As We Leave #19:The Dreamed Reality of It

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In this 19th edition of As We Leave, Mohika Agarwal, a Y21 student from the department of Mechanical engineering, shares her journey of IIT Kanpur and lets us know what place it holds in her heart. We discover how a place becomes more than just a location,it becomes the very fabric of who you are. This is a story about choices made and unmade, about finding your people in the most unexpected places. We come to know how the memories and experiences she has gained between the first and last glimpse of those bold letters at the gates of the campus left a lasting mark on her.

Disclaimer:- The views presented below are the author’s own and are not in any manner representative of the views of Vox Populi as a body or IIT Kanpur in general. This is an informal account of the author’s experiences at IITK.

27/05/2025

Attempt no. 4 at writing this AWL. Have I finally got this? I still don’t know what I want to write. I vaguely know that I want to write about what this place does to you, what it has done to me and probably understand how it has done to me whatever it is that it has done to me.

It is beautiful.
A beautiful place,
A beautiful experience,
A beautiful maze.

To define it as a place would be wrong. It is so much more. Yes, an experience. But is it just an experience? It is a collection of so many of those. No but as an experience it is a thing of the past for me now. It is so much more. It is still just as beautiful as it was when I was experiencing it. And it will stay beautiful for people who are currently experiencing it and will experience it in the future. It is differently beautiful for everyone. But in the end, it sure is beautiful. These As We Leaves themselves are a testament to this. So, let me try to define its beauty.

As you enter the gates of IIT Kanpur,
There you see it.
First at the metro station,
Then written in big bold letters right after the railway crossing.
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur.

And that is when you know it. It is all real. The dream is now real. You are here, and you are here to live it.

And once you have entered, you stop noticing the big bold letters. You leave and enter from the same gate tens and hundreds of times throughout your stay and yet you don’t see them. You see the tiny bold letters on your question papers and answer scripts, and you still don’t see them. You are too busy living it. It keeps you busy. I still don’t know what it is. But it is something.

For the past 4 years (okay 3.5) it kept me busy. With me there were about 1200 others who entered and lived it. 1200 is a huge number. So many others who are here to live the same dream? Is there enough space, enough opportunity, enough of everything for all of us here? These were a few questions in my mind when I first came to campus. These were maybe not as well-articulated back then as they are now. I am a much more articulate person now, again thanks to whatever ‘it’ is. Turns out, there was enough but also never enough of anything here. For example, there was never enough space on campus. There still isn’t (Vox promotion: Go read the Infra Review Series). But there also is enough space on campus. Enough space to accommodate everyone, and everyone’s dreams, and everyone’s wishes to do whatever it is that they wish to do. You are never really constrained, are you? You can do what you want, you can be a part of things you had previously given up for this beast called JEE, or things that you never even discovered about yourself before. It offers so much to you, and yet the choice of doing something or not doing something still lies with you. I chose to do a few things, and I also chose to not do a few things. And I am grateful for the choices I made.

In the very first sem, I decided that I wanted to attend events and participate in activities of ELS, because it is the English Literary Society and I am an English Literature enthusiast. Simple enough right? It was and I am glad. ELS gave me not just ELS but also people that I cherish even today. It gave me some of my closest friends on campus, seniors, juniors, batchmates alike. Our ELS orphanage never felt like one.

I also made similar choices in the sem that followed when we were on campus. Through ELS, I met people at Vox, discussed what the then situation was like for us freshers (wow I feel old) and how our movement was restricted. What soon followed was an invitation to attend one of Vox’s core group meetings and it was yet again a simple yes. From a CGM testing water quality of different water taps on campus to an editor leading articles, Vox is probably one of the reasons I can write the way I do today. Thanks to CGMs, article meets, ed-board meets, and parties, I met yet another set of people to cherish.

And I made another choice of attending one random session that summer on ‘Intro to Consulting’ and that led me to ICG. I remember discussing that session in the wing multiple times, and from there, deciding to fill the secy nomination, and then the leader nomination, it was one interesting journey. ICG gave me a lot of my learnings. How to structure things, how to plan things out, how to talk to people, how to present your points, and a lot more. It also gave me seniors I can still rush to for advice and batchmates and juniors I’ve loved working with. Not just this, ICG also led to Inter IIT Tech. Over the span of 3 years, through ups and downs, highs and lows, I think it has given me a lot of learnings. I hope that the coming years see IITK going back to winning ways.

