Parayathe ariyathe nee poyathalle..
Maruvaaku mindanjathalle..
Oru nokku kaanathe nee poyathalle…
Doorekku nee maanjathalle..
Sakhiye nee kaanunnuvo..
En mizhikal nirayum nombaram…
Innumorkkunnuvo veendumorkkunnuvo..
Annu naam thangalil piriyum raave..

She got for LLB and she’s going.. nope she already went.. Snowy Girl means Manju Poloru Penkutty in Malayalam. Yeah she is like that for many reasons… Her name is Manju, actually its Manjula.. She likes being called Manju.. She’s snowy white (she can be easily mistaken for a foreigner or a ghost, esp at night!!) she’s very soft in character, and she’s very very tiny.. i think only a layer of skin runs on top of her skeleton, and she’s my first ever roomie too. I never thought that she’d go if she got for LLB. But FT was too much a headache for her. She couldn’t draw, she couldn’t paint, there was nothing that she could do.. so it was pointless for her to stay.. still….

If I think properly, sometimes we used to get irritated by her, she whined all the time for some reason, always tensed about something, and will spoil the spirit most times by bringing in some sad stuff.. But I am sure that I’m gonna miss her.. Her bed will be empty.. err.. no.. our stuff will be on top of it! but thats not what i mean.. leave it.. everything changes.. She got 138th rank in LLB, let her find her true calling too… I found mine.. its not fair on my part to feel bad.. atleast she didnt lose an year..

I dedicate the above song to her, and may she have a wonderful and successful future

After having taken a long leave from 4th of July to 8th due to a nasty cough, cold and fever, I felt kind of relieved to get back to the college. Nothing was taught, to my luck. But I did miss all the fun which had happened there, and I couldn’t wait to catch up with everything! :P On Sunday evening, the harthal on Monday was postponed to some other day and Shalin called me and asked whether I really wanted to go on Monday itself. I did not know why she wasn’t really looking forward to go, but then she told why.. They were given a work the previous week, which was to draw 100 pictures, 60 black and white and 40 color, and shade them accordingly too.. It was the first work given after teaching shading and light effects.. It was to be done on a particular book, and I had not brought that book, so me no worry! :P But Shalin had to, and she asked me to stay for one more day. She buttered up my bro, and he buttered up mom, and in the end, I was allowed to stay.

That one day was utilized to buy a few stuff like gateway paper, and some other stationary. Next day early in the morning, I woke up, got dressed and went to the railway station to catch the early morning train. Shalin was already in the train. After a boring train journey which consisted of flashing lakes and bushes, we reached C’cherry by 8:15am. I wanted to call a friend, whom I was not able to inform about my departure.. But we got an autorickshaw from the other side of the station, so we both rushed through the heavy undergrowth to the other side, got in the auto and went to the hostel. When we reached there, we saw Anju, who had come just now too! She too hadn’t finished the homework :P and the three of us walked into the hostel. We saw the warden, and instead of a sudden bolt of thunder and lightning that we had expected, she asked us whether our fever had gone, whether we had breakfast, and if not, then we could go to the mess. Mess time was over by now, still we went in and had steaming hot appam and stew. :P

We went up after breakfast, and Anju’s roomie, Chakshu (in my same class) came and told that new students had come the day before, from different department. Therefore my room was shifted to the PG line of rooms, the first one there. But an evil idea sprouted in Chakshu’s mind! The new girls never saw us till now, so it was the best chance to give them a good scare! Some of these girls, as Chakshu said, were not the kind of people to have as neighbours. An air of arrogance surrounded them, according to the description that we got. So we decided to go and get introduced them pretending to be second years!! So Anju, Shalin and I went inside their rooms, never told them that we were 2nd years or 1st years either.. Our seriousness was easily mistaken for seniority!!! They stood up when we asked their name and place..! There were three (or two?) rooms in total. After scaring them all,(we just asked their name and place they come from, maybe in a serious tone, who asked them to get scared! ) we went back to our rooms. After a while we again went to their rooms and broke out the truth, and they all laughed their heart out!! I thought that we would get beat up for sure, but none of that happened to our luck!! :D

On Wednesday, we had a common english class as the first hour. During that class, Anju, Shalin and I were sitting together somehow, and thats when the unthinkable happened.. Everyone was wasked to describe their first time hostel experience. Thats when to our surprise, Anita (one of our “ragging” victims!) stood up and narrated the happenings of the previous day!! She described the whole “ragging” part and we were asked to stand up for the teacher to see! The fact that the three of us were sitting together made the teacher think that we were a mischievous trio, and she asked us to sit in different corners from the next day onwards! That was jus a joke, she never meant it! She was laughing with the other students who were there, who were from different departments. Anyways, the three of us became quite famous after this incident!! That was a grand welcome for us to the first English class!! And the three of us became a lot more closer after this incident, and we are upto more mischief from that day onwards..!!

1st BFT means First year, Bachelor of Fashion Technology. Its certainly different from what I studied for all these years, ahem.. 13 years.. the 13th year being engg.. We have six subjects in all.. English, Textile Science and Fashion Business were the theory papers. They’re really boring subjects.. But Fashion Business is a bit more interesting, coz when we’re bored, we can admire on the work of nature while its teaching us!! :P Miss S is teaching us FB. She’s a north Indian, and it shows on her face very well.. If her eyes were a bit more smaller, she’d have been perfect, right now she’s just a small unit away from perfection..! And its hard to say that she has a kid by her looks!!

