Field Note 02 of 22

Ramniranjan Jhunjhunwala College, Mumbai

“Calm, serene, stacked with old books — the way an educational institution is supposed to feel.”

The library was the first thing that stayed with me. Rows of old volumes, people reading quietly, the particular hush that only a good library has. It was, simply, what a place of learning is supposed to feel like — a feeling that's rarer to find than it should be.

Later, at the airport waiting to board my flight home, a message arrived from Balwinder Singh Sandhu — the former Indian cricketer, and an alumnus of the college. He thanked me for visiting, and said that had he known in advance, he would have come himself.

A small gesture. But it said something about what this institution still means to the people who passed through it, decades later — the kind of loyalty a place earns, not one it can build through announcement.

Field Note 02