This is me...

25 Things To Do When You are Bored

2011-12-06T07:26:00.001-08:00

1. Put your head out the window and shout - Dogs Days Are Over.
(Make sure your neighbors HAVE a dog.)

2. Play 'who blinks first' with the LOLCat.
(Try one of those animated ones.)

3. Think.
(Well, for starters, think of what could go into this bracket.)

4. Stop thinking.
(Okay, I can't exactly put "You're such a bitch" in that bracket above, so stop.)

5. Sing 'Baby Got Back' backwards.
(Record it and use to amuse your cousin's baby.)

6. Try to touch your nose-tip with your tongue.
(A chocolate covered nose can prove to be a great source of motivation.)

7. Make baba ganoush.
(It is pretty easy.)

8. Create a blank Facebook update.
(Don't forget to 'like' it.)

9. Throw things out of your window.
(Liquidy things are the best.)

10. Take a deep breath.
(If you are still reading this, you are not breathing.)

11. Hold your breath.
(Holding your nose helps. Honest.)

12. Say "I am sexy and I know it" in as many different ways as you can.
(Lisp, babble, baby-talk, Jazz/Blues singer, like a dog... like Justin Beiber...)

13. Whine.
(No, not wine, wHine)

14. Blow kisses and thrust your pelvis at every alternate person.
(You have to be in a crowded place for this.)

15. Scream "Keel haul!"
(For best results, do it in a library.)

16. Follow your pet dog around the house.
(In short, walk in his shoes for a while.)

17. Post yourself a love letter.
(Don't forget to seal it with a kiss.)

18. Fill the bath tub but don't have a bath.
(Ha! You fooled the tub! Boo!)

19. Dig your nose.
(Press the findings in a notebook.)

20. Make a low, guttural noise looking at the clock.
(You can do the same looking at the wall, the door, or your girlfriend/boyfriend.)

21. Pretend to be Marvin from The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy.
(He is that really sad robot who is always depressed. Some of you might not have to pretend to be this though. Sorry; only 24 things for you guys then.)

22. Melt a candle to make a wax flower on the table. Spend rest of the day scrapping it off.
(If you are really, really bored, use a toothbrush to scrape the wax flower off the table.)

23. Act surprised when you look at the mirror.
(Imagine this is part of a government conspiracy to drive you mad because you are an ex-government official who knew too much.)

24. Squeeze a tube of toothpaste onto your palms. Now put the toothpaste back in the tube.
(For best results, squeeze tube from bottom and flatten as you go up.)

25. Share this blog.
(Do this even if you aren't bored.)

ON AGE, LOVE AND ELIZABETH GILBERT

2011-10-01T22:08:00.000-07:00

Seldom has it ever happened that some random quote I shared as a status on Facebook actually turned out to be true, so that when it happened today morning, I was quite bemused!

I had lend my copy of Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat Pray Love to a friend of mine, more than a year ago. She happened to return it to me yesterday. The sight of that book in my hand after all these years kind of reminded me how much I liked it. I flipped through the pages of the book, stopping at random passages... Dario and Giovanni, Richard from Texas, finally Felipe arrived, and I smiled at the sight of his name of those yellowed pages of the book. Felipe. Yes I remembered that character well.

I gave up leafing and read through the rest of the book thoroughly. One of the sentences stayed with me -

"It is only the young and stupid who are sure about sex and love. Do you think any of us know what were doing?"

It stayed with me through the book. It stayed with me through dinner. It went to bed with me. When that happens, I usually get up, grab my cell phone in the dark (as I am too lazy to actually get off the bed and turn on the lights), and update the status message on my Facebook profile with whatever it is that has so obstinately stayed with me. And that is what I did last night...

I got up in the morning to go to work today. I had forgotten about the status update (as I had spent almost an hour and half talking to my friend after that, and the conversation was playing on in my mind). But on my way to work, I happened to pass by a local college. I saw this really young couple - 11^th or 12^th grade boy and girl. I am guessing I am not the only one - but I have this uncanny knack. One look at a boy and a girl, and i immediately know if they are just friends, lovers, or siblings. I just do! So the moment I saw these guys, I knew they were a couple. The boy was really good-looking. The girl quite ordinary. They were sitting on a parked two-wheeler, and I could tell it was a spanking new one. What happened within the next few seconds was this - the guy pulled out his cell phone, took the girl's arm and wrapped it around himself and clicked a self-portrait. Just as I passed them I heard the girl say "trouble" and the guy say "but we love". The girl had gone crimson in her cheeks and was mock hitting the guy.

The sight somehow made me smile... it reminded me of a time when I was their age. I was so sure about sex and love too! Just like that guy was sure that because he loved the girl, they were permitted to click a picture together. Our equations, fundas, concepts are so clear when we are young, isn't it? I remember myself from when I was their age... I thought I knew what love is, what marriage is, what a relationship is, what I want my guy to be; in fact, I didn't think I knew, I knew that I knew! I was so sure!

But you grow up, and all hell breaks loose. This whole thing we call 'experience' - it doesn't always do you good, does it? I don't think so. I mean, what good have a couple of heartbreaks done to me? Yeah, you will say "They have made you stronger", and all that bull. But what good is it to become as strong as a stone?

Sometimes it becomes difficult to keep faith. It becomes difficult to wait. Sometimes all you want is for time to freeze, so that you don't race into another heartbreak, so that you don't collide head-on into another disillusionment. And it need not necessarily be a happy time you want to freeze. Sometimes you are content with it just being neutral. Just no more 'happenings'... that's all. Is that too much to ask?

In the end the filter should be in our hands - which experiences we want to keep with us and take with us to the grave, and which ones we want to pass as 'bad teachers'... after all not every teacher we meet in life is a good one, for there sure is a great deal of difference between a knowledgeable person and a good teacher! Filter. That's all.

ON BELONGING

2011-06-17T10:17:00.000-07:00

Have you ever wished to be invisible? Be forgotten? Wished like nobody knew you? Like you could just sink into oblivion… not be a part of anything… or just exist, just 'be' without having to be a part of anything? Sometimes everything about the world, the world around you, your world, seems so fake… fake smiles, fake laughs… fake worries, tensions… it’s like having two people live inside of you, each with their own mind. One seeks to rise above everything and everyone; while the other aches to be ordinary, if only to not be alone. Sometimes you wish you had the same set of problems people your age have – low grades, bullies at school, subjects you don’t like, a crush way out of your league, low salary, low self-esteem… anything must be better than to feel like you were born in the wrong era… the wrong society, the wrong culture… or worse still the wrong family... Radical differences between your intellect and that of people around you can make you feel like an outcast in a really powerful and crazy way.

And then an endless search begins – for that one person who would at least understand you, if not accept you and/or be with you. You look for that one person who you hope will know what it is to feel the way you do… Have you ever been in the company of all your favorite people and still found it difficult to keep up with what was being discussed or talked about? You kind of get up from your chair, take a few steps back and look at yourself, sitting in the company of those strangers. You – or whatever it is you want to call it; your mind, your soul, your heart, the “real” you – just look at your expressionless face, blank eyes, and there is nothing you can do but laugh at the sight and nod your head in a “poor guy/girl” way! And then suddenly a loud cheer, a pat on the back, and you snap out of it, and “you” shoots back to its place in the body – the head, or the heart perhaps. I have even felt the jolt of “me” returning to my body sometimes... actually, physically felt it…

And these few fractions-of-a-second of a possible out-of-body experience are enough to question the purpose of a life, or its mere existence even…

And after you have exhausted yourself and the ATP molecules in your brain cells, comes the final question – does he/she or do they feel like I do? Does it bother him/her/them as much as it bothers me? You gather the nerve to finally ask your bestest among your best friends – “gather the nerve” not because you are afraid of being made fun of, but for the fear of discovering that even your bestest of the best friends is not on the same plane as you are. You call him/her up, call him/her over, make a cup of coffee, sit down, start a conversation and build up to your question… but even as you are just about to touch upon the topic, you are hit stark in the face by a sudden realization – either that your friend has his/her own set of problems they are worried about... a guy/girl they know they can never have, a promotion that seems to forever elude them; problems that are very common, very “routine”; problems that you never had and probably (or luckily) will never have... but problems that you would happily exchange yours for… or you suddenly realize, like a brainwave, the utter and complete pointlessness of the whole thing.

With time it even becomes difficult to have a simple conversation with someone – because you are fatigued of feeling detached, disconnected. Then you hear the buzz around you whenever you go out and into the company of people you know – “oh he/she has changed so much; we had so much in common before, so much to talk about; now we hardly talk; not for months together even” kind of things. Its nobody’s fault really. In fact, it is not a mistake to begin with. It’s just a difference – a huge one, so to say… like a dog that can see colour, or a musician who is deaf… after a while you just tend to retrieve into yourself and prefer to be in your own company... if nothing else then to avoid conflicts.

But that search for that one person always continues… not always conscious… not always conspicuous… but always there, nonetheless… and it is the same with a good film, good music, a good book, or your favorite hangout… the feeling that YOU BELONG…

DIARY OF A SLUTTY GIRL

2011-06-12T09:18:00.000-07:00

So I wake up in the morning after a good night’s sleep and brush my teeth and come into the drawing room, and I am greeted by a grumpy Dad who is behaving rather touchy today, asking Mom to run the mixer-grinder at a lower volume… guess that late night movie he stayed up for didn’t turn out to be that good after all, or he just got off the wrong side of the bed. It is Sunday and I am eager to lay my hands on the Times Life supplement of The Times Of India (TOI) – not that it is very great or whatever; it is the only day I have time to while away on the morning coffee, and being uninterested in politics and in ‘reading’ sports leaves very little to be read in newspapers.

I go through the articles I usually read – God & I featured Madhur Bhandarkar today… I do quite like the guy, or maybe I should say I DID quite like the guy till I lay eyes on his picture that was printed with the article. You know how sometimes a single picture can speak a thousand words? This one spoke chapters to me – and very weird ones, if I may say so!

Then I came upon this article called “The Faster Sex!” that talked about how women move on and into a new relationship faster than men do, post a break-up… nothing new again, if I may say so!

After that I saw this column called “Diary of a Single Girl” and made a mental note to come back to it in the end.

I turned to the last page and came upon my favourite little feature of the supplement – Book Shelf. Being a voracious reader, I am always interested in and on the lookout for new books to read. Book Shelf is a nice way to find out who’s reading what – as I do not have too many friends who are into reading; sigh.

Today Book Shelf featured Chetan Bhagat, and the article carried along with it a picture of Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart; and I knew I was going to regret reading it! Here’s what he said –

Current read: At the moment I am not reading anything as I am busy writing my next book and don’t want to get influenced. (Right; as if books/moves you have read/seen so far haven’t/won’t influence what you have written/are writing. Old tosh. And seriously, we asked you your current read, not how you go about writing a new book or whatever. He could have just simply said the next sentence without “accidentally” mentioning this little piece of information!) My last read was the Twilight series, as I wanted to know what attracted millions to it. (Really? That’s why you read the Twilight series? Seriously? Swear by your writing talent (!)? I am going to go read the book he is currently writing once it’s out and then decide whether or not to believe in these two statements.)

Number 1: You want to tell the world you are writing a new book, have someone interview you, or hold a press conference if you must; but please do not mention it while answering “current read”! It’s just… eeeeeeewww.

Number 2: You read the Twilight series and enjoyed it, fine. No one’s gonna hang you by the neck for saying that. But saying you read it because you wanted to find out what attracted millions to it is utter gibberish, and totally uncool.

Needless to say I did not move on to Chetan Bhagat’s all-time favourites.

I was almost about to toss the supplement away when I remembered marking that article – Diary of a Single Girl. I turned back to the article and settled down to read it.

And by the end of it, I was looking for a carry bag to puke.

Literally.

Lemme tell you why.

I have been writing since grade seven, and I have been actively blogging since 2007; and someday I aspire to make my mark in the literary world. And I think the best job for me would be that of a columnist. As I see it being a columnist, for me, means getting to write about what you want to write about, getting a readership for your writing, and opening up an interactive forum where writer and reader both make the column a success. It truly is my dream job.

And here is this… this whatever… who has a column and is using it – correction: wasting it – to describe her slutty escapades, and how she is young, and has an active sex life, with complications such as her beau having an incredibly sexy Armani clad younger brother who found her the prettiest girl in the room, and how she was attracted to him as well, how she doesn’t want to mix up with her beau’s friends but rather wants to spend time with her own friends, how her beau has friends who bring scantily-clad girls to parties, how these girls are all over every guy in the room, including the writer’s (Oh how I hate to call her a “writer”!) beau, and how this makes her jealous, and how she hates silicon but doesn’t mind boasting about her natural twins (though I seriously doubt the part about them being “natural”; and like silicon is slutty but saying you have Greek goddess boobs isn’t; I’m not kidding, you can read the article, those are her actual words!)… and then the article ends with a part of her wishing she meets her beau’s younger brother again, and another part of her wishing they never cross paths again.

Seriously – Diary of a Single Girl?

Single?

Girl?

Is this what signifies or represents the lives of Single Girls?

I was shocked TOI ever approved the concept of such a column being published in Times Life – like we don’t have enough people obsessed about Sex and the City or Desperate Housewives already? Not that I really like TOI or whatever, I am pretty neutral towards newspapers. But seriously!

It is shocking and disgusting what is becoming of the literary scene these days… few self-proclaimed, fresh and young writers are spoiling the name of some truly fresh and young writers out there; maybe some who are yet to be discovered even!

Apparently the column comes with no email-id of the “writer” (cringe!) or any detail where you can mail feedback. But honestly, would you even want to try and give feedback to a newspaper who had agreed to print/publish anything like that in the first place? Really, do the editors even read the article before publishing it?

Being single, being on your own has got so much more to it than what the article talks about! The article is just so utterly distasteful. It makes me feel guilty of being single myself!

I think people just do not understand the responsibility and the opportunity they have sometimes – this girl has a column to herself; and a BIG column too. Does she even realise what it means to have that kind of a platform, a voice, especially in a world that is so over-crowded that people can’t even hear each other talk? Does she realise what it means to have that kind of power to really make a difference? I always get to listen to grown-ups/elders say how our generation is becoming all promiscuous and disgraceful – so who is sitting in the TOI office, a bunch of teenagers?

The single biggest problem of today is “dogma” – in the words of a dear friend of mine. This whole chalta-hai attitude that everybody seems to succumb to these days is just plain and simple repulsive, and encounters with people with such an attitude even more so. And by everybody I mean “everybody” – from students, youngsters and teenagers, to teachers, employers and all sorts of pseudo responsible grown-ups; from “us” to “them”, irrespective of whichever side of the line you are standing on.

I do not know for how many more weeks am I going to have to endure that column – not that I will be reading it every time its published; but the mere sight of it is going to ache, I know it for a fact. But this is something that should be given a serious thought. I wouldn’t even go and try to comment or utter a single word of the girl who wrote that column – for it is despicable. But if that is what it means to be single – going around acting slutty – if that is what being single has come down to, I would very gladly like to declare:

I am single, and I am not a slut.

FRIENDS

2011-05-01T01:23:00.001-07:00

Being in a city you hardly know – or one where hardly anyone knows you – can give you the kind of freedom where you can do things as simple as taking a walk with a guy at half past eleven in the night. It’s not like you are doing something rather blasphemous, neither is it that you are acting careless or being impulsive. But somehow you wouldn’t do that in your hometown.

