Week-44 here refers to the week of February 16, 2026 to February 22, 2026. This week, which ideally should have been dominated by conversations around the arrival of the next PGPX batch, was instead taken over, quite gloriously, by the surprise visit of my best friend to campus. While he spent a generous portion of his time roasting me and ensuring my self-esteem stayed appropriately grounded, his presence felt like a throwback to a decade of shared chaos, growth, and unwavering friendship.

In between the mockery and the nostalgia, we revisited the highs and lows we have witnessed in each other’s lives, the versions of ourselves we have outgrown, and the ones we are still becoming. Ten years of friendship is no small milestone, and my joy knew no bounds the moment I saw him standing outside my dorm room on a random Friday evening, as if the past decade had quietly folded itself into that one unexpected, perfect instant. To meet one of the constants of your life in a place you once only dared to dream about, in a setting you had long imagined but never quite believed would come true, is a moment no one can really plan for, and one very few are lucky enough to experience.

Tuesday brought with it the official photoshoot for the Placement Committee, alongside the Placement Chair of IIM Ahmedabad. For a year defined by restless nights, endless CV iterations, anxious waits for shortlists, and the occasional radio silence from company HRs, this photoshoot felt symbolic; it marked the beginning of the end of a chapter that had demanded everything from us. Those four days in November 2025, along with the weeks that surrounded them, were never just about numbers, recruiters, or final outcomes. They were about the unseen hours of coordination, the last-minute crises, the difficult calls, and the quiet determination to hold things together when everything felt like it could fall apart.

Placements were never meant to be reduced to figures on a report or logos on a slide. What truly defined the experience was the time spent together: the shared jokes in the middle of chaos, the late-night rants, the collective frustration, and the small wins that felt larger because we experienced them as a team. More than any photograph could capture, it is that camaraderie, the grit, the trust, and the bond forged under pressure, that I will carry with me long after PGPX ends.

Wednesday was an outing of a completely different flavour. We attended the T20 World Cup clash between India and the Netherlands, and somewhere along the way, I realised I have attended more live cricket matches this year than I had in the previous 28 years of my existence combined. And both times, the experience has surpassed anything I could have imagined. There is something almost cinematic about walking into a stadium draped in blue, feeling the collective anticipation of thousands, and then watching it erupt with every boundary and wicket.

India sailed through to a comfortable victory, as expected. But what stood out was the spirit of the Netherlands: a team from a nation not traditionally defined by cricket, yet playing with grit, discipline, and flashes of brilliance. For a country like India, where cricket runs through veins and arteries alike, the win may have felt routine. But for the Netherlands, every run scored and every breakthrough achieved carried a different weight. It was a reminder that sport, at its best, is not just about dominance, but about heart, courage, and showing up on the biggest stage regardless of the odds.

Friday brought along 110 eager faces from the incoming PGPX batch onto campus, and as we, the X20s, watched them walk through the red-bricked corridors, it felt like looking into a mirror from a year ago. The same wide-eyed curiosity. The same nervous excitement. The same quiet confidence masking an even quieter anxiety. To step into these hallowed red bricks for the first time is no small moment. We could almost predict what lay ahead for them: crying over quizzes where you somehow manage to score just one mark above the lowest, complaining about the hundred assignments that were due yesterday, swearing you would sleep early tonight, only to find yourself at Bhavesh Bhai’s at 3 AM with chai in hand and existential dread in your eyes.

From polished corporate hotshots to self-declared fools (a very specific PGPX reference), every single one of them stands at the beginning of a transformation they cannot yet fully comprehend. The journey that feels overwhelming at first will slowly become routine, then unforgettable, and eventually, nostalgic. Watching them, the distance between who we were and who we are now felt both immense and negligible. It seems like yesterday that we were in their shoes, and yet, somewhere along the sleepless nights, relentless deadlines, placement chaos, friendships, fights, and laughter, we changed. The beginning of that transformation now feels both far away and startlingly close, like a memory you can almost touch, but not quite relive.

We found the X21s asking almost the exact same questions we once had, and almost instinctively, we responded in the very same manner our seniors had responded to us. Back then, when we were in their seats, those answers had left us slightly uneasy and far more unsatisfied than we cared to admit. They felt too broad, too cautious, not nearly as specific or prescriptive as we wanted them to be. We were looking for clarity, for certainty, for a neat roadmap to navigate the year ahead.

But now that we stand on the other side of the table, it all makes sense. Every measured response. Every thoughtful pause.Every reluctance to offer a definitive answer. We now understand that some experiences cannot be explained in bullet points. Some lessons cannot be handed over neatly packaged. The journey is too personal, too layered, too unpredictable to be reduced to a crisp, actionable takeaway. What once felt like incomplete answers now feels like wisdom restrained by experience. And in that shift, from impatience to understanding, we perhaps see the clearest evidence of how far we have come.

But the biggest and most pleasant surprise of the week was the arrival of my best friend of ten years. It may sound like a child is narrating this part of the blog, but the sheer joy I felt over those three days easily rivaled some of my best moments at PGPX. There is something deeply grounding about seeing someone who has known you long before the degrees, the titles, the LinkedIn updates, and the polished elevator pitches. The trio of my best friend, myself, and my special friend (oh, really?!) practically took over the city. We checked off every tourist spot that Google insisted was a must-visit and dutifully sampled every chic restaurant that Zomato and Swiggy ranked above 4.5 stars. Between laughter, nostalgia, and inside jokes that needed no context, the city felt smaller and far more personal.

I must have given him at least three separate tours of my second home, this campus, walking him through the red-bricked corridors, the Louis Kahn Plaza, my dorm, the classrooms, the mess, and every little corner that had silently shaped my year. And I did it with the kind of pride only a child has while showing off his most prized possession. Because in many ways, that is exactly what this place has been for me: a dream I once spoke about casually, now standing solid and real, witnessed by someone who has seen every version of me along the way.

And as his departure was scheduled for the quiet, almost unfair hours of Monday morning, the familiar ache returned, the awareness that my own time on this campus is running out. Watching someone from my past walk through a place that has defined my present only sharpened that realization. The days no longer feel infinite; they feel numbered. For a dream that began years ago, half ambition, half fantasy, to now be this close to completion feels almost like a trick of time. How can something you chased for so long slip through your fingers so quickly?

If given the choice, I would gladly sign up to relive the PGPX experience all over again: for the people who became family, for the quiet prestige of these red bricks, for the madness of placements, and for the intellectual rigor that stretched every limit I thought I had. To graduate from this institution, to call myself an alum of IIM Ahmedabad, and to be counted among the many sharp, restless, ambitious minds who once walked these same corridors, it is not just a milestone. It is a privilege. A quiet, humbling privilege to belong, even for a brief moment in time, to a place so many extraordinary souls call their second home.