Leela Addepalli, Grade 11
UWC Mahindra
11th March, 2020
One of the teachers had let slip the secret, and my friends and I were overjoyed. We were going home early! What could be better than that? Finally eating good food, watching programs on a real TV and no more worrying about losing our debit cards from going back and forth to the almost always broken ATM. So, when Soraya called the “confidential” meeting on the 11th of March, over two months before the end of term, I thought I felt prepared for what was coming.
I have never been so wrong in my life.
When Soraya said, “We will not be able to fulfil the conditions of a campus-wide lockdown, and so we have made the tough decision to send y’all back home”, my friends and I were the only ones smiling. The previously quiet room was full now. Full of heavy hearts, of poorly subdued sobs and of the sorrow of impending departure. The emotions that flooded that hall overwhelm me even today, months later, and at that moment, I understood the implications of what “going back home” meant. This was not a vacation we were talking about. This was the end of a very short year. For some of us, this was the end of MUWCI itself. The dreaded virus had invaded the country, and it brought with it a trail of doom and despair. I realized that the seniors I loved as family, as indulgent older siblings, were leaving, and they were going for good. I would probably never see them again. We had only a few more days left to do all that we thought we had months for. The seniors would barely even graduate properly. My cheeks were wet, tears falling hot and fast onto mine and Vanshika’s joint hands. Soraya was crying now too, as were the other faculty members. Words were coming out of her mouth, but I could not comprehend them over the all-encompassing, ringing sound of grief.
We left that hall, crying, disoriented, unsure of everything except Aparna’s last instructions. “Head to your advisor’s houses.” We stumbled up to Beulah’s door and rang the bell. Not trusting my unsteady knees to hold me up much longer, I wanted her to open up quickly. I called my dad first because I could not deal with my mother’s “I told you so” and “Oh finally someone I can go to movies with”, and so I called my father. He, although had his own set of flaws, knew how to listen, and having lived in a hostel would understand the sorrow of losing everything in a single day.
Beulah asked us about our travel plans. First years were required to leave by Saturday, the 14th. Beulah was leaving too, I realized. I had meant to make her a farewell gift, but that wasn’t even on my top ten things to do before leaving. My mind was racing, but also hurting because the tears hadn’t stopped. This was the first time I saw Uditi ever cry. Only Jose looked unperturbed, eating ice cream calmly.
I got out of there as fast as I could and ran to our house and hugged my roommates. Eva and I jumped into the pool and swam for all of forty-five seconds before we decided that it was too cold. She was talking to Jahzara when I met Lucas, and he bought me chocolate ice cream from the coffee shop. Anoop Ji, our waiter, was annoyed, as usual.
I went from Wada to Wada (that’s what we call our dorms), hugging people, not knowing whether to say hello or goodbye, see you later or I’ll miss you. No one knew when they were leaving, so it seemed safer to say both.
As I was walking down the road, someone yelled, Holi party in 10 minutes. Holi was the festival of colours, one of the significant occasions on the Hindu calendar, and also one, that I had been sure I would miss due to Covid-19 regulations. Even though it had seemed impossible just a couple of hours earlier, I smiled.
By most Indian standards, it was an unsatisfactory Holi celebration, one that had barely any colour, almost inaudible music and lasted only 30 minutes. But what made it perfect was the people. Everyone, including those coming from entirely different cultures, everyone was so excited to try this out and continue challenging themselves, just like Duc once said, in the MUWCI way. Despite the hard news we had to absorb, we came together as a community, stood up for each other and celebrated our differences.
I had red teeth, and a yellow face and I knew my hair was looking dreadful, so you have to understand his greatness when Lucas called me beautiful as we walked down the road that took us Off-Campus. Eva asked me to take the lead, none of the others had been to Internet Hill before.
Going up was a huge challenge, especially since I took an extremely sketchy shortcut, and because none of us was wearing appropriate footwear. Lucas came barefoot, the poor guy. But it was worth it. The view from up there was absolutely splendid. I could not believe that this was only my second time climbing this hill. I immediately vowed then and there that every week next term, I would make this journey, if only to get some peace and a change of scene. That is if we get the next term.