On a particularly starry night, Falon was walking down an almost deserted road with her best buddy in this strange town she was only beginning to learn and like. She kept asking Aditya where they were going; but Aditya just kept on talking and kept on walking.

“Tum kitna sochti ho Falon!” (You think too much Falon) he exclaimed turning back to look at her. He kept walking backwards. “Aren’t you having a good time?”

“I am Aditya. I would have gone straight home from the restaurant if I wasn’t.”

“Then keep walking!” he said.

“Giroge,” Falon warned (You’ll fall).

“Nahi girunga,” Aditya said (No I won’t), and almost the next minute he had landed square on his butt.

Falon burst out laughing and gave Aditya a hand to get up.

“Ooouww,” Aditya moaned as he slowly got up. He took one look at Falon and immediately added – “I know you told me, don’t go and say it again.”

“Don’t wanna walk?” Falon said.

“Nah,” Aditya replied.

“Where were we going anyway?” Falon asked.

“Well, there is this kind of a playground close-by that kids in the neighbourhood use as a cricket-field. It’s just an open area actually, nothing great. But there are not too many trees and all, so the sky really looks beautiful from there. We could have gone and just sat for a while and…”

“And what?” Falon prompted.

Aditya reached inside his bag-pack and pulled out a bottle of wine.

“Oh come on! I can’t let you sit here after showing me that! We have to go! The place can’t be so far away now, can it? We’ve been walking for almost twenty minutes! And you –“

“Okay okay! We’ll go!” Aditya said, throwing his hands up. “Crack pot,” Aditya said and looked at Falon out of the corner of his eyes and ducked immediately. But Falon was just smiling.

“What? You’re not going to hit me?” Aditya questioned.

“I finally figured why you call me that,” she said.

“Pray! Do enlighten me,” Aditya teased.

Falon stepped closer. She leaned in till her mouth was right next to his ears and then answered – “It’s because I intoxicate you as much as one.”

Aditya kept looking at Falon. Suddenly Falon burst out laughing.

“Gotcha!” she said. “After all those straight-faced jokes of yours, I finally got back at you!” She kept stepping onto and off the footpath, like she were doing a little victory dance.

“But you are not far from the truth,” Aditya said. Falon stopped dancing and turned around to look at Aditya. Aditya walked up to her and took her hand in his.

“No matter how good you are sweetheart, the last one’s always mine,” he said, and winked at her.

“ADI! Not fair ya!” Falon said as she jerked his grip off. Aditya caught up and hugged Falon around her waist.

“Come on Falon,” he said, trying to make up to her. “Be a sport!” he teased, and soon enough they were both giggling like teenagers.

“I knew you were kidding,” Falon said, blushing only slightly.

“No, you didn’t. You totally fell for it,” Aditya said.

“Okay I admit, maybe for a moment I did. But I would never take it seriously for more than that! The concept of dating you is just so weird, so – so alien!” Falon added.

“I know, I know,” Aditya said – “Same to you!” he said and stuck his tongue out. Falon stuck hers out at him in response.

“Look at us! We are crazy!” Falon said.

“No, I am totally sane – but yes; if not you, your madness sure is intoxicating!” Aditya replied. They had reached the old rusty gate that guarded the playground from trespassers. Falon looked at the heavy padlock chained to the gate.

“Now what?” she asked.

“We climb, and then we jump!” Aditya said, securing his bag-pack on his back and began climbing up the gate. He reached the top and jumped onto the wall next to it. He turned around. Falon was merely staring at him.

“What, did you think there was gonna be champagne and red carpet to welcome you?” he said. “Come on! You can climb up! You’re wearing jeans!”

Falon handed her clutch to Aditya and climbed up the gate and sat next to Adi on the wall.

“Yahin baithate hai?” she suggested. (Let’s stay here?)

“Arre no ya! Let’s go to the centre of the playground! Trust me, you will love it,” Aditya said.

Falon turned to look at the ground and heaved a sigh. “I am so tired ya… please!”

“Moti! (Fatso!)What tired?” Aditya teased. “Come on!” and before Falon could say another word in protest, Aditya had jumped off the wall and started walking towards the centre.

“Saala mere ko moti kehta hai,” (You’re calling me fat, you dog!) Falon said jumping of the wall herself. “Ruk. Abhi dikhati hun.” (I’ll show you who’s fat.) She took off her jacket and tied it around her waist. She rolled up the sleeves of her white cotton blouse. She took a stance and called out to Aditya.

“ADI!”

Aditya stopped dead in his tracks and turned around to look at Falon.

“HERE I COME!”

And the next moment Falon was racing towards Aditya. Aditya recovered from the initial shock and started running himself. He huffed and puffed as he saw Falon come from behind him and dash ahead of him, and before he knew it, she had reached the centre of the ground!

Aditya slowed down as he saw Falon do her little victory dance again. He covered the rest of the distance in a slow-jog.

“So who’e the fatso, eh?” Falon said.

“Hey, you’re a trained athelete, okay? I am a commoner! You should appreciate I even tried to race you,” Aditya said as he kneeled down on the ground. Falon kneeled next to him and immediately started tugging at his bag-pack.

“Come on now. You shouldn’t keep a girl waiting for so long for a drink! All that walking and running’s made me thirsty!”

Aditya laughed as he let Falon pull his bag off his back and watched her as she opened the wine bottle. A couple of big gulps later she realised the oddness of the whole thing. “Why do you have a wine bottle on you anyway?”

“Because we were going to meet at your place initially? And because it is good manners to take a bottle of wine when someone calls you over for dinner.”

“Since when did ‘manners’ become so important to you?”

“Since now,” he said and pulled his bag out of Falon’s hands. He pulled out a small gift neatly wrapped in plain blue paper with an ink blue coloured ribbon on it. He held the gift out to Falon and said “Happy birthday sweetheart.”

Falon looked at her watch. It was mid-night. Falon just kept staring at her watch. “How did you know?” she asked without looking up.

“I’d asked you, you’d told me a long time back!” Aditya exclaimed.

“No I meant – how did you think of doing all this? Mid-night, wine, new-moon, blue wrapping…”

“Well, that’s what friends are for, isn’t it?”

Falon still kept staring at her watch and refused to look up. Aditya moved closer to her and held up her face. He saw a tear trickle down Falon’s cheek.

“Falon.”

“No! It’s ok. I’m alright,” Falon said, readily rubbing her cheeks clean. She held out her hand, and Aditya placed the gift in it. She untied the ink blue ribbon and the paper unfolded. Falon took one look at the little black box and knew what was inside. She handed the box back to Aditya. “I would like you to put it on me,” she said.

Aditya smiled and opened the box. He took the silver chain out, closed the box and set it on the ground. Falon quickly picked it up and dusted it.

“Oho! Niche kyun rakha? (Why did you put it down?)”

Aditya held his ears.

Falon smiled and turned her back to Aditya. She pulled her hair onto one side. Aditya carefully held the chain in place and tightened the clasp. Falon turned around and looked down at the pendant – a pair of small silver dolphins, with diamonds as eyes.

“This is just perfect Aditya,” Falon said.

“What, are you kidding me? The bottle’s not even half empty!” Aditya said, and they were giggling all over again. Aditya looked at Falon for a moment, and then lay down on his back. “Lie down,” he urged Falon. “You’ve got to check out the view.”

Falon removed her jacket from around her waist and laid it on the ground so as to not spoil her white blouse. She lied down and exclaimed almost immediately.

“This is lunatically beautiful!”

Aditya laughed.

They laid there for a while, both not saying a word. The summer air was not cold, but was far from hot too. They laid there for a while, both talking about myriad things – their first birthdays, their latest crushes, the last movie they’d seen together, the worst New Year’s Eve they’d had, the one time in their lives when they felt nothing was impossible… after a while they were just staring at the sky… the clear, moonless, starry sky.

“That,” Falon said, pointing out to a star, “is the Orion.”

“Hmmm.”

“I’ve always loved that name, ‘Orion’. If I have a daughter someday, I’m gonna name her Orion.”

“Orion. But you know Orion is ‘The Hunter’, right?”

“Is it?” Falon asked, quite surprised. “I didn’t know that!”

Aditya laughed. “Funny you want to christen your girl with a name you do not even know the meaning of!” Aditya remarked.

“Aye! It’s still a beautiful name! And I will name my daughter that someday…”

“I hope you do also know that to have a daughter you need to be married; to a man no less…” Aditya remarked again. Falon hit him on his stomach. “Ooouww!” he exclaimed.

“Come on! It’s not like I am never going to get married!”

“I know honey, I am only teasing…”

Falon suddenly put her arm around Aditya and hugged him.

“Ha! You cry and I want to hug you, and you verbally push me away. And now you hug me. Why can’t I push you away?”

“Who said no? Of course you can. But do you really want to?” Falon challenged, and Aditya only put an arm around Falon in response. They stayed like that for a moment, and then Falon got up and sat, leaning against Aditya’s legs.

“You know Aditya, I was really grateful when we became friends. There’s a certain age that we all cross in life, after which there’s hardly ever a guy who approaches you because he wants to be nothing more than just a friend. They all are always attracted to you, and so want to become your friend in the hope of becoming a lover sometime down the line. What makes it ugly is when they realise it’s not gonna work out. Then they cut you off like you never existed. Whatever happened to friendship? Sometimes I hate this whole ‘love’ funda. It’s like, there’s a guy and a girl, they are best friends, till they become teenagers, and then they get attracted to each other. In the beginning its all weird cos, they are like best buddies till then. And then they get all infatuated, and start to think it’s ‘love’, and then they start dating, going out, till one of them finally grows up or – luckily – both of them do. But then it’s even weirder, cos now every time they meet each other as friends, they think about the times when they were sweethearts… and then they just, kind of, let it die.”

Falon paused. Aditya waited for her to continue, but she didn’t. Finally he prompted her –

“What was his name?”

“Rohan.”

“Hmmm.”

There was another long pause.

“I am just so glad that’s never gonna happen between us,” Falon said finally. “Sometimes that’s all that you want – a best friend.”

“Correction,” Aditya interrupted. “You may get tired of a brother, an aunt, your mother, even love for that matter – or love even more so. But no matter what, that’s something you will always want – a best friend.” Pause. “That was a good line!”

Falon applauded and held up the bottle.

“It was a mighty good one!” she exclaimed.

They mingled for a little longer and talked about some more random stuff after that. They then walked back to the restaurant, in front of which they had parked their bike. They held hands while walking, on their way back, and it wasn’t weird at all. It was the most comfortable feeling in the whole world…

*Author’s Note: A lot of people wonder quite often how girls sometimes find it easier to talk to boys than other girls. A lot of people ridicule and even deny accepting friendship between a guy and a girl as just friendship and nothing else. This piece is to celebrate exactly that – friendship. It is to celebrate the kind of comfort you have with your best friend that you don’t with any other person in the world. This piece is for all those who have – at least at some point of time, even as briefly as for a moment – valued friendship. This piece is for those unselfish people in your life who like you for what you are, not what you can be; for those people who you can call even only once in a year and still share the same warmth and connect as you used to in your hey-days… this one’s for you, my Friend. Even as cliché as it sounds, life’s truly is beautiful cos you’re a part of it.

THE MEMORY

2011-04-23T10:03:00.000-07:00

The power of the human brain or mind – I don’t know which is it exactly – to associate certain things or situations with certain people or places is so strong that it amuses me sometimes, and almost makes me wish it weren’t so…

… that movie which always makes you think of your best friend, no matter the place where you are watching the movie, or the time of the day at which you are watching it…

… or that fragrance that you associate with those cold winter mornings when you used to go for an early morning walk…

… or that song that reminds you of a love that was never meant to be…

You associate every minute detail of that memory with the person or the place that they remind you of – though it may not always hold true. You see your friend in place of the protagonist in the movie; you suddenly start to feel cold, even though it isn’t cold that day, and you wish that someone special meant the words of that song for you and only you, almost as if he wrote it for you…

And then you almost instantly wish you had not remembered… you wish you had forgotten all about it…

On a particularly neutral night, 2572 songs playing on shuffle mode, and the one song that still manages to send chills up and down my spine plays… and I freeze. I do not turn it off. I do not turn it up. I just keep staring at my laptop, and the song keeps playing… an agonising seven minutes fifty-six seconds long song… it just keeps playing…

… and then that particular line that I still so strongly associate with him…

I close my eyes – and I am in that small studio apartment again, in his arms, underneath that teddy-bear blanket, content – though not comfortable maybe, sharing one small mattress on a cold winter evening…

I almost feel my stomach knotting as it all comes back so strongly as nothing can ever bring it back.

I open the folder containing the song. I right click on it – but I just can’t bring myself to delete it…

It is the only song in my library that is in .m4a format…

It is the only song by that artist in my library…

It is the only thing that’s proof that he is not just a character from one of my stories but was for real; that he really happened to me.

He has vanished off the face of my life.

I do not have his number.

I do not remember his e-mail address.

I do not remember any contact detail…

But I don’t know if I should be glad about it or not…

‘It would be nice to listen to his voice again’, I think, only to realise I have forgotten what he sounds like…

‘It would be nice to know what he is doing now’, I think, only to realise he is not even in the same city any more…

So many things forgotten…

And then why do I still associate this song with him?

It is a pity I will never appreciate the song ever again in my life – for I cannot listen to it and NOT think about him…

And the thought of him – ah! It pains! The pang is deep, the pang is genuine… the pang is proof that he is not just a character from one of my stories but was for real; that he really happened to me.

How is it that a single song or a single movie is able to recreate the mood, the feeling, and the state of mind that is now a thing of the past, to such a minute detail?

I almost rub my sides, in fearful anticipation of finding his arms still wrapped around me… but I feel my own touch, and I don’t know if I am glad or sad that it’s only me… that hereon it will always be only me… that the memory will never be complete…

Dhadkan yeh mere dilki… puchhe re tere dil se… ke sach-much kya hai tu duniya mein?

BLINDED BY THE MUNDANE

2011-04-13T04:08:00.000-07:00

Today I appeared for the last internal theory exam of the semester, and probably of my life. From the waking moment of the day, I was feeling rather anxious. I tried to place cause and effect in order, but couldn’t. I decided to stop thinking about it and to concentrate on the exam that lay ahead.

The hour of the exam came and went – but the feeling remained. After the exam, we went to the college canteen and sat down to snack a little. We started talking about all the usual topics – a project that had finally come to an end, a thesis that was finally in hand, a college that we were finally going to get out of, a staff that we would finally not have to bear everyday… though many of the things we said were exaggerated, many of them were even true. I went and submitted a copy of my thesis at the institute where I did my thesis project – and on the way I realised this was probably the last time I was going to that place too; the last time I was driving down that road (for I have nothing else that would take me on that course again); the last time I was going to pass by those colourful teddy bears that a small family sold on the street; the last time I was going to wish I could just drive further down the road and go visit my friend who lives close by (for now I actually can do it when I want, and not just keep wishing I could).

And I realised that was where my nervousness was coming from – that finality in the day today.

Everything was coming to an end, one after the other – like the chapters of a book.

Since school I had been sure about what I wanted to do – science stream in 11-12th; graduation in Microbiology after that; post graduation after that… and now suddenly I didn’t know what lay ahead, or what I wanted to do.

It was a hilarious moment when suddenly Shahid Kapoor flashed in my mind – running alongside white horses in Kaminey.

