BY DR ANUSHREE CHAUDHARI 

 

 

HAVE you visited a place you had been a part of and experienced the energy of that campus with every cell of your body? The emotions start filling you up and suddenly you feel choked with too many weird feelings overpowering you. It’s a bittersweet experience; a part of you reminds you of the beautiful moments you once lived there but the other part reminds you that the tide has turned and there is no going back… Suddenly the responsibilities weighing on your shoulders in the present seem heavier and you yearn for those carefree days. I had a tryst with Nostalgia recently when I visited my MBBS graduation college, Seth GS medical, and it was a rollercoaster ride of emotions, to say the least. As it happened, I was in Mumbai and had an hour before heading to the airport when I decided to squeeze in a visit to my Alma mater. Mere driving on the Parel streets made my heart swell with joy but my hands tremble! I was teary eyed not because of sadness, but more so because the place had opened the doors to the memories that had got cramped in some corner of my heart, unvisited for nearly 15 years! The uneasiness was replaced by excitement as I walked down the long corridors of my college building.

 

The dissection hall, where we used scalpels on pounds of human flesh guided by the pansophical ‘Cunningham’ unaffected by the musty stench of formaldehyde, hadn’t changed a bit! The pathology lab where we racked our brains identifying ‘mind -muddling’ slides and specimens gave me goosebumps. The walls were the same so were the tall desks! At the end of the corridor was a passageway that led to the Library, the shrine for searching souls! (Many searching for answers, some for soulmates!) I remembered how we spent hours looking into the books, mugging up lessons after lessons, taking in all the information they had to offer like a sponge! As if our lives depended on them! We were naïve but we, yes all of us, did unweariedly walk the untrodden path to finally find our fates! I entered the reading room, which was my haven during the last year of preparation for post graduation, the last bridge to cross! The heaps of books which decorated the tall tables were replaced by tablets! The bugs laden, hard wooden seats were replaced by modern maroon cushioned chairs! The lady had gotten her makeover! What a relief it was! The so called ‘badminton court’ outside the library had gotten a facelift too, a new roof and new wooden floors adorned the once open air courtyard!

 

As I proceeded to the canteen, the empty ‘kattas’ which once bustled with life and laughter (and dogs!) made me feel empty too... The sadness and surprise at how a place once the nerve of the campus lost its importance with time taught me that nothing is permanent but change. But every rule has an exception! The window for dispensing ‘cutting chai’ for students hurrying and worrying through their breaks was still there in the canteen! “Same unpainted ragged walls and ragged roof so lame. But with many new ‘exotic’ dishes (prawns masala!) having made it to the same old’ little shining, ‘black board of fame’!” And finally one familiar face! The one sitting on the cash counter recognised me and suddenly I felt like the small girl chasing her dreams. Instantly we took a selfie, he was proudly beaming with a grin and so was I! I somehow belonged there yet felt out of place. What I missed was the familiar faces that used to occupy it once. It hit me that the place will keep on surviving without me, new people will come and again move out only to be again replaced by new ones. This rude reality that life does go on and you cannot hold it tight in your fist is unnerving. Everything that begins has to end one day. What remains are the memories.