We whispered up there; yelling seemed to disturb the palpable energy that exists on hills such as this one, almost as if they have their own souls. We spoke openly that day. It seemed vital, to get to know each other better in the few moments we had left, lest these stories go unheard and those sacrifices are left unacknowledged. We all thought we had more time to enjoy these things. I was reminded of the old Hindi saying, roughly translating to do whatever you can today, never know if you’ll have a tomorrow.
When we got back to the room, my housemate and I fought for the shower. She won because she made the argument that I take longer showers. When she left the shower as dirty as she always does though, I didn’t shut up and say to myself “Maybe she’ll pick it up next time” but instead called her out and yelled, only half-joking, “Clean up your mess you disgusting human!” because I wanted to be honest in these last few days. I owed that to these people who had very quickly turned into family, didn’t I? Honesty?
There was a community kitchen in Wada 2, and I wanted to make french fries for that, but by the time I got ready, I was out of time.
When I walked into Wada 2, once again, I was not prepared for what I was about to witness.
It seemed like almost the whole campus, all 240 of us, not even counting faculty, all were present in that tiny space in the middle of the dorm. The smell of cooked meat filled the air, and although that was unpleasant to me as a vegetarian, I didn’t run away because the view made up for the smell. Everyone had piled up food in the middle of the common room, snacks from home, sweets from countries I had dreamt of visiting, delicacies that only days ago we had guarded with our lives, now being openly distributed. It was heart-warming, to say the least. I didn’t eat too much, to be honest, the whole thing was a little unsanitary, people dipping their spoons into communal bowls of food, but it was all the same a beautiful thing to witness. We danced, and when someone started crying, we wiped their tears and pulled them onto the dance-floor. The music pulsed, in languages I could not comprehend, but the message remained the same. Dance, it said. Dance now, there’s time for memories later.
And so we danced.
I remember walking over to Vanshika’s room, hours later, and finding it full. Terence, Eva, Vanshika, Zasal, Dipakshi, Qing, Khushi, Reina, Alex, Maja, Tahmuras, everyone. All of these people were part of House 7. We didn’t have four corners in this room, we had 225 square feet multiplied by an infinite amount of love, that made the room as large as our hearts, able to accommodate everyone. A sort of open for all. Space, food, laughter, sorrow, we shared everything those few months. When someone got into college, we were the first ones to know, even before anyone back home. We were the ones who’d yell and go out into the Wada dancing and cheering, “My baby’s going to college woohoooooo” until we had tomatoes thrown at us from half asleep neighbours.
A lot more happened that night, that may or may not have involved people jumping into the pool fully clothed, random bursts of music and laughter at 3 AM from somewhere nearby, and just the general apathy of people who know that there are no more consequences, because the biggest scariest sentence has already been delivered.
I know I went back to my room, feet blistering from all the running around, arms exhausted from all the climbing, hugging and waving, cheeks sore from laughing and eyes red, tired of producing tears. I looked at the three empty beds in my room. I recalled the day I arrived on campus, tired and exhausted then too, just waiting to curl up and cry about leaving home for the first time. They didn’t let me. Andrea (Venezuela, MUWCI ‘20) took me to the common room, made me accompany her while she was cooking Arepas. She told me never to call them Spanish Pancakes or she’d kill me, even though they looked exactly like pancakes, except made out of corn flour. She told me all about herself and the family she left behind, the crisis in her country and how much she hated her President. I just thought she was being friendly, but she was distracting me from longing for home. Unknowingly, she was integral to my new one. I remember Qing (China, MUWCI ’20) was the one who created a welcome hamper for me, complete with sweets she’d brought from China for her “firstie”. Hila (Israel, MUWCI ’20) had seemed intimidating at first, for quite a while, until she burst out laughing at my very messy corner one day and told me, doing an uncanny impression of my mother whom she’d never met, to clean it up before she gets back. I remember thinking, that first day, all those months ago, “I’m so lucky to have three senior roommates, they can tell me about everything”.
MUWCI is not about the gorgeous campus, not about the academics, not even about services or the activities we do daily. It was never about that. It has always been about the people. And that day, on the 11th of March, 2020, we appreciated this fact in all its glory, as we began saying the first goodbyes, all the while wishing, hoping, and praying to whichever God we believed in, please let us meet again.