That’s kinda how I felt at that moment – and there is only little exaggeration in the statement.

For the first time on my way back from the institute today, I noticed 6 different trees in full bloom in the middle of summer. I also noticed a dhobhi-ghaat by the banks of the river which I drove over every day. I drove by at 30kmph from the institute to my house, and it took me 45 minutes. But I didn’t feel the need to hurry to anywhere today. I was on my own. I could go home when I wanted. I could NOT go home if I wanted. There was no one expecting things off me – time, punctuality, results, reports, answers, marks, nothing.

I was free.

The realisation was one full of relief and fear; relief because now I had a lot of free time, fear because I had not a clue about how I was going to spend it.

It was something like what Budd says to Elle – now that your enemy is dead, which is the greatest ‘R’ you feel, relief or regret? People who have a job tend to live longer. Now that your enemy is dead, what are you going to do?

At the dinner table a couple of days back, I said I’d have been better off in Arts rather than in the field of Science, to which Dad said – don’t say that; science always helps you develop as a person. Now you have your whole life to do what you want to do.

But I am not sure if I am happy about the fact, or not.

In fact I am not sure about what I feel about it at all!

I have always wanted to do a lot of things – learn to play the piano, take dance lessons, know how to read people’s handwriting, go on a holiday, travel, write, work on my photography skills. But I never did them saying I didn’t have time. And now that time is here, I don’t know how I feel about spending it on doing each of these things… cos I was brought up to believe that these things can be done at any point in life, now is the time to make your life, to make a career, to make somebody of yourself. But isn’t now also the time to do insane stuff with friends, act crazy, have a booze party, fall in and out and in love again, keep secrets, keep promises…?

I sometimes look back and feel like all I have done in the past five years is earn two degrees and get a distinction. I know the statement is largely not true, but it also is true to some degree. Where has been the time to even meet friends, forget doing stuff together?

Life, time, moments – they always pass you by. And you can’t expect things to slow down just because you are too busy. But what you can do is not let life ALWAYS pass you by. Spend time with yourself, spend time with your friends, spend money on yourself, pamper yourself, and get yourself that ridiculously expensive watch or dress if you really want it!

Sometimes we only have to shift by a few degrees to understand and enjoy what’s been served to us better – after all tequila sucks without lemon!

THE BLACK ROSE

2011-03-12T01:56:00.000-08:00

I wonder what it is like to be an ordinary girl sometimes, with an ordinary house, an ordinary family, a father with an ordinary job – basically a job. I see girls around me with a lot less than what I have, but they have something I will probably never have.

It’s always been this way – from school times too. But then back in school, no one knew who I was. I was just a classmate, a friend, and several boys had a crush on me. I remember the names of a few of them, faces of few others. But there is no one I remember as much as Tony. I still have a picture of the two of us together, with me holding his collar and he holding my plaits. I even had one of both of us together at our Prom; but I trashed that one away… it looked too formal, and fake, though I know it was nothing more than the awkwardness of standing next to your first crush. He used to always dress shabbily. He lived only a few minutes away from school and used to pedal down on his cycle everyday – and yet he always managed to get spoil his uniform before he even entered class. I used to like him too.

But of course, with time, we grew out of it.

I used to see my father only occasionally. He was never home every night. But he used to be home every Sunday – and he used to turn every Sunday into a mini-holiday for me. We would have breakfast at Bakers Inn, the owner being father’s childhood friend. Then we would go buy me something father called ‘Gift of the Week’ – and it could be anything from as small as a pencil to as big as a doll house; anything I pleased. And father would always find reasons to buy me the gift, so that I never felt like it was unnecessary and also never took it for granted. Once he brought Brownie home in a nice little wicker basket just because I had been a good daughter and had helped mother out in the garden. I remember getting up to being licked all over my face, and how my surprised yelp had sent Brownie off into fits of barking. I had carried him to school with me that day, and back from school, and then to my friend’s place, and back from there, and he always slept with me on my bed ever since his first day in our house. I had been very sad when he had passed away, but that was one of the best weeks of my life – as father was home every night.

I grew up and started to understand little by little that my father was someone very important. Now that I know who he is and what it is to be me, I sometimes wonder how mother and all the house servants managed to keep me away from it – but they did. Father did try and provide me with an ordinary life – but a couple years into my teens, and I knew nothing was ever going to be ordinary again.

I passed out of school, and my admission had already been secured in the best college in the city. I had lots of friends in college, right from the first day – but I had grown up enough to know they were friends of my chauffeur-driven car, my huge house, and my pocket money more than me. But I was always on guard and never let any one of them get too close to me – something I learnt from father.

But I was a teenager after all – and love soon caught me round the corner one day, and Rafael entered my life. He never tried to control me – as I had been warned some boys would want to by my girl friends. He didn’t even try to know more about me – as some over inquisitive boys had wanted. And he never ever, not even once, tried to kiss me or make a pass at me – as almost every boy in college had tried to. And I don’t know if it was this that drew me into him, or just the fact that I was ordinary when I was with him.

But I lost Rafael – even as a friend – when one of the boys in college went missing after having followed me home one evening after classes.

And I guess I knew right then – that I was never going to be an ordinary girl.

A lot of things about me have changed since that incidence.

I have lost most of my girl friends and all of my boy friends.

And my chauffeur-driven car is now tagged by another car and two bikes in the front and at the back.

I can almost feel an invisible bubble around me. Everybody maintains a five foot radius around me. Nobody sits next to me during classes. Nobody hangs out with me. A few true friends have managed to stick around though. They come attend every party and every function in our family, and I am grateful to have them. But there is a certain void that gets created in your life when you become a certain age and do not experience the things that that age brings along with it. And I feel that void every year on Valentine’s Day.

When you are who I am, people are always going to treat you with a lot of respect, and they are always going to be happy to help you and show gratitude in whatever way they can, and they are always going to feel obliged even when all you do is greet them. Your paper work is never going to get stuck, because there is never going to be any paper work. Your car is never going to be towed, because there is never going to be a no-parking zone for you. You are never going to buy anything at its original price because there is always going to be a discount on everything all year round. When you are who I am, everybody wants to be you – but they don’t want to be with you, or are afraid of being with you. Everybody wants a rose, but no one wants a black one – even if it is a rose after all.

There may be a lot of things about me, and about my life that people around me may crave for, may feel like they could give anything for – respect, command, loyalty of the people around, money of course, and perhaps power. But there is one thing that a Mafia daughter can never have, and it is probably the single most important thing to any girl in her life.

A Mafia daughter can never have love.

I GOT 20/-

2010-12-03T08:37:00.001-08:00

I had a chat with one of my friends today… after a really long time. He is someone I genuinely like, but also someone I genuinely hate! We quarrel more, and more often, than we talk; and we always joke about it. It’s a funny friendship I have with him – but he is a good guy, and I like him.

It is almost after a couple months that we spoke to each other… and within minutes we were arguing about some hypothetical question. But this time the conversation got a little more personal than hypothetical, and things kind of went out of hands.

Eventually we did sort it out, and ended the conversation on a happy note, but – the obsessive, compulsive over thinker that I am – I kept thinking about our conversation for the rest of the day. Like the backdrop of a stage, my mind kept coming back to it again and again, after all the thoughts had vanished from the foreground. I left the house in the same state, and forgot my bike keys inside after I had pulled the door close. Then I realised I had forgotten my wallet as well, and the keys to the house along with it. I checked my pant pockets and found I had about fifty bucks. I decided to take a rickshaw to college.

I met all my classmates on reaching the department… after many days we were all happy and laughing and tension free, now that exams were over. We went to the canteen and decided to rob one of our friends of all her money – she owed us too many a treat and hadn’t given any! We all decided to settle the account.

‘Arre yaar, aaj mere paas sacchi itne paise nahi hai!’ she tried to explain – ‘I got only twenty!’

But we still kept on teasing her and asking her for a treat.

And in that moment I realised – isn’t that about how unreasonable we act sometimes?

We expect time from someone who is busy.

We expect co-operation from the least friendly colleague.

We want love from someone who takes us only as a friend.

We want someone who loves talking to sit quietly and listen to us.

My mom always says – each person gives only that what he has. I used to never understand her when she used to say that – but now I know.

There are so many kinds of people we meet every day – look around and you may find that namuna who is always happy, that person who is always alone, who is always sad, or who is always lost. There was a phase when I used to be always angry. My friends used to say – you lose your temper too quickly now-a-days.

When I look back, I now realise that at that point of time, I was going through a lot of things that I had absolutely no control over. It was like I was being pulled into situations which I wanted to avoid and there was nothing I could do about it – and it made me angry. The fact, or its realisation, that I had no control over what was happening to me and no way to make it right made me angry, and my anger lashed out at people near me.

But do we realise this when we see it happening around us?

We are very quick at jumping to conclusions –

‘Oh she has changed, she is just so moody now-a-days.’

‘I don’t know what’s wrong; he was never like this before.’

But do we ever stop and think “why” this is happening?

A person who is hurt, hurts others.

A person who is angry, lashes out at others.

A person who does not hang out with others is in fact feeling very lonely and outcast himself.

A person who is bitter has someone being bitter to him.

It is almost always like this.

Each person gives only that what he has.

If you see such people around you and if they are someone you know or like or care for, go talk to them; sit down next to them; chat with them; ask them if they want to share what they are going through with you.

Help them.

Genuinely help them.

And help them in a way that suits them – not in a way that you think is right. Don’t help them for your sake – to make you feel good; for that help is no help.

It is not too difficult to pick on someone who is going through a tough time – unless that person is really good at masking his or her true feelings. And even such people break down at some point of time.

No one wants someone who is always rude, or moody, or upset, or fussy, or angry around them – but if that someone is your friend, don’t abandon him, for that only adds to their pain. Talk to him.

Pouring your heart out does not always mean loving the person, being caring, being affectionate and being nice – as much as these feelings, it is also the heart only that is home to feelings like hurt, anger, exertion, disappointment. Don’t choose people by their behaviour towards you, for that is going to change with their state of mind and with the state of affairs in their lives; choose people for the what they are after all these feelings have washed off and faded away… for that is the true nature that lies at the heart of that person.

Every person is capable of some good in life – and no one who is distressed deserves to be abandoned by his friends.

If someone got only twenty, he will give you only twenty. Don’t say – oh he won’t even give me a fifty, I don’t like him. Remember the times he gave you more than you wanted – and be grateful for it, for we may never know when roles reverse and we are on the other side, only hoping and wishing crazy that our friends understand us and support us.

The good and the bad are both you – don’t be ashamed of it.

And always remember – someone who can’t handle your worst, doesn’t deserve your best.

A RACE AGAINST TIME

2010-12-02T08:54:00.000-08:00

I came across a bunch of forgotten photo albums while cleaning up my mom’s dressing table today afternoon, and it was such a joyride! Me in specs, big fat round ones, that made my eyes look funny; and sporting clothes reminiscent of times and fashion statements that are ancient now – balloon sleeves, two long pony tails, and a skirt that went below my knees but floated above the ground. Sure I looked like a disaster! But those pictures did manage to bring a smile on my face.

After that, I took out the bag of photo albums from under my bed and went through those pictures too, like I have on so many afternoons before, and like I will on so many more – for I never tire of looking at those pictures. I saw myself growing up through the pictures… a baby, yawning away as Mom kissed my forehead; a toddler, waving to Dad from the floor as he left for office; a kindergarten student, clapping her hands and dancing to the tune of Tu Cheez Badi Hai Mast Mast (yes, I admit, I used to love that song as a kid!); a schoolgirl, cutting the cake on her birthday with all her classmates around her; a teenager, with her best friend on a pajama-party night…

And then somewhere in between I disappeared totally from almost all the pictures… and it was just Mom, Dad, Atya, my sisters and brothers, relatives, my nephew, and everybody else – except me. Everyone laughing, sharing stories, telling jokes, just like always… but I was missing. I caught my head, or my hair in one or two pictures; but that was it.

I didn’t realise it until a tear had fallen on the one of the pictures that I was crying. I looked at all the get-togethers and dinners and parties and functions I had missed – because I was too busy studying for some exam, or completing journals and submissions and assignments. I felt very virtuous at the time – felt like I was being responsible and doing the right thing. Sure my relatives were all always proud of all my achievements, and so was I, I guess.

But looking at those pictures reminded me of times that I had let go by, and that didn’t look like they were going to come back. I miss my cousins, I miss my aunts and uncles, I miss all of them, and all the fun times we used to have together – the PPPJs, the ghost stories, the college affairs (that they used to try and hide from me, cos I was too young n all, but that I did learn about anyway!) and so many other things…

I looked at those pictures and thought – why had I let these moments slip out of hand? Why had I missed that get-together? Why had I opted out of that party?

It wouldn’t have hurt if I had scored a little less on that test.

It certainly would not have harmed if I had not attended college on that Monday.

It would not have mattered if I had reached late for practicals that day.

But I was brought up to be like this – responsible, punctual, dutiful, a good student, a good daughter – and that is how I have lived my life so far.

But do you call this ‘living’?

I do not want to suggest that the above qualities are not virtue – they no doubt are. But are these virtues more important than spending time with your family, or making merry with your friends, or just having a good time?

Just the other day I saw a trailer of some movie, and one of the dialogues hit me stark in my face –

Life mein kabhi kuchh galat kiya?

And I realised – no, maine kabhi life mein kuchh galat nahi kiya tha…

I keep telling Mom – loosen up, let go, ease out, relax, it’s alright if you don’t do one out of a hundred things, it’s ok if you don’t do the laundry today, it’s ok if you don’t cook today, it’s alright if you sleep till late today, it’s fine if the milk spills over before you could take it off the burner… but I wish I had realised the same a few years ago… that it was ok for me to not be punctual all the time, that it was ok for me to bunk my tuitions and go for a movie someday…

We often let virtues get bigger than people…

We give up on family, friends, and relationships even for our careers, for our jobs, for a better life, for money…

But this is not just about that…

This is about not letting virtues define your existence – you did not come in this world to be perfect.

Spend time with your loved ones…

Laugh from the bottom of your heart…

Love like you’ve never been hurt…

Dance like no one’s watching…

And live each day like it’s the last day of your life – you wouldn’t want to be sitting in front of a computer and working, or mugging up chemistry formulas, or making balance sheets if it was the last day of your life, right?

And this is not because ‘kya pata kal ho na ho’… but because it is worth it, creating all those memories… they will run for your rescue in ways least expected, and you shall be grateful to them at some point of time in life…

REGRET

2010-11-02T09:33:00.001-07:00

Malvika looked at Hrishab, sitting right beside her on a flight to Delhi. She looked at his face that seemed as usual – calm, serene, composed – but something told her he was everything but that underneath. And she wondered if any man would ever do for her what Hrishab was doing.

One phone call – and everything had changed for her; her course of the next week, and – perhaps – that of her life. But she wished it hadn’t. She so dearly wished it hadn’t.

They got off at the airport and took a taxi and headed straight for the hospital. Malvika was clutching the paper with the address of the hospital tightly in her one hand; in the other she held Hrishab’s hand. Hrishab looked at Malvika. He clearly saw the panic in her eyes, the worry, the care, the affection, the bond – perhaps the love too, or whatever remained of it. For the first time in his life, Hrishab felt scared, threatened, and like something was slipping out of his hands. He looked at this unusual, unconventional girl sitting next to him – for yes, in as many ways as she was mature, she was still a girl. He looked at the girl sitting next to him, who had possessed his heart like no one had ever been able to. And to see all these emotions in her eyes for someone else and not him scared Hrishab. It scared him a lot.

