Packing for Pilani
You can try, but you’ll never succeed
Most first-year students will be living away from home for the first time—so it can be a strenuous and stressful task to properly pack for Pilani. You should pack adequately enough to remain self-reliant, and not lack anything essential. Given Pilani’s remoteness from major towns and relatively inaccessible location, it would be a good idea to bring everything one needs. This helps a student avoid any major issues while they are already busy trying to settle in and get used to college life.
This guide will omit items that the Institute will make clear that a student should bring—items such as academic documents and their photocopies, passport-size photos, vaccinations, and RT-PCR certificates. While the campus has several shops and facilities, it is better for a student to bring their own items for a slightly easier time settling in.
Clothing and Footwear
The number of sets of clothes a student brings will be dependent on how frequently they intend to bathe. The hygienic student goes through ten sets of clothes every two weeks (on average), while the apathetic student goes through half as many. It is extremely important to bring winter wear (like thermals, jackets, mufflers, gloves, and sweaters) because temperatures go down to single digits post October. BITS has no dress code for classes, so it is a good idea to load up on clothes that are most comfortable to wear.
Bringing a couple of formal outfits will help if one is in certain clubs or departments, but they will come in handy only twice or thrice a semester. These can be borrowed too, but be warned of high demand and low supply during such times.
One should note that if they want clean clothes quickly (within one or two days of unuse), the best move is to wash them by hand. The other two options are the Laundromat service (a consistent but more expensive option) and the dhobi (cheaper but slightly more unpredictable). Each hostel wing has its own dhobi who usually comes by twice a week. Both options usually take three days.
As for footwear, a pair of shoes will be needed for lab sessions, and hopefully match with formal clothes when the occasion arises. A pair of slippers or sandals will be handy (or footy) for the quick run to a nearby redi or other events of similar importance.
Sportswear and Equipment
You never know when you may get peer-pressured by your wing into picking up a basketball and showing up at the Gym-G. Having a pair of running shoes can be useful. One may choose to bring these in lieu of other closed footwear (as mentioned earlier), but using the same pair of shoes for sports and classes may lead to accelerated wear and tear.
If one plays a particular sport or is interested in joining one of the Institute’s sports teams, it is advised to bring any special gear from home like goalkeeping gloves, football shoes, and tennis and squash racquets. There are facilities for a vast range of sports, and most sports (like pool) have equipment in situ. Basketball, football, volleyball, and other sports played at Gym-G have their equipment in the Gym-G room. A student is welcome to use those within the grounds or bring them to the hostel for a game in the QT, but signing out equipment is mandatory in either case. The general store, Akshay, offers a limited amount of sports equipment—racquets and balls for a few sports, cricket bats, and badminton shuttlecocks, for example.
Hostel Room and Toiletries
Almost all items in this section can be bought at Akshay, so for those running low on storage space, it is advised to omit some items.
Each hostel room is endowed with (per person) a cot, table, chair, board, shelves, and almirah. Bringing a mattress and pillows is not advised (especially if travel to campus is lengthy). These can be procured from Akshay or C’Not. Bringing one’s own pillowcases and blankets is fine. It is imperative to bring an extra-thick blanket (quilt or razai) for the winter. Bringing curtains is also good unless one is distressingly unconcerned about privacy. Speaking of which, bringing a couple of locks goes a long way. All these items are available at Akshay and C’Not. For room maintenance, brooms and dustbins can be bought here—it is better to do so. For the occasional foray into the bathroom, buckets, soap dishes, and mugs are available on campus.
It is a very good idea to bring a first-aid kit (like band-aids, antiseptics, cotton, and gauze) and basic medicines like cough syrup, pills for cold and fever, antacids, and inhalers. The Institute does have a pharmacy, but it is useful to have the bare essentials by one’s bedside. On a related note, mosquito- and bug-repellent sprays and ointments are also good to have.
The general checklist for toiletries is something along the lines of toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, detergent, sanitiser, deodorant, and shaving kit, with add-ons like hair oil, face wash, nail cutter, and moisturisers for those more concerned about their general welfare. Any personalised medications or toiletries (for the brand-conscious) should be brought to campus.
Electronic Items
It is a practical necessity to have a phone, laptop, and a litany of chargers. Apart from keeping in contact with the outside world, laptops are useful for studies, with most textbooks available in PDF format, and common courses like Engineering Graphics requiring adequate practice. Bringing a Kindle for academic purposes or an iPad to take notes in class may be rather extravagant (and subject to the professor’s tolerance).
It is recommended to bring an extension cord. These are highly useful for doing group projects in the same room, playing video games, and other activities that entail multiple devices in the same room. It is worth noting that boys’ hostel rooms (except Bhagirath Bhawan) have two sockets for each resident, while girls’ and Bhagirath rooms have one each.
Other items that may be useful are flash drives, LAN cables, power banks, torches, and table lamps. Some of these may be available at Akshay, but the quality may be an issue. It is safer to bring these from home.
Classroom Requirements
Most items in this section can be bought on campus. Some items in this section can be bought only on campus. But if one already has them, they might as well bring them.
Textbooks are not a necessity, but are still highly recommended to have. The PDF versions of most of them (if not all) should be available. If not, checking one’s mail (or asking friends) is a simple solution. These may, however, be illegal to use. Additionally, they are not permissible for open-book evaluative components.
For physical copies, a student can approach one of the book vendors in Pilani—the main ones being Ashu Book House and Roongta Book Store. They usually set up stalls on campus (near Vishwakarma and Bhagirath Bhawans) for up to a month after freshmen start arriving on campus. A much easier and cheaper alternative is finding a senior willing to sell their first-year textbooks. The campus has a culture of batches buying from their seniors and selling to their juniors—and prospective juniors also benefit from the notes and previous years’ papers occasionally attached.
Notebooks and stationery of all kinds are available on campus. So are calculators, which are absolutely essential to have. Attending an evaluation without it may be considered an attempt at failing the course. Bags can be bought here, but the quality-conscious may prefer to bring their own. The latter is a preferable option.
Miscellaneous
- Some courses may mandate a lab coat for their laboratory or practical sessions. . Lab coats can be bought on campus.
- Having an umbrella is strongly recommended because rains here are unpredictable, and have happened at all times of the year.
- For those wearing spectacles, a spare pair is advisable. Finding an optometrist nearby and having a new pair made as per one’s prescription is very hard in Pilani. It is much better to have that done before coming to campus.
- Having a watch (analogue or digital) helps immensely in keeping track of time during exams. Smart watches are not allowed in examination halls.
- A set of utensils can save the day at the oddest times.
- While the vast majority of people on campus regard face masks as a thing of the past, it never hurts to keep a few handy, especially if one plans on leaving campus every so often.
Important Notes
- For students wondering about the items available at Akshay—it is basically a department store/supermarket that caters to the needs of all the students and residents of the campus. A general rule of thumb is that if the average household requires an item at least occasionally, Akshay will cover that. This also holds true for C’Not and general stores outside campus.
- It will be of comfort to know that online retail services like Amazon and Flipkart deliver to the campus at speeds comparable to those in metropolitan cities. Students can resort to these to get things forgotten, unavailable on campus, or time-consuming to obtain.
- At every step of the packing process, it is good to see if the luggage being taken is acceptable for the mode of travel being used. Bringing inflammable chemicals is fine on a train, but scissors in in-hand luggage will result in an extra check by airport security.
Godspeed, freshmen. Enjoy your time on campus—there is much to see and do—and pray that you find the mess food palatable, the classes tolerable, and the bathrooms flushed.