Your first year of university comes with a lot of stress and awkward moments. Join our hosts Dalal, Joshua, Pooja and James as they spill the tea on their first year fails and expose themselves to you! If you are looking for inspiring stories, advice for Gen Z and hot takes then this podcast is the one!
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Dalal: [00:00:04] Hey, everyone, and welcome to the first episode of Tea with GenZ, the podcast where we discuss the latest topics by you and for you. I'm your host, Dalal, and welcome to today's episode. I'm so, so excited that you guys are joining us today for our first episode. We're going to be talking about some juicy stories and discussing our first year failures. So buckle up because we are about to expose ourselves. Joining me today, we have James Pooja and Joshua. Hey, guys,
James: [00:00:30] Welcome to the first episode, everybody. How cool is this?
Pooja: [0:00:35] Hey, guys, I can't wait to begin this journey with all of you. I'm so happy to be here today.
Joshua: [00:00:40] What's up, guys, super pumped for today's episode, can't wait to expose ourselves.
Dalal: [00:00:46] Welcome. Welcome, everyone. Honestly, I cannot believe the twenty twenty one is almost over. Isn't that crazy? Like, where has the time gone? The last time I was on campus, it was twenty nineteen, which is crazy to me because it's about to be twenty twenty two.
Joshua: [00:00:59] My God.
Dalal: [00:01:00] What do you guys miss most about us. I know there's a lot of things that I personally miss, but I'm curious to know what you guys are missing.
James: [00:01:07] I miss the hustle and bustle of the student center, believe it or not, like I miss just the chaos of the student center. The headache. Yes. I was annoyed with, like, all the loud screaming stuff bumping into people you don't know. But now that's something I miss a lot.
Dalal: [00:01:22] And the random music that's always playing in the background and you never know where it's coming from.
James: [00:01:25] Exactly.
Dalal: [00:01:26] This part of the experience
Pooja: [00:01:29] For me and my life revolves around food. So I totally miss the lotus cheesecake that we had in Breakpoint. The Uni-life the campus life its just the food for me. It's not even about the classes
Dalal: [00:01:41] And Dunkin Donuts. You cannot forget about them.
Pooja: [00:01:43] You know the coffee. That's delicious. I'm such a coffee person
Dalal: [00:01:48] With Dunkin Donuts was just always there for you. When you're starving between classes, it's just like this light at the end of the tunnel and then Dunkin Donuts there. It's like an Angel
James: [00:01:58] The one true love
Dalal: [00:02:00] Dunkin Donuts. But I feel bad for Joshua. Joshua hasn't been on campus like he can't relate to any of these things.
Joshua: [00:02:06] Man, it's so sad. I really want to go on campus and experience all this and everyone's daily stories of what they've done and what they've seen, what they've eaten. And I'm like, oh, one day, one day.
Dalal: [00:02:18] One day. But at least you can avoid the embarrassment that most of us went through on our first year, because honestly, these stories are just so bad. You're lucky you didn't have any of these things happen to you.
Joshua: [00:02:26] You know, I had a really embarrassing story in my first year, online. To be honest, it was one of the craziest things. So, I was sitting for a midterm and this particular professor wanted us to keep our cameras inside you so that she could see everything on our table and see if we were looking at our phone or looking at books to see if we were cheating or not. So I did that. I set it up very nicely and I'm like ready for the exam and everything and doing the exam. I'm just writing and I'm like, what's happening? I don't know any of this. I'm so scared what's going to happen. I got to feel. And the door of my room opens and my dad comes in and now this. There's something on the floor. There's something I don't know what's on the floor. And my dad doesn't see it. He's just walking in the coming in. He trips on whatever was there,
James: [00:03:22] No
Joshua: [00:03:23] Photo to the camera and breaks the camera.
Dalal:[00:03:29] What we break the camera like full on
Joshua: [00:03:31] Break for lunch breaks it men, and this is in the
James: [00:03:33] Middle of an exam.