And yet, though he didn’t understand why, he had agreed to fly with Malvika to Delhi – quite against his will, but because he knew she needed him, or would need him as she faced Vikram after all these years. At least he was hoping she would need him.

As they arrived at the hospital, their palms grew wet – but Malvika didn’t know if it was she who was sweating or Hrishab. And that’s the first time she allowed herself to look at Hrishab directly in his eyes. But she couldn’t think of anything to say that would put him to comfort – no reassurance. She just kept staring into those warm brown eyes, and looked away. As the taxi parked in front of the hospital, Malvika let go of Hrishab’s hand.

‘I’ll go inside.’

Hrishab nodded as he pulled out his wallet to pay for the ride. He pulled a single bag out of the trunk and thanked the taxi driver. He turned around and saw Malvika standing at the counter – and was suddenly reminded of the first time he had seen her, ironically in the same dress. There was a sense of intriguing austerity in the way that Malvika carried herself around – something that pulled you toward her, made you want to know her more, but not without knowing you can only get so much closer to her on your own; from thereon, it was her choice, if she let you get any closer or not.

‘Room 109,’ Malvika said, as Hrishab reached her. She took his hand again and they walked to the elevator. But there were far too many people standing to get in. Malvika led them to the stairs and they started climbing them. Hrishab was tired and wanted to protest although it was just one floor, but he took one look at Malvika, and couldn’t. They took the stairs in small quick steps and were soon on the first floor. They looked around. A nurse stopped by.

‘Yes?’

‘Room 109?’

‘First room on your left.’

‘Thank you.’

They started walking toward the room – but suddenly Malvika had slowed down. Hrishab noticed this and slowed down as well. Finally, she stopped a few steps short of the room. Hrishab stopped as well. He waited patiently for Malvika to do something. She turned around and looked at him. He looked at her.

He gave her hand a squeeze and blinked.

She turned left and walked right upto the room.

She could see him inside the room.

He had lost quite some weight – his tall frame looked frail and weak, as he lay on the bed. There was a copy of Wuthering Heights propped open upon his chest. Malvika instantly recognised it as the one she had gifted him, and the one he had mocked her about. She looked at all the tubes going inside his body – carrying God only knows what not. He looked quite okay otherwise. And then Malvika noticed his head.

Those thick black curls that she had locked her fingers into once upon a time were gone. What remained was only the skull cap that she used to tease him about.

A lady sitting next to him looked up from her book at Malvika. She immediately got up and came outside the room.

‘Hello aunty,’ Malvika greeted her, as she put her free hand on the lady’s shoulder. The lady grabbed it and started crying. Malvika looked at Hrishab and then back at the lady.

‘Thank you for coming beta,’ the lady said. ‘He is waiting for you.’

Malvika smiled at the lady, and opened the door, and though she had made no sound, Vikram opened his eyes and looked at her. He smiled.

‘Hi.’

And with that, Malvika let go or Hrishab’s hand and walked into the room, closing the door behind her.

-x-x-

The lady looked at Hrishab, offering him half an awkward smile. Hrishab smiled back.

‘Are you with Malvika?’

‘Yes.’

‘What’s your name?’

‘Hrishab.’

She went and sat in one of the chairs placed outside the room. She motioned for Hrishab to join her.

‘I am glad you could come with her. I had been angry and worried when Vikram had called her – angry because he had not done the right thing by disturbing her and her life by making that phone call out of the blue, and with the news that he had; worried because I didn’t know how Malvika would take it.’

‘You knew about your son and Malvika?’

A long pause. A sigh.

‘Yes.’

Another long awkward pause.

‘I’m glad she is not alone,’ the lady said again. Hrishab could not really read the emotion in her voice. But he could make out one thing for sure – the woman was trying to say ‘I’m glad she found someone’ in every way other than directly saying it.

Hrishab steered the lady towards her son.

‘When did you find out?’

‘Eight months back.’

So he had thought a lot before informing Malvika, Hrishab thought.

‘How did you come to know?’

The lady removed her specs and put them into a case before answering him.

‘He threw up blood.’

Hrishab didn’t know what else to say.

‘You must be tired. Shall we go have a cup of coffee?’ the lady offered.

‘Sure, if that is not too much trouble,’ Hrishab said, but only to be polite. As much as a part of him was aching to wrap his lips around a cup of strong, hot coffee, a much bigger part of him was dying to burst into the room and pull Malvika out of it. But he knew he couldn’t do it; and more than that he knew he didn’t have to do it. But when life threatens your love, all logic seems ridiculous.

Hrishab took one look at the door of the room, and walked past it. Resisting himself a glance inside through the small glass window on the door with great difficulty, he followed the woman to the hospital canteen.

-x-x-

Malvika put her purse in one of the chairs inside the room and came and stood by the bed. Vikram closed the book and put it on the side table.

‘I can’t believe you’ve finally come around to reading it,’ Malvika said, in a desperate attempt to make casual conversation.

‘Yeah, I don’t have the kind of time to put it off to any later a date,’ Vikram said, smiling.

Malvika looked pained.

‘Come on, you know me and my sick sense of humour,’ Vikram said, ‘that only you found funny.’

Malvika made a sincere effort to smile.

‘Come sit,’ Vikram said, tucking his blanket underneath himself and making room for Malvika on the bed.

‘No I’m fine,’ she protested. There was hardly enough room on the bed for two.

‘Come on,’ Vikram said and held her hand.

Instantly Malvika went stiff. She inhaled deeply.

She still remembered his touch; and how the calluses on his palms felt. The familiarity had not faded, even over three years.

Vikram noticed it, and let go of her hand immediately.

Malvika sat down next to him. She was careful not to disturb or touch any tubes or needles running into Vikram’s veins.

‘So how are you?’

‘I am fine.’

‘You look beautiful,’ Vikram said.

Malvika looked at Vikram. This was the first time he had called her beautiful. Malvika couldn’t respond to the compliment and only nodded.

‘Was it a good flight till down here?’

‘Yes.’

‘On time too?’

‘Yep.’

Pause.

‘Malvika, thanks for coming.’

‘How could I refuse Vikram?’ Malvika said, as she allowed herself to look at Vikram.

Vikram hung his head – ‘After the way it ended between us, I never thought I would ever see you again. And I wouldn’t have, I guess, if it hadn’t been for my condition. But I couldn’t think of anyone else I wanted to talk to or meet more than you.’

‘What do you mean? What about Dhiraj?’

Vikram paused before answering, surprise evident in his eyes – ‘You still remember Dhiraj?’

‘I remember everything Vikram. It is not so long ago for me to start to forget everything.’

Pause.

‘He is in Auckland now. Got a job.’

‘And…’ Malvika hesitated.

‘Swati?’ Vikram prompted. Malvika only nodded.

‘We are not in touch anymore.’

‘Why? What happened?’

‘We broke up within a few months.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

Vikram didn’t reply.

‘What went wrong?’ Malvika tried again.

‘I really don’t want to talk about it.’

‘Oh ok. I’m sorry I brought it up.’

‘No no, come on. It’s alright, you couldn’t have known.’

Vikram looked at Malvika as she tried to think of something to say to stay away from the most obvious of questions. Vikram could see her struggle inside her head, as she went through all the things she could talk about so as to steer clear from talking about his illness.

‘So you still drive your old Kinetic?’ Vikram asked out of the blue.

‘Of course! I love it! She’s my first love!’ Malvika said, trying to sound cheerful. ‘And I’m sure you still have your Yamaha?’

‘Nah, I sold it.’

‘What? Why!’ Malvika exclaimed, the surprise genuine in her voice.

‘Just. Didn’t feel like driving it anymore.’

‘How are all your crazy friends from college?’

‘I don’t know,’ Vikram answered after thinking for a while.

‘What do you mean “I don’t know”?’

‘I am not in touch with anyone anymore.’

‘Oh my God. Vikram what happened?’

‘I don’t know. Everything just went wrong suddenly, one after the other. First it went kaput between me and Swati. And then just everything went wrong. And then I was diagnosed of cancer, about a week before your birthday. It just all went kind of downhill from there, everything just went out of – Malvika, you’re crying.’

Malvika wiped her tears of her cheeks, but they refuse to stay behind her eyes any longer.

‘You’d called on my birthday. Why didn’t you tell me?’ Malvika said through her tears. And then, neither could tell who initiated it, but they were in each other’s arms and their lips had locked.

Malvika clung onto Vikram’s shirt and kissed him. Vikram kissed her back, holding her in his arms, caressing her and try to calm her down. But Malvika couldn’t stop. She kept on crying. She cried and cried till her throat went dry. ‘Why?’ she kept on asking.

‘I just didn’t,’ was all Vikram had to say in reply.

‘Vikram, don’t you know even by now, what you meant to me?’ Malvika asked sincerely.

‘I do Malvika – and it scares me. I am not worth what you give me.’

Malvika nodded ‘no’.

‘I am not Malvika, even though you think otherwise.’

‘Vikram that’s not even an answer! We were a lot more than just…’ Malvika couldn’t complete her sentence. ‘Vikram you were always special to me, and you will always be! You should’ve told me Vikram! I can’t believe it… all this time, all these years… and you didn’t call me even once! I know we didn’t break up on a healthy note, but still! We meant a lot more to each other…’

‘It was not until I lost you that I realised it Malvika. I just couldn’t bring myself to call you.’

‘Vikram…’

But Malvika could say no more.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door.

Malvika got up and reached for her purse. She pulled out a napkin and went into the bathroom as a nurse came in to check on Vikram.

‘Is there anything you need?’ Malvika heard a female voice above the sound of tap water.

‘No I’m fine, thank you.’ Vikram’s voice. Malvika wiped the water off her face and entered the room again, just as the nurse left. She put her napkin back into the purse and came and sat down beside Vikram again.

‘It feels so nice to see you Malvika. I really mean it.’

‘It is good to see you too Vikram.’

‘I’m sorry it didn’t work out – ’

‘Stop it Vikram. Forget about it.’

Pause.

‘You tell me about yourself! How are you doing?’

‘I am fine. I’m doling ok.’

‘Have you come alone?’

‘No I got someone along with me…’ Malvika answered tentatively.

Vikram looked at her.

‘What’s his name?’ he asked.

‘Hrishab.’

Pause.

‘Would you like to meet him?’

‘I would love to.’

-x-x-

Hrishab was pacing the corridor outside Room 109. It had been almost an hour since Malvika had entered the room. He couldn’t wait any longer. Vikram’s mother had stayed back in the canteen as she bumped into someone she knew, while Hrishab had come back up to the room. Hrishab wondered what Malvika and Vikram were talking about, what they were doing. Sure Vikram had only a few months of life left, but Hrishab had no sympathy for him. Malvika had barely given him the most essential information, but Hrishab had never had to ask; for any person with even an ounce of compassion could tell what a tough time Malvika had had to go through. And then Hrishab could read faces.

He had chosen never to ask Malvika anything after the first and the last time she told him about Vikram, but that does not mean Hrishab did not know what had happened. And he had no sympathy for a guy who could put someone he loved at some point of time at least through something like that. And least of all someone Hrishab now loved more than anyone else. He could and would never forgive Vikram. Ever.

The door to room 109 opened and Malvika stepped outside – one look and Hrishab knew he had made a mistake by agreeing to fly Malvika down to Delhi. A girl like her did not deserve to be put through this turmoil, no matter how much she wanted it.

Malvika walked upto Hrishab. Hrishab stepped toward her and hugged her. He kissed her on the forehead.

‘Are you alright?’ he asked.

‘Yes. I am fine,’ she said while still hugging him back, her head on his chest. She stayed like that for a moment, then looked up at him.

‘Will you come inside and say hi, please?’

‘Why?’

Malvika paused – ‘For me?’

-x-x-

‘Hi.’

‘Hi Hrishab. Thanks for flying Malvika down. I am really grateful. And it’s nice to meet you.’

Malvika looked at the two of them – one too upset to talk, the other too ashamed. She tried to fill in.

‘Hrishab works with Capgemini.’

‘Oh I see.’

‘He will be flying to Texas next week regarding work. He is going to be there for about a month.’

‘Texas is an awesome place.’

Malvika’s phone buzzed. She fished it out of her purse.

‘I’m sorry, I have to take this. Please excuse me,’ she said as she walked out of the room.

Vikram looked at Hrishab.

‘Thanks for coming, really. It means a lot to me.’

‘I did not do it for you.’

‘And you have done it quite unwillingly for her as well, as I can see.’

Hrishab began to say something, but stopped himself. For as much as he could never bring himself to forgive Vikram, he could read the regret on his face, as clear as ink on paper. Only he wished he could tell Vikram everything that he had to do to pull Malvika out of him, to convince her to trust people again, to trust herself again. Only he knew what that girl talking on the phone outside had been through, and how much it had thrown her off track, how deeply it had shook her. Only Hrishab knew how helpless Malvika had sounded when she’d told Hrishab why she wasn’t attracted to him in spite of him being such a great person, why she felt nothing about a guy who would have otherwise made her go weak in the knees, why she was so inert. Vikram didn’t know how horribly Malvika had closed into herself, and how difficult it had been for her to come out of her closet. He didn’t know how much the girl had paid, and only for having loved – selflessly and honestly.

But the regret and remorse on Vikram’s face was unmistakable. And Hrishab couldn’t possibly bring himself to say anything to him.

‘I threw away something that people don’t get even once in their life. I didn’t know what I had when I had it. But I hope you do. And I hope you will take good care of her and cherish her much more than I ever had or ever can.’

Hrishab nodded in reply.

Malvika entered the room as if on cue. She looked at both of them and smiled.

‘We are going to our hotel room now. We will come back in the evening to see you again,’ Malvika said, as they decided to take leave.

‘I’ll let you say goodbye,’ Hrishab said and walked out of the room.

‘So long,’ Malvika said, as she bent down to hug Vikram.

‘Bye. I really missed you all these years. It was so nice to see you,’ Vikram said, as he put his arms around Malvika’s neck and hugged her back.

‘Anything I can bring for you when I come in the evening?’ Malvika asked.

‘Just yourself – it is more than I can ever be grateful for anyway.’

‘Come on Vikram, don’t talk that way.’

‘You still get so disturbed Malvika – its alright. I am ready now.’

‘What do you mean?’

Vikram looked at Malvika, taking some time before he answered. He looked at those eyes that were once full of love for him, and those arms that he’d caressed standing in the balcony of his house. He looked at the locket that still hung around Malvika's neck and that he had never liked but had grown fond of over time. He looked at her, unblinking, drinking in with his eyes the sight of that lovely face, that lovely girl, that girl who loved him, but who he could never love back as much. He looked at her, as if absorbing her so that he could keep her in his memory forever. He tried to remember the Malvika he had known, and it struck him – nothing had changed. She still loved him, at some level. There was a part of her that she had with him, and that he knew would always be only his, till eternity, even though she was with Hrishab now and they were going to get married.

Nothing had changed.

And yet everything had.

‘Nothing,’ he said finally, and Malvika walked out of the door.

-x-x-

Vikram’s mother walked into the room. Vikram kept on staring outside the window. She came in and sat next to him on the bed. She looked at him. But he kept staring out of the window.

‘Are you feeling better?’

But Vikram didn’t say a word.

‘I am glad she came,’ Vikram’s mother said.