But all of these were in some ways very direct offerings that IITK gave me. There are also the trivial ones that you seldom notice and appreciate. Like your academics. Let’s just say I survived the mech courses and loved doing the open electives a little more because of the people I did the courses with. Going through struggles of quizzes, assignments and exams definitely gives you people to cherish. And I’ve found great people who have helped me selflessly through exams and the breakdowns they brought with them. Well surviving was all about mech, but my open electives have luckily been by choice, of things I wanted to actually study. Thanks to Suchitra ma’am and fem theory I am a much more curious person now when it comes to social situations around me. (Highly recommend doing a course under Suchitra ma’am, it is tough to keep up with the assignments but so worth it.)

Another trivial offering is our halls. I met some of the most amazing girls in the corridors, mess and the canteen of Hall 6. These girls became my ride or die. The rooms have heard our laughs and cries alike. But the hall is so much more. The mess wali aunties have always been so sweet while serving rotis, and the floor wali aunties have initiated some very sweet conversations while cleaning our rooms and common spaces. And the places. The 5B balcony (in my 2nd year) offered a very peaceful view. Something about sitting there would calm you after a stressful day. The 3rd floor connector (3rd year) and the windows we could sit in, had become a cocoon on days I wanted to hide away in peace. And by the time I reached 5D (4th year), I think I had become used to both laughing and crying in my own room and running to my friends’ rooms when it was tough to cry alone. I’ll miss being able to run to my people to simply just cry, without any questions. They would embrace you in a warm hug and let you cry your heart out without asking why. Who would do that in bustling cities for you?

Come to think of it, almost every nook and corner on campus holds a memory. Some small, some big but all beautiful. I think a lot of it comes from the way we can be in these spaces. There is just so much freedom, if I can call it that? I could sit on a random bus stand, or a bench or on the OAT stairs and have any kind of conversation with a friend. I could for that matter just sit on the road if I wanted to. I could go to rooftops (coyly of course) and watch a beautiful sunrise after a calm night with my people. I could do anything and everything, yet no one would stop me (mostly). What is more important is that I would not stop myself. I could be myself, and for most parts not think about what others are thinking of me in these situations. Now, while I won’t even have the luxury to randomly sit on the road, I would also probably stop myself. But I hope I can still have places and people and more its where I can be myself without holding back.

This it has another unique feature. This 1100 acres of land, breeds familiarity in its grounds. You could walk on the remotest path, sit in the quietest corner, and yet recognise a familiar face. What lies outside this utopia, is a world of unknowns. Unknown faces, unknown paths, unknown corners. This familiarity that the campus offered was almost calming. You were never too worried about things that you would often worry about outside. That is to some degrees freeing. It lets you be yourself and enjoy with the people around you a little more than you could outside. I think coming back to campus would always offer this freedom from worrying and for that I’ll probably want to come back.

In the last few days, as I started meeting people for the last time before we leave, and then when people started to actually leave, it was hard. People leave a very strong mark on you. You remember certain things about them which they might not. They remember things about you that you might not. What I was before I came here to what I am as I leave, this difference has a lot of people in it. Over time, you adopt certain slangs and mannerisms from the people around you. And in moments you use it, you remember them most organically and so I hope I would. I’ll try to stay in touch and meet these people too. But it’ll be different. The access you had to these people so easily and organically will be gone. Here’s a thought I had as friends were leaving:

If your life was an iPhone, the end of college probably takes away your airdrop feature. You no longer have the privilege of proximity.

And this hurts. But then when you think of it, you never knew these people before. Now you do. And now, you have these people in your life. Which is great. Because you will find them when it matters and so will they. I think my purpose is served. I have to some extent understood what this has done to me and how it has done so. I hope it changes you for the better too.

And then, after all these goodbyes,
as you leave campus,
you see it again.
Written in big bold letters right before the railway crossing.
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur.

And that is when you know it. It is all real. The dream is now real. You were here, and you have lived it.