One of the teachers had let slip the secret, and my friends and I were overjoyed. We were going home early! What could be better than that? Finally eating good food, watching programs on a real TV and no more worrying about losing our debit cards from going back and forth to the almost always broken ATM. So, when Soraya called the “confidential” meeting on the 11th of March, over two months before the end of term, I thought I felt prepared for what was coming.
I have never been so wrong in my life.
When Soraya said, “We will not be able to fulfil the conditions of a campus-wide lockdown, and so we have made the tough decision to send y’all back home”, my friends and I were the only ones smiling. The previously quiet room was full now. Full of heavy hearts, of poorly subdued sobs and of the sorrow of impending departure. The emotions that flooded that hall overwhelm me even today, months later, and at that moment, I understood the implications of what “going back home” meant. This was not a vacation we were talking about. This was the end of a very short year. For some of us, this was the end of MUWCI itself. The dreaded virus had invaded the country, and it brought with it a trail of doom and despair. I realized that the seniors I loved as family, as indulgent older siblings, were leaving, and they were going for good. I would probably never see them again. We had only a few more days left to do all that we thought we had months for. The seniors would barely even graduate properly. My cheeks were wet, tears falling hot and fast onto mine and Vanshika’s joint hands. Soraya was crying now too, as were the other faculty members. Words were coming out of her mouth, but I could not comprehend them over the all-encompassing, ringing sound of grief.
We left that hall, crying, disoriented, unsure of everything except Aparna’s last instructions. “Head to your advisor’s houses.” We stumbled up to Beulah’s door and rang the bell. Not trusting my unsteady knees to hold me up much longer, I wanted her to open up quickly. I called my dad first because I could not deal with my mother’s “I told you so” and “Oh finally someone I can go to movies with”, and so I called my father. He, although had his own set of flaws, knew how to listen, and having lived in a hostel would understand the sorrow of losing everything in a single day.
Beulah asked us about our travel plans. First years were required to leave by Saturday, the 14th. Beulah was leaving too, I realized. I had meant to make her a farewell gift, but that wasn’t even on my top ten things to do before leaving. My mind was racing, but also hurting because the tears hadn’t stopped. This was the first time I saw Uditi ever cry. Only Jose looked unperturbed, eating ice cream calmly.
I got out of there as fast as I could and ran to our house and hugged my roommates. Eva and I jumped into the pool and swam for all of forty-five seconds before we decided that it was too cold. She was talking to Jahzara when I met Lucas, and he bought me chocolate ice cream from the coffee shop. Anoop Ji, our waiter, was annoyed, as usual.
I went from Wada to Wada (that’s what we call our dorms), hugging people, not knowing whether to say hello or goodbye, see you later or I’ll miss you. No one knew when they were leaving, so it seemed safer to say both.
As I was walking down the road, someone yelled, Holi party in 10 minutes. Holi was the festival of colours, one of the significant occasions on the Hindu calendar, and also one, that I had been sure I would miss due to Covid-19 regulations. Even though it had seemed impossible just a couple of hours earlier, I smiled.
By most Indian standards, it was an unsatisfactory Holi celebration, one that had barely any colour, almost inaudible music and lasted only 30 minutes. But what made it perfect was the people. Everyone, including those coming from entirely different cultures, everyone was so excited to try this out and continue challenging themselves, just like Duc once said, in the MUWCI way. Despite the hard news we had to absorb, we came together as a community, stood up for each other and celebrated our differences.
I had red teeth, and a yellow face and I knew my hair was looking dreadful, so you have to understand his greatness when Lucas called me beautiful as we walked down the road that took us Off-Campus. Eva asked me to take the lead, none of the others had been to Internet Hill before.
Going up was a huge challenge, especially since I took an extremely sketchy shortcut, and because none of us was wearing appropriate footwear. Lucas came barefoot, the poor guy. But it was worth it. The view from up there was absolutely splendid. I could not believe that this was only my second time climbing this hill. I immediately vowed then and there that every week next term, I would make this journey, if only to get some peace and a change of scene. That is if we get the next term.