Vikram still didn’t respond.

His mother called out to him – ‘Vikram?’

He still didn’t respond.

She got off the bed and walked around to face Vikram. Tears were running down his cheeks. She stretched out a hand to wipe them off, and Vikram collapsed into tears. He hugged his mother and buried his face in her bosom. ‘I wish!’ he cried…

And he never said any more.

BE THIS WAY

2010-10-18T08:34:00.000-07:00

You’ll probably never know how much I loved you
But it had rather be this way

You will never know why I gave up on coffee,
or why I cut my hair
You will never know why I now like Metallica,
and where’re all the soft toys gone, that were once there

You’ll probably never know why I learnt to bake a Black-forest cake only cos you liked it
And you’re never going to know why I stopped talking to that boy from my school you had a fight with

You will keep guessing why I took dance lessons,
and why I kept saying – “I’m all old school
and chivalry will always have its charm,
even though you think going Dutch is cool.”

You’ll keep wondering why I gave up on old Hindi movies,
or why I started watching those English action flicks
You’ll never know where all my ear-rings have gone,
and why it now lies unused – my favourite kohl stick

I guess you never knew it was you I meant when I said
“My guy must be tall
and dark and funny and strong and loving and a gentleman”
And you’d mocked – “That’s all?!”
And you’ll probably never know how much I loved you,
and how much I miss your calls

But it had rather be this way any day

A broken heart is easier to handle,
than to handle “I wish I hadn’t met you anyway”

A broken heart is much more easy to handle
than to have you in my life at a price I can hardly pay
and only for you to sometime, someday, without the slightest of notice, just walk away…

MOMENT OF CLARITY

2010-09-04T08:23:00.001-07:00

I see so many people around me everyday, always waiting for something – waiting for the lecture to get over, waiting for the person in front of you in the que to finish his transaction, waiting for the traffic-light to turn green, waiting for your turn at the hair-dresser, waiting for the answer that’s gonna change your life, waiting for someone to come around, waiting for the hour to pass… its like our happiness is just out there, in sight. You can see it clearly, in all detail. But you are waiting to reach it; or for it to reach out to you.

Sounds familiar?

So what makes us wait for something in sight but out of reach?

What makes us stop from going after and getting what we want?

I am waiting for my life to change – yeah, pretty big huh? I am waiting to complete my post graduation so that I can pursue something I have been wanting to do all my life – or all along my life so far. But more importantly, I am waiting for that one moment that I am hoping will come in my life soon, when I will know who and what I want to be, what I want to make with my life and my time and my talent and brains – just like I always knew I wanted to study biology in college.

Sometimes you just know things are going to happen.

This relationship’s not going to work.

You’re going to be disappointed by the one person you held so highly.

You are going to get that one chance you were looking for to prove your worth.

You are going to win that competition you have been waiting to participate in.

This is the last time that you are going to see your grandfather.

This is a person who is going to come to mean a lot to you.

It’s like sometimes you can feel something taking control of situations, people around you and turning things about. You feel a presence. You feel it unmistakably, and stronger than you’ve felt anything in your life before.

You look at a house and know it’s the one for you, even if it is ridiculously expensive, or far away from your work place maybe.

You go to buy a puppy, and you just know which one you are going to pick.

We go around blindly through each day, get up, get dressed, have breakfast, work, come home in the evening, have dinner, have a beer maybe, watch TV, maybe call a friend and greet them for their birthday, go to bed, read something for a while, sleep. And the cycle repeats. We have opinions about people around us, about a fashion trend, about a movie star, about a song, about political issues, about the stock market – what is your opinion about yourself? How much do we know ourselves?

We are all living each day of life as it comes; but in reality I think we are all at some level waiting for that one moment that’s going to change that one thing about you or your life that you really badly want to change; or for that one moment when you will know what it is you can do to bring about that change. We all live for that one moment of clarity. It may come to us while we are working in our garden, or when the wind hits your face next time you step out of your house, or when you are playing with your niece. It may come to us quite unexpectedly, or after a great deal of waiting – one, maybe even two years, or much longer even. But there is that moment of clarity that comes in everyone’s life. It is unmistakable, inescapable if it is meant to change you. But more than that, it is something that you cannot miss if you don’t want to let it pass by unnoticed.

I am on the lookout of mine – and I am all armed and as ready as I can be! And I hope you will find yours too.

FOOTPRINTS

2010-09-04T08:21:00.000-07:00

Just how many things do we do in life for ourselves purely?

There always has to be that response to our stimulus.

An admirer of a new dress or new hair-cut.

A supporter to your decisions.

We are always looking for something that mirrors us to ourselves all our lives. We want that reflection to be in the form of someone else; and yet we want it to be exactly that – a reflection.

Someone who believes in what you believe in.

Someone who also likes tuna fish, just like you do.

Someone who also loves to dance, just like you do.

Why is it that we relate to something distinct from us only if we have been through a phase, a situation or an experience like that ourselves?

A favourite song.

A favourite movie.

Why is it that we have most experiences in common with our best friend?

We are always looking for that one person who will be a witness to our life on this planet.

Your friend may hate you thinking you always want to control their lives – but they still always consult you before taking any decision.

You know you are a good photographer – and yet it is important to you that people see and appreciate your work and tell you ‘you’re good’ at least once in a while.

I write for myself – but I am nonetheless always waiting for feedback and comments.

Can you for once in your life sing without an audience?

Can you for once cook a great meal just because YOU feel like having great food?

Can you for once read a good book and not share about it with another book-reading friend of yours?

Can you for once go off on a journey to enjoy your own company? Or even go to a movie all alone for that matter?

Can you? And more importantly – would you?

Why is it that we always turn around and look upon our footprints to see if someone is following them?

inspired from "By The River Piedra I Sat Down And Wept" - LOVE

2010-08-25T22:57:00.001-07:00

Nancy got up with a sad feeling deep in her heart. How she regretted having to live through this day every year. Every year she would go down the memory lane and visit the same old shack by the sea where she had gone off all on her own for a vacation a few years ago and had met a man who, Nancy was sure since the moment she set her eyes on him, was going to be very important to her and was going to change her life forever. If only she had not spotted that figure on the beach. If only she had not offered the man a glass of wine. If only he had not accepted. If only they had not fallen in love.

But she had spotted that lonely figure on the beach.

She had offered the cold man a glass of wine.

He had accepted.

And they had fallen in love.

It was not something she regretted. Once in your life comes along the kind of love that we are all made to grow up believing in, but that we all learn in our own ways exists only in fairy-tales and dreams and good romantic books and cheesy romantic movies.

But she did regret not asking him to stay when she knew she could have and when she knew he would not have refused.

She regretted having heeded to the higher calling. She had put that man and his life and his path towards a better self, top-most on her list of priorities; and herself and her feelings and her happiness below it – just like she had been brought up to be; just like she had lived all her life.

Her children before her.

Her husband before her.

Her marriage before her.

Her parents, her job, the people around – the world before herself.

And that made her the good mother, the good wife, the good daughter, employee and person that everybody talked about and that everybody wanted everybody else to be – but also that that she did not like, forty years of life, fifteen years of marriage and two children later.

What good is life when you spend it living for others? Every waking moment, every breath, every thought spent on others. Every good deed always done for the betterment of others. Every sacrifice always made for the happiness of others.

And it was a weekend spent not with her husband but with a stranger in a shack many many miles away from her house that had made her think – what had she done in life for herself?

When was the last time she lived, laughed, loved for herself?

That one weekend with the man in the shack by the sea had given Nancy a taste of what life could have been – a man who loved every inch of her body, a man who loved her heart and soul and who wasn’t afraid to show it; a life with a companion who was very different from her, but who complemented her and understood her nonetheless.

And yes, he was a married man, much older to her, with a son only fifteen years younger to Nancy. He was a man with faults, much like her husband; and yet he was so different from her husband.

Nancy regretted not having asked the man to stay when it was time for him to leave. She knew she had had the power to make him wait; she knew he had longed for her to ask him to wait. He had left the decision in Nancy’s hand. And Nancy had again chosen to be the good mother and wife and had let him go, only to come back to an unfaithful husband and a broken marriage that she thought was her responsibility to try and save.

But no relationship works with the efforts of only one individual. It is a give and take.

However, that one weekend spent with that man in the shack by the sea many many miles away from her house had changed Nancy. She had returned to an unfaithful husband and a broken marriage, but without guilt or a false sense of morality. She had returned a changed woman, and she had taken charge of things and had changed her life – which included moving out of the house and life of her husband but along with her son and daughter, shifting base to a new city, making new friends and finding a new job and doing what she had always dreamt of doing; starting a plant nursery. Her daughter understood her; but Nancy would not have minded even if she hadn’t – she would when she grew up a little more. Her son still loved his mother, though he missed his father.

But Nancy was still haunted by the memories of the man she met on this day few years ago.

She was glad he had saved her.

She was glad he had shown her what her life could be, what it ought to be.

She was glad he had happened to her.

But she still regretted not having asked him to wait when she could have.

But she now understood the lines she had read many many years ago…

Love is always new. Regardless of whether we love once, twice or a dozen times in our life, we always face a brand new situation. Love can consign us to hell or to paradise, but it always takes us somewhere. We simply have to accept it because it is what nourishes our existence. If we reject it, we die of hunger, because we lack the courage to stretch out a hand and pluck the fruit from the branches of the tree of life. We have to take love where we find, even if that means hours, days, weeks of disappointment and sadness.

The moment we begin to seek love, love begins to seek us.

And to save us.

inspired from "By The River Piedra I Sat Down And Wept" - THE OLD LADY

2010-08-25T09:04:00.000-07:00

Some people always have to be doing battle with someone, sometimes with themselves, battling with their own lives. So they begin to create a kind of play in their head, and they write the script based on their frustration.

Tilo heard the old lady say these lines and realised how much they were true – every word of it was painfully true and relevant to her life. Right from the moment she had been born, all she had been doing was fighting; first as her Mother tried to kill her while she was still in her womb, and then as the people around tried to kill her soul. All she had been doing was fighting – battling to guard her existence; battling to guard her virginity, battling to guard her innocence, battling to exist in a world that was crueller than could be imagined. Every moment a struggle. Every moment a war waged against her one self that wanted to believe in the good in people and her other self that had nothing but eyes that could see the world around her with all its bad and bad.

But when night fell and her Mother had cursed and cursed her and gone off to sleep, Tilo would dare to dream – of a caring Mother, of a clean house, of school; of a normal life and a better world. And it is these few moments every night and the hope they brought that helped Tilo pull through every day.

Until the day she heard the old lady speak – the old lady that she was scared of, but that she loved to hear when she began to speak. The old lady who Tilo saw always in the same clothes and who never smiled. There was something mysterious about the lady. She was not a beggar, and yet people passing her seemed to drop money for her and touch her feet. The lady never touched the money, and never seemed hungry or thirsty. She looked almost ethereal. At some point in the day the lady would start talking – and the stresaaset would go silent; but not because everyone would be listening, but because everyone would just clear the street. They would all disappear, take their children in and go inside their little huts and shut the doors and stay in till dusk. One evening Tilo had wandered off ad returned after the street had cleared and had heard the old lady speak. She had been scared at first and had tried to make her Mother open the door so she could come into the house.

‘Pay for your little excursion! Thousand times I tell you not to wander too far away, but you just don’t listen. The Devil, that’s what you are!’

Tilo had been very scared and had cried and cried till her throat went dry and her eyes and head started to ache. Finally when exhaustion took over and she couldn’t care less if she died or lived, she walked towards the lady and went and sat down in front of her.

The old lady’s eyes were closed, and she appeared as if to be chanting something. She broke out into prose once in a while, and went back to the chanting soon again. But her eyes always remained closed, like she was reciting something from memory. Her slow steady voice almost managed to put Tilo off to sleep when the lady opened her eyes and looked at Tilo. Tilo’s fears returned, but she sat rooted to the pace, stupefied. The old lady kept on looking at her – a constant unblinking stare, and Tilo couldn’t help but stare back into those eyes. How long they sat like that, no one knows. But after quite some time had passed, Tilo felt a hand lift her to her feet rather roughly.

‘Do you want to invoke the wrath of the Devil on the entire village?’

Tilo looked at her Mother, and turned back to look at the old lady. But she was gone.

– x – x –

‘You must take her to him! He is the only one who can save your daughter!’

‘Yes! No one who has ever seen that lady or spoken to her has ever lived to tell about it. But she has. There is something that’s definitely wrong.’

‘Take her to him. He knows just what to do.’

‘He will cure her.’

‘He will save her.’

– x – x –

Several days passed. People continued to drop money at the place where Tilo had seen the old lady sitting, and continued to touch the ground even. But Tilo was confused.

‘Mother, who do they offer the money to, if the old lady is not there anymore?’

But this innocent little question only brought upon another thrashing on Tilo, and she learnt never to ask her Mother about it again.

Several days passed by again. And then several weeks. One day Tilo met the old lady while she had wandered a little too far and away from her house. This time Tilo was not scared of the lady. But the lady, instead of maintaining her distance as always, addressed Tilo directly by her secret name –

‘Janhavi!’

Tilo was so astonished that the old lady knew her secret name that she forgot all her fear and the promise she had made to herself – to treat the old lady as indifferently as she treated her – and curiosity took over and Tilo ended up talking to her. She spent the whole evening talking to the old lady, and the night and it was almost dawn by the time she realised that an entire night had passed by. Tilo felt excited. This was her first night away from her home, and she was still safe and sound.

She had witnessed the good side of the world.

Tilo started meeting the old lady regularly. Her Mother kept on beating her up when she returned home just before sunrise every day.

‘Who is she sending you to?’

‘Who is sending me anywhere Mother?’

Slap.

‘Come on you little witch! Speak up! Where are you hiding all the money?’

‘What money Mother, I don’t understand.’

‘Oh you scoundrel! Just you wait till I get my hands on the money. How long are you going to hide it from me anyway.’

Tilo discussed this with the old lady one evening.

‘Mother keeps asking me funny questions. She keeps demanding money from me. I don’t understand.’

But the old lady just smiled.

One evening Mother caught hold of Tilo just as she was about to slip off to meet the old lady.

‘Not so easy darling. Today you shall go to who I tell you to go to.’

Mother gave Tilo a clean set of clothes to wear. She combed her hair and braided them. Tilo got confused, but was still happy. Her Mother today seemed like the one from the story they told at the school that Tilo liked to listen to secretly. Before mother and daughter stepped out of the house, Tilo hugged her Mother.

‘I love you Mother!’

Little did she know what lay in front of her, what her Mother had planned for her. But in spite of all that she had to go through each day, Tilo’s heart was pure, and it knew only to love.

They reached in front of a big house after some walking. Mother picked Tilo up in her arms and knocked on the front door. A big man answered the door.

‘At last.’

Mother gave Tilo into the arms of the man. The man reached inside his pocket and pulled out a thick wad of money and handed it to Tilo’s mother.

Tilo looked upon the transaction and turned to her mother –

‘So he had the money! But who is this man? Is it Father?’

Mother looked for a moment at Tilo’s face. She realised she was going to burst out crying. She quickly turned on her heel and began to walk away as fast as she could.

Tilo called out to her Mother to wait. Tilo felt really sad – how unfortunate that on the very day that she had seen a side of Mother she didn’t knew existed, Mother had also abandoned her and left her to the mercy of a strange big and scary man. Tilo looked at the man.

