Having an entire week off from work (thank God for maintenance shutdown) actually makes me feel as if I’m on a semester break. Those were the days when I sat at home, with lots of To-Do items and lil projects in mind, almost never executing any. Those were the days I zapped mindlessly from channel to channel, and had nothing to look forward to (except results and traumatic course registration, of course). I’m not sure if it’s a blessing or curse that The Mister is easily annoyed if I lived a sloth life. Hence, *drum rolls*, here it goes, four things I miss about campus life inspired by The Mister’s #throwbackThursday and reminiscence.

1.Being My Own Boss

In campus, we planned for dinners and suppers past midnight with no second thoughts. There were no strict curfew. There were no guilt if you went out for movies every week. Now that I’m back in the Nair household, I’d get 5 calls after clock ticked 9 pm. I reached home at 11.40 pm last week only to find my father fast asleep on the sofa whilst waiting for Baby to back *oopsssss*. Father just looked at me, then his phone, and said, ‘I don’t like this.’ I quickly ran upstairs (silence is the best strategy, ladies and gentlemen). You see, my parents don’t forbid me from hanging out, but it’s all way too exhausting when you have to rush back, and wish to be honest (but you can’t). This is already starting to sound like I’m a bad child, I’ll stop it here. I love being home and all, but, I miss late nights and early mornings. 😦

2. Food, Food and Food

I used to complain A LOT about food while on campus, but I take my words back now. It wasn’t too bad actually. Since graduating, I’ve not consciously enjoyed National Chinese Breakfast Day (which is celebrated every time I crave for Tronoh aunty’s noodles, if you’re wondering). Cafeteria at my workplace could never possibly match Choy Pin lunches. That late night roti banjir with kari campur, that I always asked for tapao. Mi Sedaap from Rahman for teatime, or that shawarma I used to walk all the way to V4 for. On my lucky days, I get egg tarts and tau foo faa from Ipoh. Oh, and how can I forget the nasi lemak from V4 with squared papadoms (Yes, I have a thing for papadoms!). I miss how after tests or major presentations, we go in convoys to makan sessions. If I were to ever visit campus again, I’d write down a list of these, and make sure I don’t miss any!

3. Lazy Days and Randomness

If I were to plot a  pie chart of the distribution of all the things I miss about campus life, this would probably have the biggest percentage (no shame, sloth life is the best life!). Waking up late in the afternoon, binge watching on television series while munching on cereals with my legs up on the table,  late night conversations with the roommate and listening to her singing same lines of a song for an entire week. All these  definitely made life more bearable than my ordinary work weeks. We shouted by the lake (something I’ve been wanting to do since Foundation) after prayers in Tronoh temple. We drove aimlessly and ended up in Teluk Batik. We drove aimlessly and ended up in Ipoh, the other time. Actually, what I miss the most is, piled up clothes on my bed and feeding myself fat with junk food. Nobody really cared back then.

4. Humans of Tronoh

Okay, so this is a little hypocritical of me to say. I’m such a douche when it comes to keeping in touch (and all of my close crackos are too, coming to think of it). Some days, I miss friends who used to be around me. I’m putting the blame on adulthood exhaustion that I don’t usually text or call up someone when I miss them. Back in campus, when you miss someone, you could just walk and knock their room doors. In most cases, you met them too often that you want to shut the door and pretend to be asleep (no, I’m kdding). Colleagues are fun people, but a good catch up with college friends is something that I want these days. The reminiscence gets really critical sometimes that I’d hope someone would actually tell me to wait at the V5 palang to go for dinner.

I have come to a conclusion that campus wasn’t the worst of place to  live in after all. All that ‘Can’t wait to be out of jungle‘ talks was pointless. This is a oh-so-cliched graduate who is shamelessly confessing that she’d travel back to campus had she a time machine. To those of you counting your days to leave campus, DON’T! Cherish your time there.