Page 252 - Udaan 2019-2021 Final

IT'S BEEN A WHILE

SHAONI RAKSHIT, ISC 2016

For the longest time, I had believed that it was impossible to have meaningful
experiences within a relatively short period of time. This might have been the case

since, for fourteen years, I lived in one place and grew up with the same people.
Needless to say, I did not have any sky-high expectations when I first joined DPS

Newtown in 2014. Oh my, it has been a long time. I am just realizing that I have
not been sixteen for quite a while now. Oh, well!
When I say I disliked school when I first started class, I mean it. Having previously

studied in a DPS as well, I saw the architecture and uniforms as a distorted
reflection of a place I had moved away from. Personally, I don’t do too well with

change, and I am not particularly sociable. I was fully prepared to study in silence
and pass out without making a single friend. Only, none of that happened.

If there was a specific moment for me to point out when I started liking DPSN, I
would not be able to do so. Yet, it happened. I was looking forward to classes and

meeting my friends – that’s right, more than one! I still remember our cream
coloured classroom with its tiny benches, huddled up next to each other. To the
unsuspecting eye, it was a clustered and suffocating room. For us, it was the

coziest nook in the entire school. We did not have any assigned seats but,
somehow, we all had mutually decided on an agreeable seating arrangement. I

think I can accurately still recall who sat next to whom. There was nowhere else
any of us would rather be, including (surprise, surprise) me.