We whispered up there; yelling seemed to disturb the palpable energy that exists on hills such as this one, almost as if they have their own souls. We spoke openly that day. It seemed vital, to get to know each other better in the few moments we had left, lest these stories go unheard and those sacrifices are left unacknowledged. We all thought we had more time to enjoy these things. I was reminded of the old Hindi saying, roughly translating to do whatever you can today, never know if you’ll have a tomorrow.
When we got back to the room, my housemate and I fought for the shower. She won because she made the argument that I take longer showers. When she left the shower as dirty as she always does though, I didn’t shut up and say to myself “Maybe she’ll pick it up next time” but instead called her out and yelled, only half-joking, “Clean up your mess you disgusting human!” because I wanted to be honest in these last few days. I owed that to these people who had very quickly turned into family, didn’t I? Honesty?
There was a community kitchen in Wada 2, and I wanted to make french fries for that, but by the time I got ready, I was out of time.
When I walked into Wada 2, once again, I was not prepared for what I was about to witness.
It seemed like almost the whole campus, all 240 of us, not even counting faculty, all were present in that tiny space in the middle of the dorm. The smell of cooked meat filled the air, and although that was unpleasant to me as a vegetarian, I didn’t run away because the view made up for the smell. Everyone had piled up food in the middle of the common room, snacks from home, sweets from countries I had dreamt of visiting, delicacies that only days ago we had guarded with our lives, now being openly distributed. It was heart-warming, to say the least. I didn’t eat too much, to be honest, the whole thing was a little unsanitary, people dipping their spoons into communal bowls of food, but it was all the same a beautiful thing to witness. We danced, and when someone started crying, we wiped their tears and pulled them onto the dance-floor. The music pulsed, in languages I could not comprehend, but the message remained the same. Dance, it said. Dance now, there’s time for memories later.
And so we danced.
I remember walking over to Vanshika’s room, hours later, and finding it full. Terence, Eva, Vanshika, Zasal, Dipakshi, Qing, Khushi, Reina, Alex, Maja, Tahmuras, everyone. All of these people were part of House 7. We didn’t have four corners in this room, we had 225 square feet multiplied by an infinite amount of love, that made the room as large as our hearts, able to accommodate everyone. A sort of open for all. Space, food, laughter, sorrow, we shared everything those few months. When someone got into college, we were the first ones to know, even before anyone back home. We were the ones who’d yell and go out into the Wada dancing and cheering, “My baby’s going to college woohoooooo” until we had tomatoes thrown at us from half asleep neighbours.
A lot more happened that night, that may or may not have involved people jumping into the pool fully clothed, random bursts of music and laughter at 3 AM from somewhere nearby, and just the general apathy of people who know that there are no more consequences, because the biggest scariest sentence has already been delivered.
I know I went back to my room, feet blistering from all the running around, arms exhausted from all the climbing, hugging and waving, cheeks sore from laughing and eyes red, tired of producing tears. I looked at the three empty beds in my room. I recalled the day I arrived on campus, tired and exhausted then too, just waiting to curl up and cry about leaving home for the first time. They didn’t let me. Andrea (Venezuela, MUWCI ‘20) took me to the common room, made me accompany her while she was cooking Arepas. She told me never to call them Spanish Pancakes or she’d kill me, even though they looked exactly like pancakes, except made out of corn flour. She told me all about herself and the family she left behind, the crisis in her country and how much she hated her President. I just thought she was being friendly, but she was distracting me from longing for home. Unknowingly, she was integral to my new one. I remember Qing (China, MUWCI ’20) was the one who created a welcome hamper for me, complete with sweets she’d brought from China for her “firstie”. Hila (Israel, MUWCI ’20) had seemed intimidating at first, for quite a while, until she burst out laughing at my very messy corner one day and told me, doing an uncanny impression of my mother whom she’d never met, to clean it up before she gets back. I remember thinking, that first day, all those months ago, “I’m so lucky to have three senior roommates, they can tell me about everything”.
MUWCI is not about the gorgeous campus, not about the academics, not even about services or the activities we do daily. It was never about that. It has always been about the people. And that day, on the 11th of March, 2020, we appreciated this fact in all its glory, as we began saying the first goodbyes, all the while wishing, hoping, and praying to whichever God we believed in, please let us meet again.
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