Joshua [00:03:35] Yeah, there was an hour left and I was just I was just freaking out. The doctor is just freaking out because there's a camera and they're like, we're going to report you to your professor that there's no more camera view and everything. I was like, oh, my God. And then I'm just writing an email. I'm like, my dad found the camera, the compass broken everything. And the professor was pretty understanding. She was like, OK, I'll give you a make up exam. Right. And she she didn't think of it as an excuse. She actually understood. And the funniest part is I wrote the make up exam. And I still feel it. Oh, no, Josh.
Dalal: [00:04:12] So that's what you get for not studying. That's what you get for not studying your case.
Joshua: [00:04:17] Please study four ways.
Dalal: [00:04:19] But wait, wait, wait. So you're telling me you did this on lockdown on browser, right? Yep. So somewhere out there, there's a recording of your dad slipping, falling and breaking the camera.
Joshua: [00:04:30] I don't know. It's just the camera
Dalal: [00:04:32] There has been there. I would pay money to watch that. Please go to the professor, try to find out anything.
Joshua: [00:04:39] I'm going to I don't know what I'm going to do if I find that I could imagine
Dalal: [00:04:43] The look of horror on Joshua's face. I'm so sorry that happened to you. But it's funny.
James: [00:04:53] I mean, that's the thing, Josh, when they say anything can happen online, literally anything can happen online. I don't want to kind of say that I can top your story, but I'm going to try now.
Dalal: [00:05:04] There's no way. There's no choice.
James: [00:05:07] But I guess we'll see. We'll see. I've had, like, a crazy, embarrassing first year story that happened online as well. So this is around my second semester. We transitioned online and we're taking classes on blackboard. And I mean, you guys know how it goes with online classes. Sometimes in the middle of things, you kind of want to prepare for other things. And I mean, that's where the story starts. I had this big presentation coming up and I wanted to crush it. I figured I might as well practice right now. What I did was I viewed the class and I started rehearsing my speech. I did several takes to speed the tone. I was like, good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Good morning. Good morning. And it was actually a mess, like an absolute mess.
Dalal: [00:06:00] My only competition for the class
James:[00:06:02] And was for the class. Yeah. But I was still messing up even the practice takes my only consolation was that, like during this whole time I knew I was practicing in private, like little did I know my microphone was on the entire time.
Joshua: [00:06:20] I could
Dalal: [00:06:21] Hear
Pooja: [00:06:22] The twist.
James: [00:06:23] Exactly. And like, here's the worst part to my professor. Probably kept telling me to turn my mic off like the cure them because I had the muted little hello.
Pooja: [00:06:35] If you do that
James: [00:06:37] So bad and I think it's my classmates started texting me like, yo, your mike is on. And I was like like after realizing this, I literally was like flushed red. I was so embarrassed and like, I swear at that time I wanted to drop the course and just hide away forever.
Dalal: [00:06:55] I don't blame you. I would've done the same thing. Let's see with these stories like you are probably the only one who really remembers that were your close friends just to annoy you, they remember that story as like an embarrassing moment. But I can guarantee that the professor probably doesn't remember that or any of the classmates, because, like you mentioned, that was the semester where we transitioned from on campus online. So everyone was kind of like finding their way through Blackbaud and online classes. And I think there was a lot of room for error.
James: [00:07:21] Yeah, I mean, that's the thing, too. Like, my professor was super sweet about it. Like they didn't bring it up and they just pretended like they heard my speech for the first time. But that's the thing. I mean, you mentioned we were transitioning online, so it's a bit of like a room for forgiveness. But I'm curious, do you guys have stories of, like, embarrassing failures on campus?
Dalal: [00:07:44] Yeah, I mean, my first year, my second semester, I, I had this, like, weird thing with this one professor where he would always comment on the things I would wear and it was not like I was trying to do something intentionally to get anyone's attention. It was just like a weird coincidence. So I wear glasses. If you guys don't know what I look like, I, I, my glasses wear and on campus when I was going, one of the things I struggled with was going between classes and between buildings. There was a lot of sunlight. So I had to keep taking off my sunglasses and switching with my glasses on global and I was such a hassle. So I got one of those cool glasses, the transition under the sunlight and become sunglasses. They go back to normal when you're inside,
James: [00:08:27] Like, super cool.