Then there’s the other theory paper, Textile Science. The subject isn’t that boring.. As the name suggests, its about various types of fabric, their uses, their composition and stuff.. But Miss A has a very low volume, and the strain we take to listen hard to grasp her words easily makes us tired and sleepy. The furnishing of the Textile Science class room is impressive! In the classroom, there’s a projector, a TV, a DVD player, Speakers; and the chairs have panels fitted on to them for writing purposes, like they do have in seminar halls. It gives off an office vibe rather than that of a classroom. I’d have enjoyed it if the teacher had made the class a bit more interesting.. And the third theory paper, thats English is not yet started as the Miss is on leave. She’s a friend of my dad’s friend. That could be bad for me! :P

Fashion Art, Surface Ornamentation and Garment Construction are the practical Papers. SO and GC includes stitching, therefore eventhough I like them, it can be problemmatic sometimes!! :P Fashion Art is my favorite among all.. It includes drawing and painting.. We have to learn to draw the perfect figure, which is not possible in real life.. Because these figures, Croqui, as they’re called, may require a height of about 8 feet!! Long legs, longs hands, slender waist, even the head has a fixed measure! We have to analyze normal figures from magazines and change them to Croquis which includes a lot of steps. This was the first time that any of us were allowed to go through Vogue while in class!! Vogue is one of the best fashion magazines, one has to be really careful while going through it in public.. Its the best of FTV(and more!) printed on good quality paper!!!

Till 11th, we are kinda free.. Thats when all the faculty returns.. And thats when the actual 1st BFT starts. Everybody is saying that the nearly sleepless nights we spend often is just a sample, its just the tip of the iceberg.. Totally sleepless nights (some in the college itself) awaits us… More than that, in the hostel, the other degree students are a bit annoyed (read : jealous) of BFT students, because of the extra freedom and benefits that we get. We can sit in the college till late hours; we can use the library till 8PM (yeah, big deal); we can have the lights on during the entire night, unlike the others who can have it only till 11:30 PM maximum during exam time and till 10:30 PM otherwise.. Anyways, these have ignited lights of jealousy in the others (seniors only), so juniors from BFT uplifts the seniors ragging interests. But its our duty to make them as irritated as we possibly can, right! We do it all the time!!!

Wow! I’ve never been so happy in my life I think.. Allright.. Who am I kidding..! I’ve had better moments. But my first week at hostel and college is certainly one of them.. As I already said, there were 5 people in room number 24 and 3 people in room number 23, which is my room. All of us were BFT, which was lucky because the other hostels didnt have more than 4 people from BFT. The hostel rooms were set in ‘T’ shape.. The perpendicular line rising from the middle of the other was the line of rooms belonging to PG students.. And the other big stretch were our rooms (first years), and also the 2nd year BFT’s (who are on project, and are not here right now). Out of some 7 or 8 rooms or more, only 2 were occupied by us.. And the other line was completely occupied by PG chechis…

Anyways, one more BFT joined us, she was a friend of mine whom I met during the admission process. Her name is Sreelekshmi, and I easliy became friends with her and her elder sis on that day. She joined a day late, and I was wondering until this time in which hostel she was in. I never thought that she’d come to my hostel, and that too, in my room itself..!! It was sheer luck.. She was assigned J Hostel straight away.. So now we were 9.. which is my unluckiest number. But nothing unlucky happened to my relief! Hostel life became interesting day by day.. All of them are really nice people, and nothing like my friends from my previous engg college, no offence meant!! Its clear that people from other parts of Kerala are really better than people from Trivandrum!! Ahem.. I am an exception.. seriously!!!

It was my second week at hostel, and by Wednesday I got a call from my bro to tell me that another girl whom he knows is coming to that college, for BFT, but he doesn’t know in which hostel.. It couldn’t have been mine, coz by now, we got a 5th roomie.. Her name is Jency, from Trivandrum, doing B.A Malayalam, and also two girls Anjali and Chindha in room number 22, who have taken Communicative English. We first years bonded very quickly, and all feelings of homesickness was easily removed from them! Well, the girl whom bro was referring to was Shalin, from Trivandrum, and a cousin of my bro’s friend. I knew this friend, he was my bro’s classmate in engg college, which means that he was my senior for a year. On Tuesday, we were talking with the warden, yeah, buttering her up to leave us on friday to our homes! :P She said that a new girl was coming to our room the next day, from my place. I got the hint and asked, “Shalin??” Yes!! It was Shalin herself.. Another shocking surprise for me, because though I knew that she was coming, never thought that she’d be my roomie. Jency was shifted to next room with Comm. English people.. Never made a difference, coz all the three rooms felt like home for us! :D

The next day, we were getting ready for classes, and thats when Shalin moved in. Her mom talked to me for a long time, owing to our “connection”. She’s too a sweet girl. The day was over quickly because of the missing faculty members. They had to work during their supposed vacation time, so now one by one they r talking a big leave, but what to do, their timings clashed, and soon we were facultyless!! Yep.. for a whole week!! The day was spend talking and joking.. At night, Shalin said that she expected a really bad hostel and roomies, but this atmosphere just swept her off her feet! She felt relaxed very quickly… this was a compliment! And it was true to the core.. If I hadn’t had felt relaxed myself, I’d never have studied here, whether its FT or not… I should consider myself really really lucky!