I must be more jobless than usual today, because not only have I checked the weather forecast 3 zillion times, but I've also logged into my gmail a similar number of times. Disappointingly, the forecast still says 4 inches of snow, and I haven't received a single email all day (sigh). So then I did the even more jobless thing..I logged into Orkut. Not just logged in...I actually searched and found that a community exists for Laxmanrao Apte Junior College, Pune. Now I'm flooded with all these random memories....
1). No ladies loo. I must have had better bladder control back then. Thats all I can say.
2). A strict male-female segregation policy that made little sense. And had the unhappy effect of making 18 year olds with crushes behave like 12 year olds with crushes. And also precluded any chance of making friends with the super-brainy dude who had potential as a lender of notes.
3). A physics teacher who couldn't say Boo to a goose, let alone teach a class of 120.
4). The ugliest uniform in history. Copper sulphate blue salwar kurta, with keds. Yuck!
5). A chemistry lab in which I singed my hair twice, and burnt a hole through my kurta once. (Oh, OK...this was all klutzy me. No fault of the college.)
6). A supremely funny, Laurel and Hardy type combination of teachers who taught a subject they called "Paramedical". Turned out to be mostly Preventive and Social Medicine. They even had matching names: Thube and Tapase. Thube was the social worker who had the pleasure of introducing us to the concept of Gandhian toilets. I believe we even went for a field trip to see 'em. (He made sure to tell us the one we were seeing was just for display..not in use. In case someone felt the urge to take a leak, there was another regular loo available. I'm not kidding. I wouldn't kid about something as originally funny as this.)
7). Tapase was the one with the funny bone though. He was teaching us about the mysteries of the female body. We worked our way past puberty and child-birth, to menopause. When he paused...smiled beatifically at the class, and said: Menopause mhanje men must pause, nahi ka? Unfortunately, the beauty of this joke was lost on much of the geeky class...some of whom even dutifully wrote it down. (People wrote everything down back then. Everything.) Except me and DK who laughed till our jaws hurt. But, to Tapase's credit...he always gave me and her very good marks after that day. I liked Tapase.
8). This one trek from Katraj to Sinhagadh, which began at 5.30am and ended at 2pm or thereabouts. I was so thirsty, I drank water from a frog-infested pool at Sinhagadh. I saw the frog. I just didn't care. That trek also ruined one perfectly good pair of jeans forever. The hike was beautiful in the beginning. Very scenic and all that. Lost its charm about the same time my toenails fell off. I lost the entire nails of my 2 big toes in the course of this one stupid trek. Took forever for them to grow back.
9). A trip to Matheran, where I witnessed a remarkable paratha-eating contest between 2 guys. The winner ate 16. That trip was also happening, because our train was stuck en route to Mumbai, so we got out and walked along the railway tracks to the next station. Ah..the smell! Unforgettable!
10). Last, but never the least...my favorite memory of LAP: The one in which I came closer!
1). No ladies loo. I must have had better bladder control back then. Thats all I can say.
2). A strict male-female segregation policy that made little sense. And had the unhappy effect of making 18 year olds with crushes behave like 12 year olds with crushes. And also precluded any chance of making friends with the super-brainy dude who had potential as a lender of notes.
3). A physics teacher who couldn't say Boo to a goose, let alone teach a class of 120.
4). The ugliest uniform in history. Copper sulphate blue salwar kurta, with keds. Yuck!
5). A chemistry lab in which I singed my hair twice, and burnt a hole through my kurta once. (Oh, OK...this was all klutzy me. No fault of the college.)
6). A supremely funny, Laurel and Hardy type combination of teachers who taught a subject they called "Paramedical". Turned out to be mostly Preventive and Social Medicine. They even had matching names: Thube and Tapase. Thube was the social worker who had the pleasure of introducing us to the concept of Gandhian toilets. I believe we even went for a field trip to see 'em. (He made sure to tell us the one we were seeing was just for display..not in use. In case someone felt the urge to take a leak, there was another regular loo available. I'm not kidding. I wouldn't kid about something as originally funny as this.)
7). Tapase was the one with the funny bone though. He was teaching us about the mysteries of the female body. We worked our way past puberty and child-birth, to menopause. When he paused...smiled beatifically at the class, and said: Menopause mhanje men must pause, nahi ka? Unfortunately, the beauty of this joke was lost on much of the geeky class...some of whom even dutifully wrote it down. (People wrote everything down back then. Everything.) Except me and DK who laughed till our jaws hurt. But, to Tapase's credit...he always gave me and her very good marks after that day. I liked Tapase.
8). This one trek from Katraj to Sinhagadh, which began at 5.30am and ended at 2pm or thereabouts. I was so thirsty, I drank water from a frog-infested pool at Sinhagadh. I saw the frog. I just didn't care. That trek also ruined one perfectly good pair of jeans forever. The hike was beautiful in the beginning. Very scenic and all that. Lost its charm about the same time my toenails fell off. I lost the entire nails of my 2 big toes in the course of this one stupid trek. Took forever for them to grow back.
9). A trip to Matheran, where I witnessed a remarkable paratha-eating contest between 2 guys. The winner ate 16. That trip was also happening, because our train was stuck en route to Mumbai, so we got out and walked along the railway tracks to the next station. Ah..the smell! Unforgettable!
10). Last, but never the least...my favorite memory of LAP: The one in which I came closer!