‘I am hungry Father.’

The man slapped Tilo across her face. Tilo’s eyes instantly sprouted tears. The man’s hands stung worse than her mother’s ever had.

Tilo kicked and punched and pushed and tried to break free from the man’s hand as he dragged her towards a room in the inside of the house…

– x – x –

‘Mother!’

Tilo called out to her Mother who was sitting by the pot of water that was kept in one corner of their house. Mother turned to look at her daughter.

‘That man was not at all nice Mother. Who was he? Why did you leave me with him Mother?’

Tilo’s mother kept staring at Tilo. Suddenly she came up to her and fell at Tilo’s feet. Tilo got confused.

‘Mother! Why are you touching my feet!’

But just as Tilo touched her mother’s arms in order to lift her up, her mother’s body broke out into a crackling fire. Tilo quickly stepped aside from her Mother, shocked at what she had witnessed. Tilo quickly went to the water-pot and tried to lift it. But she lost balance and the water spilled onto the floor.

The fire died out as mysteriously as it had erupted. Tilo looked around the house, but there was nothing there. No ashes, no sign that only moments ago there had been another individual in the room, as alive and breathing as Tilo. Tilo felt the old lady’s presence and turned around to look at her.

‘What happened? Why didn’t you save Mother like you saved me!’

But the old lady just smiled.

‘I wanted to tell her how you saved me from that man! I wanted to tell her you are not a bad woman!’

‘She wouldn’t believe you Janhavi.’

‘But she would! She was my Mother!’

‘Would you have believed her, if she told you the same?’

Tilo stood still.

‘Everyone has to find me and come to me on their own. No one can be pushed in my direction to seek me. When their hearts seek me out, I shall heed. Till then, I shall wait.’

Tilo did not completely understand what the old lady had said, but she felt a lot calmer anyway.

‘Come.’

Tilo looked at the old lady’s hand, and wondered if she should take it. But somewhere she knew even before she took the hand that the choice had already been made.

Her life had already been changed.

Her path and her destiny were never going to be the same again.

And she was tied to this woman for eternity.

Tilo took the old lady’s hand and they walked out of the house.

GIRLS, GOSSIP AND GET-TOGETHERS

2010-08-18T00:09:00.001-07:00

Is it really that easy to spot a person struck by the Cupid’s arrow?

I find it rather amusing how you can just tell when someone around you falls for someone. Even the most composed and expressionless of persons are not able to conceal it.

I happened to meet one of my friends – rather two of them – after more than a month recently. We’d been planning and failing to meet since very many days. And then a chance call right after Trupti had got back from the graha-pravesh of her brother’s new flat, had me and my Tejashree driving to her place.

It was a nice fun-filled evening as we all talked almost simultaneously on three very different topics, gobbling idli-chutney side by side, and yet in perfect co-ordination, and also without losing track of what each one of us was talking about. We poured our hearts out, amidst the sound of spoons and plastic bags as we dug into a packet of fresh Chitale bakhar-vadi and a box of kalakand; we talked about who had been up to what recently, and who was bugging who in class, and how we missed sitting next to each other in lectures. We wished we were all doing the same thing in the same college, somewhere far away from home; or that we were roomies in a hostel just so that we could go to different colleges and do different courses and still not lose contact.

Suddenly someone came up with the idea of clicking pictures.

‘But who will click all three of us together?’

‘Arre timer hai na!’ I said, flaunting my new phone which doubled-up as a camera.

‘4 megapixels?’ Trupti inquired.

‘8!’ I exclaimed.

‘Cool!’

We ran around the flat looking for ideal supports to hold my cell in place so that we could all fit into the frame of the picture – problem being the fact that Tejashree and Trupti are both almost the same height, while I am much taller than both of them. Finally after hunting for almost half an hour we had assembled a tall stool, the box of modem, and a mixer-grinder.

‘Mrunal be careful yaar. Your phone is going to topple and fall,’ Tejashree warned me.

‘Jalla tujha tond!’ I remarked and we broke out into peals of laughter. Meanwhile Trupti was humming a song from a latest Salman Khan flick.

‘Oh my God Trupti! That is such an outrageous song!’ I remarked. ‘You’ve heard it?’ I asked, turning to Tejashree.

‘Ya!’ she replied. Then there was silence for a few moments, and Trupti again began singing the same song all over again –

‘Munni badnam hui, darling tere liye…’

Me – ‘Abe oye jhandu balm! Chup kar na yaar…’

Trupti – ‘Aga mi kay karu? Mala pin lagliye tya ganyachi!’

Tejashree – ‘Nahi nahi asa nahi. Kuna sathi jhandu balm jhaliyes te sang adhi!’

Trupti – ‘Arre no one yaar! There is no one in our class worth becoming jhandu balm for…’

Incidentally they then both turned to look at me.

‘Tu kyu itni hans rahi hai?’

I looked at myself in the mirror. My face was in fact blank. But their remark planted a smile on my face anyway.

‘Mi kuthe hastiye,’ I said grinning ear to ear.

Trupti – ‘Meko lagta hai teko koi mil gaya…’ she then went on to do a step from the song. She spread her hands out like Preity Zinta and Hrithik and started singing ‘Koi mil gayaaaaaa!’

I turned to Teju for refuge – ‘Ae ae! Tuppi cha patent! “Meko teko”! Remember?’

Teju mock laughed and then made a grave face – ‘Vishay badalu nako.’

‘Abe yaar kay tumhi doghi…’ I said, now even blushing a little. ‘Koi nahi hai baba!’

‘Arre I’m not saying you are going around with someone! But someone sure has caught your attention recently, hai na? In fact “hai na” kya, I know it for a fact – its written all over your face!’ Teju said.

‘And since when can you read faces?’ I countered her.

‘Vishay badalu nako!’ Tuppu repeated.

I looked at their anticipating faces. Damn. They were my best friends after all; they deserved to know – even though there wasn’t much to tell. And so I went on and told them about the guy who I had noticed recently.

‘See! I knew it! Right when you walked in through the front door I knew you had news!’

‘Eeks Tuppu! “You had news” kay are…’ I said. ‘It’s hardly anything! For all I know he could not even be interested in me.’

‘Ya. Or for all she knows, he could be gay!’ Teju added.

We all burst out laughing.

‘Ae nahi yaar, aise mat bol,’ I said.

‘Haan yaar Teju, aise mat bol – warna uska dil toot jaega!’ Tuppu added.

I made a serious face.

‘Trupti Naik, are you actually sassing your best friend? Don’t you dare sass me!’

‘Hauuuu! Ghabarle mi! Sorry sorry sorry,’ Tuppu mocked me a little more. ‘But I am honestly glad you are over that looser.’

Aha. The ‘ex’ creeps up.

‘Tuppu, he wasn’t a – ’ I said, defending him as was my habit. Tuppu cut me halfway through.

‘Don’t you dare defend him Mrunal. A guy like that can only be a looser, with all his intellectuality or whatever.’

‘Intellectual looser,’ Teju chirped in.

‘Hey! New term!’ Tuppu said.

‘Yes, we have a new term added to our dictionary now! Intellectual looser – a guy – ’

‘Common Teju, be technical. You are writing a definition.’

‘Oh yes! So; intellectual looser – a male Homo sapiens with above average IQ – ’

‘ – but below average EQ.’ I added. Tejashree and Trupti both turned to look at me. And then both suddenly dived towards me and put their arms around my neck. I smiled, hugging them back.

‘That’s the spirit girl. You’ve been wearing black for far too long now; it’s time to shed it.’

And right after that we clicked many pictures. All on timer. (Apparently the stool plus modem box plus mixer assembly worked just perfectly fine and gave us some really good pictures; or shall I say good memories?) We finished all the idlis and the bakhar-vadis and the kalakand. We stayed at Tuppu’s place till almost quarter to nine. And we had a blast. We all logged into our respective facebook accounts and uploaded the pictures pronto. By the time we reached home there were some comments on them too!

‘I am riding with you after so many days!’ Teju said, as we were driving back home on my Activa. She put her arms around me and hugged me – ‘I miss you yaar!’ she said. I put my hand on hers and replied – ‘I miss you too honey’; and it was not far from the truth. I did miss these two stupid idiotic but absolutely loveable girls from my Bachelors, though I had made new friends in my Masters. I thanked God in my mind – of all the things that had changed in my life over the past year, this had not; and it meant a lot to me.

I am happy.

A DIFFERENT LIFE

2010-08-18T00:07:00.001-07:00

I waited as my cousin Sonali fished for the keys to her flat in her purse. I was just dying to drop my bags and enter the shower – the Mumbai climate was already taking its toll on me and my senses; I was going mad! Our college had organised an industrial visit which had brought us to Mumbai. I decided to stay back and spend a day with my cousin while my friends went back with the class. I had been wanting to see my cousin’s place since a long time – since she got married to an IIT Professor in fact. They obviously lived on campus, and from her descriptions, her place sounded like a small bit of heaven on Earth.

She opened the door and we stepped into the place – and I immediately fell in love with it. It was a nice cosy little house that had a very welcoming feel to it. And just as she had mentioned time and again in our chats – it was windy. Very windy.

‘Wow!’ I said, as I heard all the earthen wind chimes around the place resonating in the wind. I remembered her picking them up from Pune before she shifted to Powai. ‘The chimes sound so lovely!’

‘Don’t they?’ Sonali said. I smiled.

‘Okay, I’m making a straight dash for your bathroom now! Where can I dump my stuff?’ I asked.

Sonali showed me to a little bedroom – this one had the wind chime that was shaped like the sun – and helped me with my bags.

‘I’ll make us cold coffee till you have a shower. Thike?’

I gave her the thumbs-up.

About half an hour later we were sitting in her balcony, enjoying cold coffee and chocolate sponge cake and Chitale bakhar-vadi that she loved and that I had got for her from Pune. It was a very different experience. I had never even dreamt I would ever be at Sonali-tai’s place, gobbling, gossiping and doing all girly stuff – we were both not like that. But then, here I was – and I was enjoying it.

‘So how was your visit?’ she asked.

‘Boh-ring!’ I said, munching on the cake. Boy was I hungry!

‘I toh just can’t figure out how you can study so much! That itself is so boh-ring! And hell, you stand first in class and college and all… really, you are disrespecting us all!’ se mocked. Apparently I was the youngest and most studious of all us cousins.

I laughed as I heard Sonali-tai bash me up a little more; though of course in a very sisterly and ‘I’m-proud-of-you-but-this-is-still-too-much’ kind of way. Just then the doorbell rang.

‘Hey! What happened?’ Sonali-tai said as she opened the door for my Sanjay-jiju.

‘Forgot some of my stuff,’ he said.

‘Hi jiju!’ I called out.

‘Oh hi! When did you get here?’

‘Just a while ago. How are you doing?’

‘Running late for a lecture as of now! We’ll catch up over beer and eats in the evening, ok?’ he said, as he headed for the door carrying a file in his hand.

‘Sure!’

He kissed Sonali on her cheek and looked at her, into her eyes. He whispered something softly that made her laugh and hit him playfully. I looked away, just out of respect.

Sonali shut the door and came back where I was sitting. I smiled at her.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘It’s so nice to see you and jiju like this,’ I said.

‘Oh Sanjay is very cool,’ Sonali added.

‘Waise, if I may ask, what happened with that other guy you were dating when you were working for that call centre in Pune?’

‘Oh him – well, it just didn’t work out.’

‘But I thought you were doing really well together…’

‘Yes; but things changed after I started going for the night shifts.’

I kept staring at her, a little at loss.

‘I don’t understand…’

She sighed. ‘It’s very difficult to maintain a relationship when you can’t even see each other. And then night shifts hardly leave you any time to do anything else.’ She paused. ‘It’s like; you just don’t have a social life anymore. No festivals, no get-togethers. You come home and sleep while your world is awake and going about their usual day to day life, and you wake up and go to work when everybody else is sleeping. It’s very frustrating.’

I waited for her to go on.

‘After a while you even stop being used to having people around you. You have issues having a normal conversation with your friends, your parents even sometimes. You become a recluse.’

I tried to imagine a life like that – it was a scary thought. I looked at Sonali-tai and I could see it was difficult for her to share all this. But she still kept going on.

‘I was very depressed for a long time. It’s too much of pressure. People only see the money; and I admit that is what even I looked at for a long time. I wanted to quit well before I actually did, but I kept working looking at the money that I needed to earn at that time. Easy money they say? It’s not easy at all. And then I couldn’t give him enough time either. So he called it quits. Rather we called it quits. He was not willing to wait, and I needed that job at that time.’

I looked at my cousin. She seemed such a different person as she was talking to me.

‘There are certain things that you just have to do in life,’ she went on. ‘Doing a job you don’t like, leaving a guy you don’t want to… No one makes or forces you to do them, but you know you have to do them for your growth, for your development. You need that experience at that point of time and it teaches you a lot of things that you may not learn otherwise. I am glad I kept the job rather than the relationship. Today when I look back, I am happy with the decision I made, cos now I am a little stronger than I was before; I can handle being alone a lot better, it’s helping me work out my relationship with Sanjay too. I am also a lot less judgemental about people who work in call centres. So all in all, I am glad it happened to me.’

EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE

2010-08-09T02:47:00.001-07:00

If there is any stalker out there on Facebook, or if any of my friends has been keen enough to observe, s/he would notice the number of people in my network has suddenly gone up. And quite drastically up too.

I was myself quite surprised to learn I now have over a hundred and seventy people in my network. But what was more surprising was many of them were from school.

It is no secret even from my schoolmates I suppose, that for a very long time I had this huge massive grudge against just about every soul from school. People who had made fun of me, people who had betrayed me, who had back-stabbed me, and people who I just plain simple didn’t like. Except for the last category, almost all others were at one point of time my close friends in school. And then things turned sour, and I stopped talking to these people and mixing up with them.

At the time it felt very nice. It felt like I was doing the right thing by not being with people who were intentionally mean, sometimes even arrogant, maybe even selfish. It felt good walking in the opposite direction as the crowd, or rather choosing to do so. It felt amazing to be the rebel.

I don’t remember who it was from my school that I first added on Facebook. But about a few weeks ago I added this girl who was always very nice to me, and who I used to – and still do – genuinely like. The entire school was friends with her, and still is, from what I gather from her Facebook album. Her wrists used to be full on Friendship’s Day every year, and almost everybody in school used to have a band from her tied on their wrists.

I added this girl, and we got talking. And she filled me in on everyone from our batch – who was doing what, where, who was flying off to where, who was switching career lines, and who still asked about me to her, even though only in passing, once in a blue moon. It felt nice to know how much kids from our batch had diversified. She sounded happy to have gotten back in touch with me. And I was happy too.

On a particularly uneventful lazy evening, I was browsing through her photographs – looking at all those familiar faces – and almost immediately all the familiar feelings arose all over again.

Hurt.

Anger.

Bitterness.

Anguish.

I felt raw.

And soon the wave of those feelings got washed over by this immense feeling of tire.

I felt weary. Exhausted.

I recollected how many people it was that I had told this tale to – of being teased in school, of having no or very few friends in school.

And a peculiar realisation hit me out of the blue – the realisation of how long I had carried this baggage with me, and how much it had kept me from enjoying my life.

It’s over six years that I have passed out of school; and six years is a long long time.

