOOD discussions. I never got to know Stella’s last name. I stored her number in my cell as “Stella HP” :))
The bus ride would offer new stories everyday, new people, new experiences, and then the walk from the college bus stop to the college followed. (Sometimes I would hire an auto for 10 bucks if I was running late for class. Imagine, the custom was often to ‘share’ an auto. So, fellow students- complete strangers would simply ask each other if they wanted to ‘share’ a ride- and hence split the costs- abt 3-4 rs. Per head! :-) ) Walking alone offered a different kind of joy: it gave you all the time for mindless introspection, cathartic thinking, or non-thinking. Invariably, you would run into some batchmate or acquaintance and the rest of the walk was consumed in chatting.
(The walk from college to bus stop, at the end of the day, was even more rich and enjoyable. You would invariably walk in a larger group of your friends- and in those 20 minutes took place rich discussions on everything from god to politics; we would sometimes even merrily sing our way to the stop. And by ‘sing’, I do not mean GOOD music, but arbit songs (decent and not so decent) that came to our minds. Radz and I used to do this a lot- against threats and rebukes from the others, who claimed that unlike us, they had a dignified reputation to preserve :D)
The college gate would arrive, and you would walk into the second home, and head straight to the common room – our adda ( which, I later realized was nothing but the Central Perk for our gang) , where we practically had chairs earmarked for us- reminiscent of the F.R.I.E.N.D.S couch where at least someone or the other of the gang would invariably be sitting. And the day from there would be a roller coaster ride. I dunno how or why or when, every single day at jmc became all about laughter. All about it. With occasional emotions of all other kinds thrown in. But once I was there, life seemed good. I dunno if I am explaining this very well. If I had any problems , worries, issues in life, all of those could wait.. or just rot at home. That was a separate world, which made all such issues disappear. JMC was not about serious LIFE. There were no ISSUES to be dealt with. People were never complex. People were simply names, faces, fun, laughter, dialogue, partners, stories. That’s all. The good side, bad side, personality traits, pluses, minuses, personal equations etc etc were all secondary. Or non-existent. There was a LOT of noise- chirping, music, food, books, Xeroxes, dances, games. Almost every other face was either a friend, or an acquaintance. People would either exchange genuine smiles (at the very least) as they passed each other. Or, if they were not friends or friendly acquaintances, they just passed each other. Nothing – no one bothered too much with anyone’s personal life, habits, lifestyle etc. Unless u were friends- and then too, the interest was mainly relevant, solution oriented and inspired more by concern rather than a voyeuristic/ sadistic pleasure in relishing the bruised ego, dignity etc of any person. Now, now I am not saying that these normal human tendencies were absent amongst the junta there, but that by and large, the attitude was one of ‘live and let live.’ People did not spend too much time being judgmental or evaluative towards each other. In a way, everyone was too self- absorbed to look beyond themselves or their circle of friends.
There were the beautiful lush green gardens, pregnant with flowers. Then there was the Rock Garden, (termed by Angel Christy as ‘breezy area’) which housed the beautiful statue of Mother Mary holding baby Jesus in her arms. gardens! Ah! This was something I have sorely missed… there you could sit, chat, idle away, read, (even lie down! – er, I used to take solitary siestas in those gardens), for hours on end… in groups or all alone. Nobody to remind you the dictated norms of propriety etc. In essence, you were as free as you could ever be. [Will you believe that I often wore to jmc, those knee-length, large T-Shirts that could loosely fit a full grown man of 80 kg’s. After a fair share of initial ‘whatttt …whyyy ’ from my friends, it became an accepted code, my way of life. Contrast this with my PG institute- I wore a similar T-Shirt, POST working hrs, in the late hrs of the evening, and people were so aghast and uncomfortable with this idea of ‘unusual’ clothing that they annoyed me enough with “whaattt and whhhyy” to ensure that I could never wear it again! Pity :-/ Now, I am not doing a They vs. Them here. I adore both places, and people in both the places with special fondness. I am just observing a difference in my experience of the system and culture in both the contexts. ]
You would be allowed to take up any cause, issue, activity and go ahead with its implementation if it was not too controversial or harmful. You could do practically everything you wanted to. The only pressure was for you to manage good grades alongside. The college was a stickler for academics. We followed all Del Uuniversity rules by the book. No wink, wink by way of internal assessment. Internal exams, tutorials, lectures etc everything was done as per the stipulated system. Professors were as much bound by the rules as were the students. Of course, you were free to choose as to what you wanted to derive out of the system. You would get the best of everything- counsel, guidance, support.
If you chose to use it, well and good. If you did not, the system, profs etc would not push beyond a point. People came from diverse socio-economic, cultural, religious, regional backgrounds. And everybody got along pleasantly civil with each other. You could be a brilliant scholar, a mediocre student, a talented artist, a (pardon the stereotype) dumb blonde, a plainclothed jassi with a chashma, or a Jessica catwalking-on-the-ramp ; while you would enjoy whatever place you created for yourself, you would never suffer any negative sanctions by the system for being who/ what you were not.
There was basic civility. Mutual respect and tolerance. There was a certain kind of innocence. It being a convent, there was this firm belief in the concept of God. Most people were acquainted with each other through affiliation to a particular church. There was this constant music in the air – someone or the other practising choir songs, or some musical instrument. Bright colorful posters covered the walls, notifying us about cultural festivals or other events in and around the other colleges.
There was something very unreal about JMC. Life was kinda very rosy- too rosy to be true. Or to last beyond those 3 years, maybe. Real issues of career, jobs, life, etc etc were not the whole and soul of existence. They were just a part of it.
Actually, I guess that a lot of this is basically about jmc as I experienced it. The place viewed through my optic. Individuals have different experiences of different places, and maybe, just maybe, someone else’s description of jmc may not match verbatim with mine. Anywho, it’s not like it was a state of of utopia either. I could list tens of things that the place was lacking in. Or the people. But then, utopias are just that na- they don’t exist. All that I know at the end of it all is that those 3 years were like a dip in the pool of bliss. We had to move on ( and away).. for good. And we did.
But I’m eternally thankful to god for the time while we were there.
I had wanted to write about Mannat. But got carried away as memories came rushing through. A lot of good things are fading away from memory already. I thought it would be a good idea to record at least some for now. For safekeeping J