Dalal: [00:08:28] Coolest thing. Yeah, it's so cool. Yeah, I thought it was so cool. Like does anyone else wear these. Is it just me.
Pooja: [00:08:34] Like it's all but like my high school was my dream. Like I always wanted that. Never got it to me. Yes.
Dalal: [00:08:40] It's such a cool thing. Like I thought it was amazing. So I got one of them thinking I was like the coolest kid on the block. And it was the first day I was wearing them. The first week of the semester, I pull up to the class, sit down. And for some reason, my glasses are not shifting back to regular glasses. They're things like fully blacked out and sitting there panicking in my chair, knowing that the professor is going to walk in and say something about it. And I'm just trying to play it cool, like I'm thinking about should I take my glasses off and pretend I can't see the board or like, what do I do? So he walks in and he's just like that. Can you, like, take off your sunglasses? Like, that's not really appropriate. Like, look, you're going to. I don't know what to tell him. I'm like, should I just lie? Should I leave the conception I run away.
James: [00:09:25] I mean, here's the thing. The law like I can imagine your professor just seeing you there with, like, shades on and like, I don't know, I'm picturing you would like one foot on the desk and, like, too cool for school. That sounds funny.
Dalal: [00:09:37] If you saw me like that, then cool, but I honestly was not going for that kind of look, I'm a nerd. I would not do that kind of thing. I was like the teacher's pet. I was sitting in the first row. But to make it worse, the week after I had an unfortunate accident where I broke my toe, which is the most random bone in your body that you could possibly break. And it's just so embarrassing. It's just so embarrassing to say, yeah, my toes look so weird. You know, you get a lot of unwanted attention. So I had an unfortunate accident where I broke my toe and I was really embarrassed about it. But unfortunately, none of my shoes would fit. And this was on a Saturday night really late. And I had university early the next morning, so I didn't have enough time to go out and buy something to wear. And the only thing I had were these really embarrassing slides with like a lot of bling on them. And they were so like tacky and very attention grabbing, like you could see them from a mile away. But that was the only thing that could fit me. So I was like, you know what? That's my only choice. Either I show up to university barefoot or I go with these. So I went with them and I just played it really cool, like acted like nothing happened. I went to the class really early, so I would avoid seeing the professor like making a scene, walking in. And I kind of like put my bag right in front of my my feet so my toe wouldn't show. But I swear this this professor had like X-ray vision or something like because he immediately spotted my feet, the secretary walked and it was like, what are these flies like? Everyone started making fun of them and I was just so embarrassed by it. But the next day then my friends all started wearing them to try to comfort me and make me feel less lonely about it.
Pooja: [00:11:11] And that was a lot of fun.
Dalal: [00:11:14] Yeah. I mean, I started to trend slowly. Everyone started wearing sleights to university. And I just I just like to believe that that was my doing,
Dalal: [00:11:26] I mean, you guys can follow me on Instagram for more fashion tips. You know, a blogger
James: [00:11:31] Is like hardcore shameless plug.
Dalal: [00:11:32] You use my discount code that for to get 20 percent off anywhere you want to buy slide's. Everyone knows why I'm so.
Pooja: [00:11:40] Oh, my God, this just gives me so much memories, my embarrassment, I feel like it was over a long period of time, it was on a weekend and US had planned like a trip. And I was so excited for it. We just transitioned from high school and I was like, oh, my God, school never took me anywhere. I'm still going to make full use of university trips. Little did I know would Hatsune, but whatever. So then we booked like the slot on the bus and me and my friend, we were just so excited for it. My friend picked me up and we reached there when we got off the car. Guess what we saw.
Dalal: [00:12:18] Don't tell me I left exactly of.
Pooja: [00:12:23] We reached the library roundabout and as we reached there, the bus left.
Dalal: [00:12:28] Did you run after it?