For six years I have been constantly hating these people; constantly thinking about how right I was and am and how wrong they were. I have been holding a grudge for so long in my life, and the ones I have the grudge against are not even aware of the fact. They have had their fun, they have had their time treating me the way they wanted, and they have moved on. And even after all these years I am still holding onto things that my peers did at an age when we were all probably not even aware of what is good, what is bad, and what does getting hurt by people mean.

Yes they teased me. But don’t kids do that all the time?

Yes they isolated me and didn’t really let me mix up and play with them. But isn’t that all a part of being kids in a school, a part of growing up?

They have done what they had to, and they have moved on in life.

But I am still there… I am still on that farm-house where everybody was teasing me and I was alone, I am still on that swing where I was crying while everybody else was laughing, I am still there on the first bench at school, having my tiffin alone, I am still at the dining table at someone’s house ignoring the grumbling in my stomach and pretending I am full when I am not just so that my friends don’t tease me, I am still on the sofa in my house watching Dil Chahta Hai and wondering what everybody is doing at the party and if my Mother has been able to lie properly about me not being well. A part of me is still back there, in a place and time and situation that existed ten years ago, and I am keeping memories of that moment fresh within me.

All this pain, this hurt – who for? What for?

Sometimes you need to forgive people not because they deserve a second chance, but more because YOU deserve a second chance; because you deserve to be happy and not be haunted by your past; because you have to grow and move on in life. And that is what I have decided to do.

I still cannot and never will be able to identify with that kind of fun that kids have in that particular age – where you all gang up and corner the not so bright or not so beautiful girl, or the nerdy guy, or the one who is afraid of spiders, or even the one who is very quiet and then tease him/her to your heart’s content and harass the poor child. I seriously cannot understand what kind of pleasure one can derive out of such kind of mockery.

I look back at those times in my life and I look at how I have emerged out of it. And I see what I failed to all these years – so much of who I am now, what I believe in, what I condemn, and who I hang out with has its roots back in what I went through in my childhood and adolescent years. It’s like, it has become difficult for me to imagine what kind of a person would I be now had I not developed or inculcated certain things in me post that trauma; for yes, at that age, it was a trauma in my life. And it really saddens me to see how certain things I inculcated in me back then are affecting my relationships with people now – how I find it so difficult to forgive people; how I always am sorting people’s acts as ‘good’ and ‘bad’, constantly that sorter is turned on and fully active; how because of this some of my friends are afraid to confide in me when they are in doubt; how I find it absolutely impossible to change myself even for the people I really love, people who I would really want to change for.

Yes they were not nice to me, but that doesn’t mean I must carry that baggage with me all through my life, or point at it whenever people don’t like things about me – this is what happened to me, so I am what I am now. We must from time to time try and learn to dispense unnecessary thoughts and memories – and by unnecessary I mean those that are going to do nothing but take away from your peace of mind; for that is what is most important at the end of the day. Just because you forgive someone for having wronged you doesn’t mean that you are agreeing with what the person did; it only means that you are exercising your power to choose just what you are going to let stay with you, and what you are going to let shape you and the person you are. Forgiving does not mean to accept the wrong people did – it only means to choose to overlook it, because you know it is not important, because after all they are only people too, because you know it is never a good idea to live in denial, self-pity or with a grudge, because you need to grow as a person, and because you know you deserve to be happy.

TILL KINGDOM COMES

2010-08-07T23:15:00.000-07:00

It is only recently that I have come to fully realise how important it is to do in life just and only that that you truly wish to do; forget the money, forget the job security, forget what is right, what is more logical, forget what everybody is doing, and what your parents wish you do or even what you “think” is right for you. Your inner gut feeling, your instinct will never fail you, and it is it that you must follow, all through your life. If it fails you – think again. try and remember – it must not have been your very first instinct.

I grew up listening to two kinds of people in my home. Mom always tried to bring me up in a balance – yes it is good to do what you want to, but you must also sometimes find a way to do that which is necessary, even if it is not something you particularly enjoy. Dad on the other hand preached about doing what the heart desires. And all my childhood I grew up believing in both the views. It is only now that I realise how far apart the two things are – and which one is it that’s going to be my life-mantra.

Few are the people who get to make a living out of what they most love to do. There are countless things that go into the decision – and enough has already been said about it by everyone around me and around you too, I’m guessing. But what I really want to say is – if you have a choice, make a right one. Make one that’s right for you, not one that’s been “held” right by generations and societies. Society is never there to pull you out of your abyss when you get depressed or suicidal. It is not a wrong thing either I guess. The world was here before me – it doesn’t owe me anything. It has always given me, from my first waking moment. But what’s to be remembered is – just as it doesn’t owe you anything, nothing that came after you in the world is its to take away from you; at least nothing that you are a part in the making or creation of. And you mustn’t let the world take it away from you.

I grew up hearing Dad say things like – be yourself, march to the beat of your own drummer. And I used to smile, amused at his remark. At the time I used to think – how strange is that! Cos I thought how could I be anyone else but me? But now I know just what he meant.

Don’t feel like going to work today? Don’t go. What do you say when the Boss asks? Exactly that – I didn’t feel like coming; maybe fabricate your reply with “and I didn’t want to do a dishonest job”! But there is absolutely nothing wrong in wanting to, or not wanting to do a certain thing once in a while, even if it is something you love to do!

Nothing is more important than your peace of mind, your quiet, your health and your happiness.

And you must not be required to wait till kingdom comes for it.

THE POWER OF THE MIND

2010-08-05T00:53:00.000-07:00

An idea once planted in the mind only knows to grow. I have said this in one of my earlier posts, and I am saying it again. Why? Cos that is exactly what has happened with this idea too.

A couple of movies seen in quick succession of each other is enough to make me go into the hyperactive overthinking mode. And that is exactly what has happened over the past couple of weeks.

I saw Inception. Then I saw Inception again. And then I saw Shutter Island. And I thought to myself – Man! I am going to write one good article on what these movies talk about. And I thought I will take some time, go on and do a little bit of homework and then come up with a fantastic article, like what my friend did a few days back. (Yeah Neha, I am talking of you.)

But hell. An idea once planted in the mind only knows to grow. So here I am; sitting in Barista, flaunting my new laptop, and typing away to glory, oblivious to the track playing in the background and the people staring at me and probably wondering why my eyes look so puffy, and why is my hair so messy. To complete the image is a half-eaten black forest pastry next to my laptop on the table. Now if only this headache will at least subside a little and let me think so I can pen down just what I am thinking…

*squeezes her temples hard*

Another reason for wanting to do my homework and then write this article – that is of course before the idea of writing this article grew too big to be ignored – is the fact that, this is a rather vast topic that I wish to write upon. And also the reason that more has already been written, by far more learned men than me on this topic, than can be understood in a lifetime. Men have wasted entire births, trying to grasp a fraction of what the human mind is, how it functions and what it is capable of; for there is infinitely more that it IS capable of doing, rather than NOT.

Is it really that hard to let go of an idea you possess? Or rather an idea that has possessed you?

While you are reading this that I have typed, you are thinking of something too, I guess. Every one of us is at almost every waking moment doing at least some amount of parallel thinking. As you are reading these words I have typed out, you are probably going back on a few incidents of your life, something you saw or read or experienced or felt. And if you aren’t, then me mentioning it must have triggered it. Isn’t it?

I will tell you what I am going through.

I am rethinking of an idea that has very deeply planted itself in my head. What it is, I am not going to tell you. At least I don’t plan to at this moment, maybe by the time I am done writing this article I will have let it slip anyway. But that idea is always in my head – not always conspicuous, but persistent. It is the background of my head, the thought on which other thoughts get piled over as the day proceeds, and the thought that remains when I go to bed at the end of the day; like a stage that may host many plays with different settings, but the basic skeleton remains after the play is over. Or like this headache I have right now that is refusing to go away, though it is not affecting my thought process.

Just think – how many times is a thought process ever involved in our beliefs? We hear something, and even before we are conscious of being in the process of making a decision whether to believe or not believe what we have just heard, we have already arrived at the answer. ‘I don’t believe you.’ Or ‘Yes of course! I believe in it/him/her.’ And then all our lives we just keep looking for things, people, places, friends, that reinforce our idea. ‘See, she believes in it too.’ ‘Ya he said the same.’ ‘Oh no, she is just so different, she doesn’t agree. I don’t like her.’

I saw Inception, and I couldn’t sleep after I got back home. An idea had been planted in my head. And I just kept going at it again and again and again.

Is it really possible to incept someone with a thought?

Is any thought ever entirely new to us?

People create worlds and realities that do not exist, based on their thoughts. A woman lives in a mental institution and thinks that all the doctors, the orderlies, other patients in the institution are all just milkmen, postmen, gardner… just imagine how deeply that idea has gripped her mind – so much so that she has created a world based on it, and that is the only truth in her life. Who are you to convince her otherwise?

Sometimes I say things like – ‘I just know it.’ And I have heard other people around me say similar stuff too. How do I know? How do they know? How do you just KNOW something? And is it really possible to just KNOW, without reason or logic?

We are only beginning to speculate certain things, ideas that our forefathers were not only sure of, but have written books about. The mind travelling outside the body; the secret that the herbs of the Himalayas hold; even biology, human anatomy; stars, planets, galaxies; we are only rediscovering knowledge. Stuff like life and death, rebirth.

I think our ancestors were more open and receptive to ideas. They gave every crazy thought or idea or imagination a chance – this could or could not be true. And I think they have gone far beyond what we, with our technology and with Science, can ever manage to even comprehend. They were the Originals; the only people to have ever been truly Incepted with anything at all – we are only trying to base everything on what we know.

They say we use only a fraction of the brain’s true potential or capacity when we are awake. And the rest, remains to be discovered. The subconscious, dreams, hallucinations, paranoia, extra-sensory perceptions, visions – there is so much more literature about the mind when we are not aware it is working than the waking mind. Even if they maybe only speculations – isn’t it fascinating that there are more of these than of things we are sure of? It’s like the selfish DNA – more of junk heterochromatin than can be understood to exist as compared to functional DNA. Is it all really junk? How do we classify useful and junk? The take of Indian philosophy on it is – it is DNA that we don’t put to use. We always hear of impossible feats that our forefathers and the generations of human beings before them could perform – tales that we call Legends. What happened to these abilities that our ancestors had? How did we lose them? Wouldn’t it be nice if we could travel outside our bodies in today’s world? Imagine – no air fare to visit our over-seas relatives! Did we get so absorbed in things we were inventing that we ignored ourselves and how our bodies worked? Got so absorbed in the silly toys we were making that we just forgot all about what else we are capable of achieving.

I close my eyes and try to look at humans today from an unknown creature’s point of view – an alien if you may – and I wonder, what would we be perceived as? A life form that is constantly analysing its surroundings, its environment and all that is around it; that which it can see, hear, smell, taste or touch. So knowledgable. Such understanding of physics, chemistry, of the world even. And what does this life form know about itself? Nothing. Or nothing MUCH.

We are so caught up by science and technology and machines, so wrapped up in basing our world only on the five senses that we are aware of, that we just never let ourselves to be truly incepted. When I think more deeply about this – I think that we would all probably go mad if we gave every crazy concept to ever possess our mind the chance of being true or not being true. But would it be so bad if ALL of us became mad? Not the connotation of mad that we usually associate with the word.

It is like the story of the city where one fine day everybody who drinks the water of a particular well goes mad. They decide to overthrow the King. A rather worried King then seeks advice of the Queen, who comes up with an amazing solution – ‘Let us drink from the well as well. Then we shall be as mad as they are, and all would be good again.’

That is what has happened with us I think – we have all been drinking from the well. And anybody who doesn’t is not normal – is abnormal. But who are truly abnormal, those who drink from the well or those who refuse to? In fact if we take a look at the word ‘abnormal’ it can be split up as ‘ab’ + ‘normal’ = above normal. Isn’t that a fantastic little joke that those we call abnormal are only above normal, above us?

I guess I have made you think about too many things already. And even if I haven’t, I’m running out of time; also feeling like I am going to catch a cold. I must get out of Barista and back home. But I have not said everything I want to. I am still going to do my homework and come with another one.

Hopefully I will be incepted by something while I am doing my research; and probably you have been too, while reading this article.

Amen.

TO EACH HIS OWN

2010-08-01T04:03:00.000-07:00

They say adhyatma, philosophy, spirituality is not everybody’s cup of tea, and that such knowledge comes to you only when you are ready for it, no matter how sincere your efforts, or how long your search.

I always find it amusing – how all these things work. All of us are in fact exposed to spiritual teachings ever since we are kids, but we are somehow not aware of them. Do good and forget. Tit for tat. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. Karma kar, phal ki asha na kar. Only that we never look at them like that.

But what really amuses me is the way destiny works at large scale – at the level of masses and people of a country, or inhabitants of a city or state, or staff of companies. What is amusing to me is how destiny works during natural disasters, during plane-crashes. We are talking here of hundreds and thousands of people who all happened to be at a particular place and at a particular time. What is it that brought exactly these and no other people there?

Someone may have chosen to fill in for someone at office when the Twin Towers were blasted.

Someone may have dropped out of a family trip that ended up on the beach right when the tsunami hit the beach.

Someone may have missed a flight that went on to end up in a plane-crash.

Just how does destiny work in such situations?

Were all the people who suffered anything during such incidents due with their share of this life?

Or is it exactly that that they were destined for – to have witnessed an accident like that?

We all talk about karma and bhog, and destiny, and how we are constantly bound in the birth and death and rebirth cycle. But things like narrowly escaping a car-accident, or joining a company just weeks before it is going to be dissolved or taken over by some other, or even good things, like an exam getting cancelled right when you thought you were unprepared for it – maybe not the last one, but all the others are life-changing experiences. It takes only a moment to lose your faith, your confidence, all the money you ever earned in your life, or even all the respect – and also only a moment to get it all back sometimes. Moments can make and break people, relationships, and history.

And to think of it, all this is a big chain reaction, a catapult, a cumulative effect. Everything connected to every other thing, all fine-tuned and never without a reason.

I have now turned to writing again, after a long gap, and when I look back at how my past year has been, it is amazing to know how every minute thing has played its role in bringing me to the point in life where I am right now – where I am thinking of taking up my writing more seriously and doing something about it. I was trying to get into some universities abroad for my Masters, but it didn’t work out for the silliest of reasons, then I didn’t get through at my second and third and fourth options, and finally had to settle for my last option. Then an entire year full of misunderstandings and miscommunications, fights, quarrels, discussions, consoling and counselling (more the latter than the former), then the ultra-depression mode, all that negativity around me… so many relations broken, so many friends lost, being failed and betrayed by so many people… and then emerging out of all this; like in the tail of the ugly duckling… emerging scratched and bruised, yes, but with better understanding of myself and of the people around me, of how the world is… then a chance tarot card session with my sister-in-law, a suggestion slipped in by her casually, (write about all this, let it come out of your system, in some form; why writing, cos you are good at it) and here I am, blogging all over again, writing all over again, happy all over again, but consciously aware of how deep the rabbit hole can go. One of my friends who is into palmistry and can also read faces said to me the other day – ‘You are soon going to change what you are doing in life now, and what you then become is going to be the best thing for you. It will change your life, and bring you name and fame.’ I don’t know about the latter, but yes, I have been thinking again about what it is that I want to do in life.

