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What do you expect from your college life? What role do you think college life will play in your whole life? In "Life at College: The Most Glorious Phase of One's Life", the author will share with us his personal experiences at college. Let's find out what he thinks of the life at college.

Life at College: The Most Glorious Phase of One’s Life 

Hari Eswar

 

    One of the most interesting stages in life that gives you an opportunity to explore is the “college phase.” Life at college is the time when the teenage years end and we all dive deep into the ocean of new beginnings and possibilities. This golden period better equips you for all the challenges you’ll face in life and creates a strong foundation of knowledge. 

     My experience at IIT Roorkee has taught me one fundamental thing—life is unpredictable. It might be good, it might be bad, it might be weird, and it might not interest you, but you should expect anything to happen. For example, you might have a wonderful job this moment, and be fired the very next moment. College life prepares you for all of this. It is a perfect blend of joy and hardships. You meet different people, you interact with them, you learn about their cultures and you grow as a person. You will understand how to talk to different people, how to judge their behavior, thus learning important life skills. 

    You learn to sit through a boring lecture; you try to cope with the surprisingly strenuous syllabus, and you have the opportunity to learn from some great research minds. Academia, as they say, never lets you go free. People might try to comfort you by saying that you need to study only through your school years and chill during college life, but that isn’t true. 

    Another life lesson you will remember—learning never ends. You find campus groups or student groups where you can explore your co-curricular skills along with many other students like you. You share common interests, and thus you share common ideas. There might have been a time where you would have had to give up drawing for your JEE Advanced preparation. Trust me, once you get into a good college, you will get an opportunity to be the artist you always wanted to be through probably a fine arts campus group. You could be that director, you could be that vocalist, and you could be the dancer of your dreams—college is the Santa Claus that keeps on giving all these wonderful opportunities while you’re in it. There are also campus festivals, which draw a lot of fun crowds from other colleges and let you show off your skills. You could also enjoy being with the celebrities who are invited to perform, or even show off your technical prowess in a tech festival. 

    Life at college is a time when you can decide your career. It’s a time of dreams and innumerable paths. You can still be as good a programmer as the JEE Advanced topper who majors in Computer Science and has the option to take courses outside of your major. You can work for a non.profit organization and even gain the satisfaction of being a humanitarian. The point is that you are free to try out these new things and no one is going to forcefully control the decisions you make. Every nook and corner of the college you’d find a peaceful spot full of natural surroundings, whose value you will only realize once you graduate from your college. You will always remember the early morning fog, your hostel’s adorable “puppy” or even your grumpy stationery shopkeeper. 

    So, remember that there will be moments that carry a lot of sentimental value and you can’t help but miss them even years later. The friendships you make in college life are the most important aspect. These people will give you strength and be your knights in shining armor all your life. The time you spend with your friends, playing Mafia, Poker, or arguing about any random topic, your regular lecture “bunking” to watch a new release of your favorite star, will always stay in your heart. Planning road trips, occasional adventure surges, and impulsive journeys—all these things make you more emotional when you bid adieu to the institution. 

    So, one fine day when you see pictures of you and your college friends having a good time, you’ll definitely land up smiling silently. That’s the beauty of college life. It stays with you long after you’ve climbed those ladders of success and forgotten the name of that cute crush you used to drool over. 

    Life at college is a wild mishmash of experiences, what with all sorts of hilarious stuff going down in the hostels! 

（734 words）