Adieu, ACJ

The brilliant lights that blinded us for a moment; and sleek cars, which darted around in a hunt for parking space, announced last night it was CONVOCATION!

The campus bustled with people and activity like never before... Girls draped in exquisite saris, and boys giving them a run with embroidered kurtas, dotted the place like a constellation of stars..
All of them happy, delighted, and assured in their own rights!

Excellent food: well-chosen menu, cooked and served elegantly..
And, a battery of reporters pushing their way into the MSSRF auditorium.... The evening couldn't have been more exciting!

Except that guests outnumbered chairs... a whole swarm of them had to stand in the sideways, while an embarassed ACJ team offered apologies!

It was not for us alone that time rolled on a new note,
ACJ had its share too: A new Dean!

Ma'am Bindoo Bhaskar takes over from SKM Sir!!!

Am i happy to learn that?

hmmm.... She was the first Professor who taught us...right on July 13th...and she liked me... and i liked her just as much...so yeah, definitely, im delighted at this momentous feat of hers...

But, i'd be lying if i tell you it's an unadulterated joy...while i'm happy for Bindoo ma'am, i'm more unsettled to think SKM Sir would not be around in the dean's capacity...

i think he did an outstanding job.. he was neither harsh nor a disciplinarian...he would not make any of those efforts that make your presence felt..and yet, he had that infallible thing about him which ensured everything was in place!

A dean who never over-performed it...

I got good recognition from the professors...earlier in the day the dean called to see me.. and during the convocation, Ram Sir and Geeta maa'am approached me and talked for quite some time.. "I'll remember you as the boy who always said the right things at the right time," quipped Geeta ma'am..
So nice of her..

At dinner, Nalini ma'am and Arvind sir, too, offered me words of appreciation, and assured that things would work out soon!

So did Sampat Sir, VKR Sir, Nishat Sir and KVK Sir!

Confessions, again...

Yes i did feel lonely... though not sidelined....
A number of them took time out for me, and said that last "hullo"...
In impeccable style...

But, they were acquaintances, and their 'hullo" was for the boy who made his mark at ACJ, and whose knack for perfection they admired...

To put it plainly, i missed friends...

How many did i have, at the first place?

She is already away...

And then, the second girl, who would make me feel at home with her kind concerns, hadn't spoken to me for ages...she did make an effort the night b4 placements...sent me a lovely message, and expressed hope that i'd be triumphant...but my cold reply perhaps put her off...today when i approached her for a valediction, it seemed she revenged it... offering me formal courtesies!

Not an end i would wish to remember!
Though, it won't be easy forgetting her....

And then, he!

He avoided me, to say the least...

but i pursued him; and later, realising that i would like a valediction as pleasant as our memories had been, he too relented.. He asked me to see him at the gate.. we had some best talk, and we took snaps, too...

i don't know why i should call it best talk, considering there hardly was any?
but then, that is what I've liked about him... that special way of communicating things... he would not speak or do anything, and yet you would realise the kindness in him!

Today i called him up early morning and told him i would be coming to see him at the airport...he was happy about it... Not only did he talk more, it felt as though things had never really changed.. At least for one moment i felt he was still the same man who comforted me throughout the first term... supporting me against those people, and cheering me up in unhappy times! At least for a moment, this was true..

And then,she... what do i do write about her... she intruded into my life in the 2nd term...and then...then she must have bewitched me...otherwise how would i become her friend all so soon?
Thankfully she dint bewitch me into a frog, like the wicked fairies in Grimm brothers do.
I'm going to see her off to airport this evening...

Cannot write more...

It is by the sullen humour of destiny that all good things have to end... ACJ ended all too early, in just about 10 months... And still, we have a whole world of memories to take home............. good bye, till we meet again!