Pooja: [00:12:30] No. Oh, my God. That's the funniest part. I didn't even realize that the bus that left was my was there were two buses. One was for the exchange students trip and one was for like the regular A. And I was just so clueless and everyone was standing there, so we didn't even think that it was our bus. After some time we're like, you know what? This bus is still here. That's just there's one bus here. So let's get some food. I run back to the student center. The food outlets have closed and I come back again and they exchange students. Bus is still there. Now our bus comes back, OK? And guess what? We don't get on it again. Like, OK,
James: [00:13:12] So you guys, the second time again.
Pooja: [00:13:15] Exactly. It was like it was like fate was like telling me, get on the bus. The bus even came back, you know, but we were just like we asked a friend of ours and they were like, oh no, I think that's for the exchange students. So we didn't get on that bus off the bus left. We went to the other bus driver and I think we just gave off like Forestier wipes. Like everyone there was so sophisticated and we looked so nervous and out of place. He just knew that we were international students. It was like children. This bus is not for you. And it was so embarrassing because he was also like, oh, my God, what are you all doing here? And it was so, you know, you feel like such a baby.
James: [00:13:57] So what did you do now after that?
Pooja: [00:14:00] We just went to like me and my friend, both were like, so embarrassed. We just went to student center. We just sat down to help them out and ranted about it for some time and then just left for Volle. And oh, my siblings were like, oh, my God. It was it was so much. And what is the point? But did you
Dalal: [00:14:21] Did you pay for the trip? No, I took it. Thank God.
Pooja: [00:14:25] Thank God I did pay. I would have just been like, no, that is like a nightmare. That would have been a nightmare.
James: [00:14:32] That is an official first year fail.
Dalal: [00:14:35] Yeah, I agree that
Pooja: [00:14:37] It's a failure. And like we were so close. I mean, but that's a thing.
James: [00:14:42] We all have had moments where we've had embarrassing situations happen or we failed a certain task. And that's natural. That's normal. Like ask first year students, come and join us at us. They're going to face the same thing as well. I'm just curious, what advice do you have for students like that who might be panicking in the moment and think like it's the end of the world?
Pooja: [00:15:04] So I feel like even though everything that happened on that day was embarrassing, it was between the two of us, it was between me and my friend. And we remember it as like a really funny memory that if I just call her up now and we talk about that, it's going to be so hilarious. I think at the end of the day, like you need every feeling in your brain. So if this happened is of this anger or sadness, you also need embarrassment. And that's something that you can push away from. So don't want to get embarrassed. But after some time, you look back upon it as like a fond memory.
Dalal: [00:15:37] Exactly. I agree with you. I think these situations are inevitable. And as the first year, students are always panicking, like try to avoid them, but just let it happen, you know, let your embarrassing moments flow out. And if you're like me, super clumsy, because I know I
James: [00:15:51] Am super relate to that.
Dalal: [00:15:53] And I mean, it's just how I am. And if these things happen, you just got to own up to them and laugh with the people rather than let them laugh at you. And looking back at it now, it's one of my favorite memories. And any time I see someone wearing size, I just start laughing and I'm like, you know, like I remember when I did that. So I just remember that nobody's perfect. Like Hannah Montana said, nobody's perfect.
James [00:16:15] Yeah. I mean, that's the thing to love. I feel like oftentimes when you're new to university, you have this big picture of like the perfect college experience that sometimes when something doesn't go as planned, you kind of freak out like, oh, no, things are going wrong. But the truth is, like you mentioned, these things, color or experience, they add kind of spice to things. And honestly, I've bonded with a lot of close friends over embarrassing stories. So it really does have a positive effect long term.
Joshua: [00:16:46] You guys make your mistakes, mess up, do whatever you can in your first year. It's a learning experience at the end of the day. And when you look back at it in your next few years, you're going to think, oh, I did such a dumb thing back then. Right? And you're just going to laugh at it with your friends. And it's just going to be an amazing memory for you guys. That brings us to the end of our episode.
Dalal: [00:17:08] And we hope everybody enjoyed listening to our embarrassing moments for your entertainment. You can tune in for episodes for more of these stories, because I can guarantee you there's definitely going to be a lot more. And like our twins pop icon once said, everybody makes mistakes. Cue the Hannah Montana music.