Time sure flies!
By now, I'm guessing you all were wondering what it looked like to stay in a hall (dorm) on campus and what it was like walking around. *This page is especially dedicated to my father.
Here's a peek into, the journey of a Madras Christian College, Social Work Department student:
My hall, front door. No, wait; make that, the only door
Martin Hall
curfew for the girls: 6:30pm every night. Two nights per month they were allotted "Night-Out" where they could stay off campus, if they signed something and told the warden where they were going.
As a BCA student, we had a different curfew: 10:30pm. The doors were locked every night at 6:30 and unlocked in the morning at 6 or so, and guarded everyday all day, but if we wanted to go out late or come in late, we could. The guards at the door were always very kind and knowledgeable about this, and accommodated this arrangement.
Inside look at (what else?!)
THE COURTYARDS!
Love, love, love them! This is the most central, largest one, where I sat and enjoyed most of the time. I'd sit and read, write, talk on the phone, or just be quiet, and eventually enough people would be walking past and we'd strike up a conversation. :) Good times.
Absolute PERFECT place to have afternoon chai.
As a side note, this picture is fuzzy because of all of the rain. This was officially the first largest storm I remember having (at least during the day-time). Monsoon!
We did go out on the stage and splash in the rain, and the thunder...
Ancient palm tree growing inside of one of the smaller courtyards, interestingly, called a coconut tree here:
And one of the two smaller, adjacent courtyards in Martin Hall.
There were three total:
My journey to the Social Work Department
which always somehow reminded me of walking in a jungle..
Slightly distracted, again :)
more jungle...
Now to the straight and narrow:
1.) 2.)
Nope, we made it!
Hallways and classrooms
And the outside, or would we say inside? It's the courtyard!
And to especially take notice of: there is grass! In the hall courtyards and anywhere around campus for the most part, there was only the sandy-dirt. I'm not sure why we had grass.
We asked our director why it was that normally there is no grass (we missed it, just coming here in the summer) and she concluded, that it wasn't a priority and that it was too dry any other time of the year besides monsoon season.
Plus, I think it was easier for the cleaning ladies to sweep the ground free of leaves if there wasn't grass. Every day, the ladies would be out picking up sticks from this dirt, and sweeping the leaves. It was important that it was always well kept and looking nice. A couple times as I was walking back to the main part of campus, I even saw them sweeping the road path as well.
And this is how I arrived at the department on campus. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I do believe we were the farthest department in MCC from the main block; in general, a 15 minute walk, 10 if you're running late. (Wait... late??) I suppose that's for a later edition.
It's pretty sweet. Definitely one of the best things about living in Chennai- the awesome, GREEN campus. :)
And to treat all of you who support randomness, also spotted on campus:
Exhibit 1: Beautiful staircase on the main block of classrooms on campus
Exhibit 2:
Chair graveyard?
MCC was definitely my safe-haven staying in Chennai. While the whole city (of 8.2 million, I might add) was bustling outside, we were lucky and really couldn't hear it inside campus, which was amazing. Every so often we'd hear the Air Force's low-flying planes or their target practicing right behind campus, which was a little unnerving, but like most of the honking and other noise disturbances, I actually began to get used to it! Near the end, I remember even asking myself if the planes had just quit flying overhead completely.
This was such a good campus to get out and walk in. Any time that I needed some quiet time or some "green" time, a good walk with my notebook did me a world of good. It sure was big enough, at 365 acres, and had enough flora and fauna for anyone's liking- over 1,000 different species if I remember correctly! Hard to believe we were right in the city. And as our professor Prince Solomon liked to point out, MCC was lovingly nicknamed the "lungs of Chennai".
And the more I got out, the more people found me and we'd stop to have a genuine conversation.
Beautiful.
No comments:
Post a Comment