Struggles of Being a IIITian

Twelve years of education later, you’re finally at college. Maybe you’ve been looking forward to the sweet taste of freedom you’ve heard so much about, or maybe you’re worried about, leaving the comforts of home and being plunged into a completely new world. Either way, here you are —  at the brink of a new, sure to be a crucial chapter of your life as a IIITian.

You’ve worked hard to get here, at one of the top colleges in the country, but there will always be that uncle that congratulates you with a pat on your shoulder exclaiming, “Beta, I heard you got into IIT, congrats!!” and you’ll always have to awkwardly reply that its actually IIIT Hyderabad with three I’s – you don’t go to IIT Hyderabad. It’s not just them that make this absolutely adorable mistake. Even media outlets reporting ground-breaking research work IIIT Hyderabad has done will conveniently forget an ‘I’ crediting the work to IIT Hyderabad instead and reducing all that already minute flex power you thought you could have.

Now that you’re at college, life should be more chill right? Isn’t that what people say? Courses aside, if you have 7:30 a.m. PT, good luck forcing yourself out the door and running across campus to get your biometric attendance put on time. You probably signed up for it thinking it’d be great to get some exercise and fresh air first thing in the morning, start the day off right, and by the time you realise what a mistake that was it’s already too late. At least you’ll get breakfast though. You won’t be in the hangry state of those who woke up at 8:28 after 2 hours of sleep for an 8:30 a.m. class and sprint to Himalaya to make sure they keep their 85% attendance in check. Weekends should be better right? A chance to catch up on sleep, start the day a bit more slowly. But if you wake up at that horribly unfortunate time of 10 a.m. on Sunday mornings when the breakfast mess is closed, and Biryani at Kadamba isn’t open for another 3 hours and neither is a single canteen – you and your stomach are screwed. 

With more freedom comes more responsibilities, and that means you are so much more in control of your life now. This translates to you now need to do your own laundry, wash your own plates, and make sure your room doesn’t become a biohazard. You might have to even set an alarm for 3 a.m. just so you can find an empty washing machine and finally rid your room of that growing pile of stinky clothes but that’s all just part of the IIIT experience.

While you’re here you’ll find a million things to complain about. There’s no easier way to make friends in college than to whine together. But after you’ve been away from it for so long, you’ll realize all those things you complained about are what led to things you miss the most. Being hungry in your room alone leads you to go bang on your friend’s room door demanding food, and waiting for a washing machine to free up is when you start catching up with someone else who’s also waiting who you haven’t talked to in a while. Absolutely nothing hits as hard as going to JC or DLF to get a cup of bournvita or a shawarma roll after you managed to just complete a stressful deadline at midnight. Being a IIITian comes with its struggles, but when you leave you’ll only remember the memories and friends you made, and have nothing but wistful longing to go back.

Editor: Pahulpreet Singh