Architecture, a subject that needs passion, practice, and patience! Some people come to study architecture by knowing the hardship, and some have no clue what they are signing up for! And God saves those helpless souls who came to study architecture without knowing what the next 3-5 years of their life is going to look like. As for me, I saw two of my cousins studying architecture and got inspired by them. But it was nothing like I had seen it as an outsider when I started pursuing it! Spending nights crying, frustrated; going to class the next day with a sleepless grumpy face and a half done model; is how pretty much architecture students’ life looks like!
Coping as freshman
In 1st year, staying at campus till 11 pm, then went home, had dinner, and started working again on the project. Every night my sister used to go to sleep, wishing me the ‘best of luck’ sarcastically! The first few days, I was doing okay (not great to be noted!), but after some days, I started asking her for help; she used to scroll her phone for 1 or 2 hours but never agreed to help me once! Oh, the pain I went through that time! Watching my sister laying in a cozy, comfortable bed and me on the floor frustrated about not being able to glue the parts of my compositional model! My poor helpless face neither melted my sister’s heart, nor she helped me once!
Travelling and architecture
In my 2nd year of studying architecture, I used to travel a lot! Once we have planned a trip at the beginning of the month, that 3rd week we will go on a trip. And guess what, I had got a deadline, after the day we are coming from the trip! But canceling the trip was not an option for me. I went on the trip thinking, ‘okay, it’s just preliminary; I will work the whole night after returning from the trip.’ I went on the trip, had a fantastic weekend, came back to the city in the evening, the day before the submission. Could afford to take a rest, so immediately started working to meet the deadline. After working for a few hours, I fell asleep, and when I woke up, it was almost class time. I rushed into class, just did a few hand sketches to make the professor understand my concept. The 1st surprise bomb was that our visiting professor will join us today! Ah! My luck! I managed to make a small concept model with my friends’ help after knowing about visiting professors and a small-scale jury. After the submission and the so-called architecture jury, our professor announced it is ‘the end’ of this project; they will not spend time on this project anymore as it was a warm-up project, the 2nd surprise bomb for me! But I still do not regret going on the trip, though!
Group projects
When I was doing an urban design studio in the fourth year of architecture, it was a group project of 4 people. Every night all three of us used work, and the other one used to lay on the bed, saying, ‘guys, let’s do this, commanding us to this and that.’ After a few days, one of my group members got so worked up, and she shouted, “I am sorry, but who the hell are you, again? That you cannot come to the floor where everyone is working instead of commanding us what to do or not from the bed!” In that same semester, after finishing up the work, three of us used to go to sleep at 5 or 6 am for a short nap, and the 4th member used to have a submission for his other course. On winter nights, when you see your other group members sleeping and you alone are working on another project, how depressing is that!
Nightmares!
Crashing the computer before the final jury; the sheet has not arrived yet, but the jury has started; saving the work but still, somehow the results manage to disappear on its own are the worst that no architecture students want to face, not even in nightmares. The worst I have encountered once was a presentation I worked on the whole night, and I clearly remember saving it, but when I reopened it, nothing was there! Just 2 hours before my presentation, I couldn’t find my presentation. It was just blank!
With all the passion, depression, and frustration, architecture student life is full of these small incidents that people cherish forever. Architecture has taught us how to operate 24 hours at a stretch; given times for deadlines are never enough but still procrastinating, there should be more than 24 hours in a day! With all these whinings, when architecture students work on any project, they literally put ‘blood, sweat, and tears’ in that without any doubt!
