Thursday, August 26, 2010

Reminiscence of College days1





I presume that twenty eight years down is a fair time to reminisce the teens and the early twenties of once age.
I was in a college which had liberal sprinkling of the fairer sex. The co-ed institution was one of the best in Thiruvanathapuram and quite capable of standing up to the Women's colleges of that city in the matter of pretty beautiful girls.
Our class acquired a rebellious nimbus, and in the words of our professor “infamous and impertinent bunch”. The description covered both the sex in the batch.
I would in fact hesitate to term us rebellious- well if it is purely for antagonising the professor for conducting in an unconventional way, quite different from his and some of the staff members views, well then the adjective is apposite. It has to be acknowledged that the staff members were headed by a very conservative professor who would in all probability have proscribed co-education, if he had his ways. And also some of the staff members were quite respectful of him and would not will to antagonise or do something contrary to his opinion.

It all began in the first year during the fun trip to Bangalore. Those days the KK Express (Kerala- Karnataka Express) got one to Bangalore from Thiruvanathapuram. Some ten of us boys and girls took off after dinner without the consent of the leader of the pack the Assistant professor. We took a couple of auto rickshaws, bunched ourselves in and reached Brigades road and got into the cinema to watch “Return of the Dragon”. It was very late after midnight that we came back to the Hotel .And was given a severe dressing down by the Asst professor. He also reported the matter back to the college.

During the recess between classes we used to engage in the game of Lexicon cards. It was a fascinating game of alphabets and words played with “Lexicon Cards”. One needs a fair percent of erudition and vocabulary to consider the game as his or her forte. And for an onlooker,at a glance, it would seemingly be like the game of Bridge. The Staff members thought so, and we were pulled up to the Principal. Outrageous, boys and girls, they even have the temerity to play cards in the class room. This was the accusation of the Professor. The matter was given a cold shoulder by the Principal when he found what we were engaged in, but the Professor was appalled that boys and girls conduct in such blatant activity inside the college.

Once, a prankster in our midst, (whose identity is still debated amongst us) sent by post to the professor a fascinating book of pictures, those that were explicit, and akin to the ones from Khujaraho. This infuriated the professor. And instead of ignoring the audacity of the fellow who ever he was, he brought the matter in public and the whole college was laughing at his predicament. Fancy stories went around.

We found yet another way to revel in past time. There is a very Keralite game which is played in the country side. I would say it is a Kerala version of base ball. The only difference was that the bat was a stick that was feet long and the ball was replaced by another stick of six inches. And we played that amongst us with a mix team of boys and girls. The court was down the department building and in full view of the professor and the staff members’ room. Notoriety and infamy that was redefined! The fascinating game of "kuttium kollum" was thereby decreed as frivolous and a  game of impertinent bunch of rascals .

                                            The class of 1980 farewell day
The end result was during the farewell party in the far end of the terminal year the Professor and the staff members chose the moment to vent their wrath on us. The farewell party was boycotted by all of them except one gentleman, our Economics tutor. The class photo gave a fascinating look .Just the Principal and the teacher stood along with us. A similar incident had never happened before or after.
The bottom line was the graduation result,and it  was a sweet retort of sorts. Two University rankers, the first and the second were from amongst us. And a record number of First class graduates. I was lucky one of them! 
But the Professor did not relent he refused to endorse our conduct certificates.

12 comments:

Shilpa Garg said...

College days are fun days!

We had a similar experience with UNO... our gang including kids used to play UNO at the lounge of our hotel while on vacations and we heard somebody remarking that we are so irresponsible parents, letting our kids play cards!!

This keralite game that you mentioned...is it Gilli Danda??

Made for an interesting read!

Insignia said...

Fun days in deed and reminiscing about those days would have surely brought a smile.

The prof was adamant not to acknowledge the fact that you folks were smart and it was normal to have fun during those teen years. Sad but who cares, isnt it?

anilkurup59 said...

@Shilpa Garg,
Yes the game is similar , I checked with a couple friends from north and they said its the same.All the while I thought it was unique to Kerala.
Thanks for the visit

anilkurup59 said...

@ insignia

Yes you are right . It was the case of an orthodox righteous person amongst a bunch of youthful exuberance. We loved every day of those times.

A New Beginning said...

lolz you had a great college life Anil!!Must have been fun!:))Thanks for sharing the memories of such delightful day :)

anilkurup59 said...

@ANew Begining

Yes we had a memorable three years.

Balachandran V said...

Good read! Would have loved to hear more of your naughtiness! ;)

deeps said...

bingo...
not really gone are the days for me... but those days will never be back..

anilkurup59 said...

@ Bals
@ deeps
Will follow up ha with some more

RGB said...

Looks like you had a great bunch of fun-loving friends at college. Just reminiscing those good old days is fun. And too bad the professor was not game to all the pranks that I would say are 'mandatory' in college life! btw, gilli-danda is played in TN too...

anilkurup59 said...

@ RGB,
Ha thanks for the message. One cannot expect the elderly to see life from the perspective of youth.
But we loved it .

amalg999 said...

Your card game reminds me of another example.

Check out :

http://www.stlyrics.com/songs/w/winkmartindale7684/adeckofcards274894.html