Sans hunger

“How can Chota be closed now? Its only 3.30 for God’s sake!” I asked no one in particular and thus was answered immediately. “Yeah! Apparently these guys don’t have six assignments and four projects to submit tomorrow.” Somebody else pitched in, “you are forgetting the case-studies we have to go prepared with Dude, for six different classes.” A loser joined in, “what are you saying, I counted four! OB, Mark Ops, Brand and Retail, what are the other two?". The main concern was promptly forgotten. We had all gathered here hunting for food and Chota, the private canteen of our campus, was closed.
The conversation moved on to the numerous assignments and projects we had to submit everyday along with the mandatory readings and analysis etc. before classes. Someone even remarked, “Man! If we were paid two bucks per project and one per assignment, we would have recovered our tuition fee!” The third trimester has just started and we are already zonked. The 9-9 classes, group projects, individual assignments and projects, presentations, case-studies, mandatory readings and all, sapped life out of us. We have forgotten what weekends are, thanks to the visiting lecturers who make the most of the free day to teach. We have forgotten that 3.30 in the night is the time when normal people sleep and not wait on customers in the canteen. Off late I have started hating the dogs on the campus. While we are hurrying between classes or rushing to grab lunch in the 10 minute break these canines are in deep slumber in the middle of the road. They wake up to our noisy footsteps and give us loathsome looks for spoiling their siesta! These days I feel like killing anything I catch sleeping while I slog on with itchy eyes and tired limbs.
The rumble in my stomach reminds me that this is not the time to fret about the unfair thing called life in a B-school. I must get some carbohydrates to replenish my Adenosine-tri-phosphate levels, the energy currency of the body. It is irritating when biochemistry comes to haunt you at the most ludicrous instances. I cannot help being a Biotechnology graduate and thus come up with names of relevant molecules at the most irrelevant times! I never shared this with anybody lest I be deemed loony but my top-of-the-mind-recall associated with the word ‘sex’ is ‘estrogen and testosterone’! Anyway, I shove aside the adenosine thought and move on in pursuit of food.
Where do I start? Anumeha! That woman has her heart at the right place. She even keeps stuff that she can offer people when they ‘visit’ her room. The door is open and there are people on the bed, the chairs, the floor, discussing some case-study and gossiping. They welcome me like a blood-sister coming to join the gang, sniffing loose-talks in the air. I am also rewarded with the news of the latest break-ups and hook-ups in the campus. Somebody asks me about my neighbour and like a duh I answer that she is alright, as if they were interested in her health! Amrita knows me better and makes an eye gesture to others akin to- don’t ask her, she won’t notice a hook-up even if it danced naked in front of her wearing a crown lettered H-o-o-k-u-p. I let this insult pass and ask for food. Unfortunately, the women gathered there have polished off everything. Probably that explains the Kurkure ad. in which gossip starts flowing as soon as a fat woman munches on the snack! The Kurkure thought is making me desperate. I knock every possible door in Champa in vain. Ms. Jain opened the door and gave me a withering look, I should have remembered, all the hunger in Somalia combined is less important than her sleep.
Like a derelict I move to Gulmohar hostel to Veggie. She keeps Ayurvedic medicines for all ailments ranging from headache to foot-sprain, the corollary is, she must have something for the ailment called hunger-at-odd-hours. All I got was sympathy and an assurance that I might lose that flab if I spent some more hungry nights like this. Nobody dying of hunger would like to be pointed out the extra layers of fat she is carrying round her waist but Veggie might understandably be on a vengeance spree, she has had jaundice and is currently surviving on boiled vegetables.
The boys will not care to store any food I supposed. Most of the times they are raiding the likes of Anumeha but I have a Hobson’s choice. Chaddha offered me booze apologizing for the lack of food. Bose, my senior, told me a story to ease my pangs. It seems, in his first year he too faced this desperate situation. After scavenging for food all over the Campus he planned to return to his room, tighten his belt and get back to the numerous assignments awaiting his attention. Comming towards his room, from the distance he could see Mohit calling a dog and opening up a chocolate wrapper. Before Bose could shout ‘Stop!’ the dog had gobbled up the treat and Mohit delightfully crooned ‘Mera Baccha’. It turned out that Mohit fed the last available chocolate to the dog for the lack of a better palate and Bose resorted to his tighten-the-belt plan again. The story did not ease the pangs but I became smart enough to keep a look out for any dog-human interaction on the way.
Forlorn by now checking out the rooms for food had become a formality, and then, I get this surprising affirmation from an unlikely quarter. Saucy had food! He showed me the secret place in his room where he kept it. Digging through layers of books, clothes and books again I found a packet of Marie Biscuits.
“Ugh! This is not food! I do not like them,” I lamented. “Saucy, how can anybody eat this? What prompted you to buy something nobody wants to eat?”
As far as I know, I have not seen anybody jumping with joy at the sight of these biscuits. They are unappetizing enough to be left on the plate every time they are served with tea. Only old Bengalis or people with stomach ailments eat them! I have not come across a single person for whom these top their most-desired-biscuit list. I mentioned my analysis to Saucy while I helplessly swallowed them compelled by hunger.
The Guru of consumer insight spake thus- “Do you think I do not know any of what you are telling me? I bought them precisely because they are so undesirable. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have survived to quench your hunger at this hour of night, My Lady!”