No One Left To Walk With.

Sincere thank you to the person who's taught so much, in so little time.

I want to begin by admitting my ignorance. Because I was concerned. Like several other pivotal experiences in my life, that I have promised myself the trouble of drafting in my diary after being in the company of several amazing people from my time in IIITD, I felt, this, too, would remain unpenned. How I would have almost ignored writing what you are about to read altogether. For we humans are oblivious in realizing the very fragility of very good friendships. And yet, something about my time between the 26th to the 29th of January, in its clear blue skies, in its spotless streets, in its sun-drenched winter of the town Badnera, of Amravati in Maharashtra, convinced me strongly to write, from how much of an accommodating and lovely bunch, the Dhopte family were to us, and even more to me in particular. At an age doped with 30-second reels, a poppied generation from intoxicants, I had an opportunity to be present. To appreciate. To celebrate. Why we must all choose to choose.
From witnessing how two very different families, who until their arranged engagement would have known so little of each other’s being, will now soon begin to espouse each other’s values into their own, I had the chance to begin pondering of my own. Its sheer potency shook me enough to wonder how lucky I was for even being invited. It is also this intangible character, of “values”, of possessing a “moral compass”, that Walmikee and I used to so endearingly deliberate about, and my deficiency at fully ever being able to quantify how much this experience means to me, that has prompted me to write about at the very least. For if I don’t, I know how much of a grave injustice I’d be doing not to give the Dhopte family the wholesome opportunity of what a fantastic individual he has seasoned into from his time in Delhi, but more importantly, how much of a lasting impression he has made, to the closest of his friends. I am glad, for I enjoyed the personal connection I desired with a few of his lovely friends, his cousins, his parents, and the rest of his relatives, despite how limited our time was, mutually in person. A subject of perennial interest to me has been how the select few people that were close to me blossomed from their families. Walmikee, to me, has been one of those friends. And now I know, how much of a lovely family he has primed from.
From childhood, I have routinely sought the patronisation, patriarchy and pedestalisation of someone older. Maybe owing to my lack of older siblings, I sought the sage in every mature person to steer clear of my own emotional and vesuvian personality. He was that. To me. And to every one of us. The ideal Older Brother.

First Interactions

March to April was a time of wrestling with my inadequacy of being good at anything. Despondent and more confused than ever, despite my well-anticipated summer spent in ISB Hyderabad, I desired perspective. I sought that from a fresh pair of friends, one of whom being Walmikee. In one of several such anguished mornings, spent in deep contemplation of my future, I see him, in the Gym, wearing a neon green shirt. His calm demeanour, his peaceful gaze, and his introverted bearing matched anything against my pompous, ecstatic, and extroverted self that I was. From him, a mental image was formed. I wanted to look like him. I introduce myself the next time we came across each other in the Hostel lift, and I am sure he wasn’t surprised by the countless times people must have asked him about how great of a physique he had.
His name intrigued me more than anything. Walmikee. From a generation of aashish’s, aarush’s, aaryan’s, ananya’s, the Hinduistic tradition and authenticity disguised in merely his name was a breath of fresh air. Walmikee soon became embraced as our Wall-E. And finds himself recruited into our motley group of BTech misfits. My friends became his, and his, mine. With time, our friendship consummated and matured over a shared love for our religion, physical fitness, casual debates over life, ethics of the Indian culture and language, and our mutual exploration of the Dravidian culture. We shared modicums and tenets from our own upbringing and cultures and borrowed from each other into our own. I admired, adored and religiously envied his routine, his calm demeanour, his meticulousness, his discipline and his way of looking at life.

Delhi

From my time in Delhi, I went from being my family’s preferred kind of Gudipati to becoming my own very specific kind of Gudipati. After seeing Walmikee in Amravati, where he grew up, with whom he grew up, I imagine much the same metamorphosis perhaps happening with Walmikee. From being a Dhopte to being his own specific kind of Dhopte. I imagine someone alone, with one suitcase, with one dream. To secure the coveted placement. That’s what I imagine from Walmikee’s arrival to Delhi, nearly 10 months back in February when life was still a slave to covid statistics. In a couple of semesters, I find him leaving with more than just what he desired. An experience to Love, obtain Work, befriend Friends, and finally some very good times for Google Photos to remind him how Delhi was much more than what he initially came asking for.
Most conversations in Delhi, are expected to violate the norms of conversations of all politeness. It is after all, for the people of Delhi, their way of endearment. If you are skinned enough to handle the insult, you are skinned enough to belong in close circles. Maybe that was how I bought myself the ticket into such kind of friendships in Delhi. By not taking myself too seriously. By buying their endearment. In their self-deprecation. Their complexion of how they find friendship, by breaking all boundaries of what kind of insult hurts you the most because they can.
And yet this. Endearment of precisely this kind. The kind that finds insult as a means to pull each one’s leg and arm as an expense to buying into someone’s friendship was something the both of us found exhausting. That’s maybe why, and maybe how I found such a strong union with Walmikee. In all my fake pretence of dealing with such insults throughout the day, I always had Walmikee, and in his sagacious warmth, I forever had a non-compromising, un-judgmental conversation.

The last few weeks before our mutual departures from this campus meant that we tried spending as much time as we could in each other’s company. The frequent walks. The copious amount of coffee cups. But it looks like that hasn’t been the case since January 16th. I no longer find that familiar knock on my door asking if I’d tag along for the hourly coffee walk. And I just wished I could relive all of that friendship once again. Again. In IIIT Delhi. On the floors of H1. In the cozy comforts of our crew’s favourite 804 room. Probably listening to Saudebazi on Amazon Echo.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for all the memories, and for all the good habits.

-Abhinav Gudipati