I used to worry myself sick as to why I couldn’t get into those universities abroad, and how come I could have made stupid silly mistakes and what went wrong. It is like, I could feel something was slipping out of my hands; like something had gone horribly wrong, just that I didn’t know what and why. And now when I look back at everything, I am glad I am not outside my country right now, stuck with lab-work in some university, for yes, that is how I feel about it now – I feel like it is a task, a job. I don’t enjoy it anymore… at least not as much as I used to before. And who knows, if this is what I am destined to be – a writer rather than a research person – then it makes perfect sense how everything went wrong and made me take up my last option, how all those people turned, how situations became the way they did. For each of these things has played a role no matter how small or how big, in making me think again.

It is one thing to have the capability or capacity to do something, and another to have the urge to do it. I can become an excellent lawyer. My father says I have all the makings of one – I have ‘all it takes’, in his words. That however, does NOT mean I take up law!

Yes I am someone who is seven out of ten times sure of what she wants. But that also means that when I want to change, I want to change. And people should accept that change just as they accept my decisions. Period.

But wait, I am drifting away from the topic!

Point is – everything happens for a reason. You get exactly that in life which you are destined for, and most of the times, it is what you deserve. In fact, it is almost always what you deserve, only we are not able to make out two plus two is four always. We have our grip so tight on the one ‘two’ in our hand that we fail to see the other ‘two’, which may well be lying right under your nose! We are delivered with exactly that what is meant for us – to each his own. Our share of this life is fixed, and who serves it to us, who become the instrument to deliver us, is fixed too. If I am to be betrayed by my most trustworthy friend, then that is what will happen. Only that will probably put me through a phase that will really change me into something that I ought to be. Just an acquaintance betraying me is not going to have the same effect, and so it won’t happen.

Why we act in a certain way in certain situations may not always be in our grasp. But nothing is without reason. Even co-incidence is nothing but merely the co-occurrence of two incidents…! It is rather fascinating to even try and understand how things take their natural course – for that is exactly what they do… take their natural course! So then what’s in our hands? To do good and forget. Maybe good things don’t always happen to good people – again a matter of destiny – but good always does beget good, and nothing bad will happen to you for a good deed you do.

COBWEBS IN THE CLOSET

2010-07-30T05:34:00.000-07:00

It is really amusing how we just can’t get rid of certain things in life no matter how dirty, old or useless they maybe. An old t-shirt, a favourite pair of jeans, an old stamp, your first watch, the first diary, the first thing you bought out of your first salary…

I happened to come across a carry bag in one corner of my drawer today morning while I was looking for something to keep my project papers in. I came across the bag – with a name on it that was at one point very special to me. I looked at the bag that had once carried a beautiful set of pearls for me in a beautiful brown coloured case with a note in it, and with lots of love. I looked again at the name on the bag that was at one point very special to me; and I looked at it with no emotion, no feeling or bonding or attachment.

That is what love does to you sometimes. It exhausts you, depletes you completely of any kind or form of love once it leaves you. And that is what has happened to me.

I still have the pearl set with me. It is far too beautiful for me to give it away to anyone. And it is the only gift that I have ever got that was really a surprise for me. I mean, I knew a gift was coming my way, but I didn’t know it would be what it was. I never knew or thought he was capable of picking up something like that. But he did, and it meant a lot to me. At least back then it did. And I cannot give it away.

But the pearl set remains in its brown case – untouched, unworn and out of sight. I never had the occasion to wear it, though I loved it very much. It is strange, considering the fact that I have had it for more than a year now. One year, so many festivals, so many family functions and get-togethers, and still not one chance good enough for me to want to wear it.

But the pearl set remains. I cannot somehow bear to look at it; for fear of releasing the emotions I have so painfully locked away in some trunk and thrown at the bottom of the sea in my mind – irretrievable. I am just not able to look at the set anymore; at least not without feeling a pang in my chest that refuses to go away for a long long time.

But I have somehow still kept the bag the pearl set came in – with the name on it that was at one point very special to me. I haven’t gotten rid of the bag, though I know I can. Of course I haven’t intentionally kept the bag with me either. But it just has remained with me for a while now. And I don’t really know if I have grown attached to it or what, but throwing it away doesn’t feel right anymore somehow.

And that is how the human mind is – an idea, a feeling, an emotion once planted in the mind only knows to grow. Happiness becomes mirth, boredom becomes frustration, laziness becomes inertia, and sadness becomes melancholy. Although what it is with the bag that makes it impossible for me to throw it out I still don’t know. The name, the person who the bag came from, what he did to me and where I have landed because of him also do not seem to be reasons enough for me to throw it out. I am conscious I have not intentionally kept the bag, as I have the pearl set on the other hand, and the note that came with it, and the coffee bill with a remark in his hand at the back of it, and a picture of ours that my friend had clicked for me.

And yet the bag remains, in one corner of my drawer, with a name on it that was at one point very special to me.

KIN

2010-07-29T09:29:00.000-07:00

Pune, 29th July 2010.

It was a horrific site on Senapati Bapat Road as I came back from my project place today – an entire seven storeyed building on fire, just like in the movies. The whole business complex had become a furnace – fire lashing out from all different openings that the building had. The terrace and the last floor of the building were completely wrapped up in a thick black blanket of smoke.

Me and my friend had already seen the smoke from about two kilometres away, and we had tried to find out what it could have been. I dropped my friend off at the bus stop.

‘Tell me what it is if you find out,’ she said, before I drove away. And within a couple of minutes I was staring at the business complex inferno.

All sense was lost to me for a moment. I could hear no sound, see no traffic, and sense nothing as I stared at the flames coming out of the building, threatening to wrap around everything that came in contact with them. I just kept staring at the site, totally numb and speechless. It was only when my hand went to my face to wipe out what I thought were rain drops did I realise I was crying.

I tried to make myself stop. But the tears just kept coming. I drove along the footpath at almost nil speed, staring at the fire. I just couldn’t take my eyes off it. When I reached opposite the building, a whistle blew right in my ears, and my sense returned. There was a huge crowd that had gathered on the streets and was staring at the building. A few traffic policemen were trying to control the traffic and divert it onto appropriate roads, blowing on their whistles time and again. I stopped to the side of the road and parked my bike. My eyes were as if glued to the scene of peril.

‘Tumcha kuni ahe ka aat?’ (Is anyone you know inside that building?) a boy standing next to me asked me. I nodded ‘no’, still looking at the building and the fire brigades parked nearby.

‘Mag ka radtaye tumhi?’ (Then why are you crying?) the girl with the boy asked. That remark somehow made me tear my eyes away from the building and look at the couple.

‘Mhanje?’ (What do you mean?) I asked. And the boy just shrugged. The girl looked at him, and then they both looked at me. I turned my eyes back at the building. They took a couple of pictures and then drove off.

I looked at the building and everything happening around for a few more moments. Something gave my feet momentum and I walked back to my bike. The policemen brandished their lathis at people, trying to get them to move away from the scene. I sat on my bike and drove away from there.

I was still quite in a dazed state as I drove on towards my home. The site of the building on fire, of people standing around and looking, of smoke coming out of the building, the fire brigades parked nearby kept coming back in my head again and again. My ears had somehow gone mute again. All I could see were scenes, like in a silent movie. And then suddenly I heard the girl’s voice ringing in my head –

‘Mag ka radtaye tumhi?’

And then like a record that gets stuck in a gramophone, those words were the only ones ringing in my mind for a while, until they were like a battle cry.

And they made me angry. And frustrated.

‘Mag ka radtaye tumhi?’

I honestly do not know why I started crying when I looked at the building. No one I know, none of my friends or relatives was working in that building. I didn’t even know the different offices that the building housed. And yet the site of that building on fire, on a street I travel by everyday alarmed me, scared me, and made me cry.

Is it so that we must cry only when someone we know is hurt or faces a mishap?

Why have we become so immune to each other’s pain?

I honestly, genuinely felt worried sick for the people in that building. I thought of their families, their relatives, waiting for them to return home from their work. Maybe some had dinner plans; maybe it was someone’s birthday; first day of work for someone; a day of promotion even. Maybe someone had fought with her boyfriend before coming to office that day – would the boyfriend be able to forgive himself for having fought with her? Maybe someone had decided to not go out for lunch with friends because there was extra work that day – would they all be able to see their friend again?

The real cause of the fire is not known yet, it will probably come in the papers tomorrow. But I am guessing that with the rains and all, it must have been a short circuit that must have caused the fire. But short circuits can happen anywhere, right? What if there was one to happen in my college tomorrow? Or one at Dad’s office? Or maybe even in our own home?

And in a worse come scenario – what if I had people like the couple I spoke to around me when my family was in trouble?

The thought sincerely scared me.

Why is it that we have become so immune to the feelings of people around us? What has made us so stone hearted as to not feel anything when we see a whole building on fire, just because no one we know is burning inside? It is a shame if our material things and all the progress we are making is also making us so insusceptible at the same time. I don’t mean to say that we should cry at the slightest of bad news and should go and pay our respect to every family to ever have faced death. But if people have come to a state where they look at a scene like the one I saw today and feel nothing, it is something to worry about indeed.

This brings up a lot of issues to the forefront. On reaching home I learned that all people from the building were rescued and were safe, with no major injuries – it was running on one of the news channels. And still that unsettling feeling had not dissipated from within me. How is it then that terrorists are able to plan the killing of thousands and lakhs of people? We come close to driving over a small kitten or puppy on the road and we screech to a hault. That is our first instinct – to not harm the kitten or puppy. It gets our heartbeats racing and our pulse shooting. Then how is it that people are able to kill someone? What might be the reason to make them the way they are?

I understand that we cannot really put the aam janta and killers, murderers and terrorists in the same balance pan, but looking at all of them as human beings, don’t you agree that as a race, humans are becoming more and more self-absorbed? As long as I am happy, my people are ok, and no one I know is in trouble, I couldn’t care less if a train blew up in Mumbai, or if a Tsunami left scores of people homeless, or if a building in my city caught fire. How did we get to this point?

This is not an issue that you play the “blame-game” with. This is more something to think and reflect on. We see an accident, and all we do is look upon the people with our arms crossed across our chests. We look at the mother trying to calm her child and find her keys and other belongings while the minor who dashed into her speeds away. We neither offer the poor girl water or first-aid, nor do we note down the number of the vehicle the minor kid was driving. We are no help, just a bunch of on-lookers. Imagine a case of reverse – how much would we curse the spectators just standing around doing nothing? I know people who have become paralysed for the rest of their lives, lost an arm or leg, or even their eye-sight or speech because of not getting help in time. Why do we run away from an accident when it has been our fault? Why are we so scared of the police? Why aren’t we responsible enough to take blame of some wrong we have done, and at least try and make amends?

It is all about me, and my pain, and my suffering, and my family, and my friends, and my happiness, and my comfort, and my benefit – me, my I. I want this. I want that. I was cheated. I was hurt. I am disappointed. People have failed me. When will we come out of the ‘I’ and look at the ‘we’? Ask yourself this – when was the last time you helped someone out, genuinely and only because you wanted to help him/her out? When was the last time you did something for someone without thinking ‘Now I can ask him/her for a favour sometime’?

I do not know what it is that is taking our attention so perfectly away from each other and the people around us, so much so that no one matters to us much anymore. I do not know what is making the human race the way it is. But if we all do our part of thinking, I am sure we can come up with ways to change this – for this is a change definitely required.

Everyone, each and every single person on this planet, is capable of doing good karma – from convicts to the innocent. And it doesn’t matter whether you believe in luck, fate, destiny and stuff like that or you don’t; good always begets good, what goes around comes around, and good things do happen to good people.

WAVE OF UTTER GIBBERISH

2010-07-28T07:54:00.000-07:00

I hate Chetan Bhagat.

I never thought I would ever get this kind of a feeling. But I did, within less than a moment, today, when I was at Crossword.

Now, lemme take a moment here to dwell a little bit into my relationship with the author.

I was in 11th standard, when I read my first Chetan Bhagat book. Or rather when he wrote and published his first book. And I instantly fell in love with it. I gifted the book to many of my friends on their birthdays, and the popularity of the book spread like wild fire. Suddenly everyone was reading Five Point Someone, communities sprung up on Orkut, and people started having competitions of who had read Five Point Someone the most number of times.

Then came One Night @ The Call Centre.

And then 3 Mistakes Of My Life.

And somehow I started liking him lesser and lesser.

Somehow I still felt a little… how do I put this, ummm… I felt a little ‘committed’ to him. Like I had to ‘like’ him, in spite of him not writing stuff good enough anymore, just because I had immensely liked his first book. Yeah, I am that kind of a person. I feel like I am cheating and being unfaithful to admit that someone I like, or used to like is not so great anymore. But yeah, that is more or less how I felt. I used to try and find something good, something positive about his books. And I failed and failed.

And then came the final blow: 2 States.

I read that book and swore to never read another Chetan Bhagat book ever in my life. But I still didn’t hate him. He had, through his book, given me some precious moments, some unforgettable, funny, happy moments. And for that I was happy.

But I totally lost it at Crossword today.

I was an hour early for a show at E-Square. And with another book lover by my side, I stepped into Crossword to kill time till the show. I turned straight to the fiction section and browsed through the different titles. I added a couple to my list of must-buys – a list that is never empty. At one time there were about 34 books in the list, and the least number of books to be in that list has been 5. I turned to the book lover with me – Mom – and observed her as she leafed through some of the Marathi titles. And then I turned to the rack that is near the billing counter at any Crossword store – I am not sure if it is one of New Arrivals, or of Recent Best Sellers. But I turned towards it. And I wished I hadn’t.

Out of about 42 books arranged six in a row in total seven rows, roughly 30 books were of the kind that I call ‘the Chetan Bhagat genre’ – one average student, smitten by one ravishing (or maybe not so ravishing, if the author is trying to be different) girl, stuck in a college he doesn’t like, with professors who hate him, and then there is the lowest low, and then something happens and everything is eventually alright. Invariably there is a hostel involved, so it has to be an IIM or IIT where the story is based. Then there are the parents with high expectations, the topper who is waved in the face as an example at every possible chance, and our rebel who always scores less and has friends who make him feel less guilty – more often than not by throwing a booze party.

Just looking at the shelves made me sick.

Oops I Fell In Love.

The Lost Scarps Of Love.

Heartbeats And Dreams.

Crazy Bloody Thing Love.

The Equation Of My Love.

The Kiss In The Rain.

She Broke Up I Didn’t.

Everything You Desire.

Jab Se You Have Loved Me.

The Journey To Nowhere.

(The last one had a tag line even, which went – ‘unfortunately a true love story of a medical’.)

I almost puked.

Lemme get a few things straight though, before I move on.

I have been in love and out of it. And yeah, it makes you happy to be in love and be loved, and yes it hurts like hell to come out of it. I have no intention of ridiculing young love, or the problems youth faces today, or the stress that the education system puts on them – no. I know what it feels like when you and your problems are not taken seriously. It sucks. Big time. There is no better phrase I could use.

But that does not mean that if one person gets up and writes a book about all this everyone should follow and jump into the well as well…! Not everyone can do it! In fact even the guy who started it all can’t do it that well anymore, I think.

I really do not like what is becoming of the Indian Fiction Writing scenario – all these wanna-be Chetan Bhagats sprouting out of nowhere like mushrooms in the rain and coming up with utter rubbish that is not even remotely enjoyable. Find your own thread people! Choose your own subjects, make your own cocktail! Explore other things in life! It is not that the youth wants to read about only this. For the mere lack of better stuff to read, we sometimes have to pick up books we wouldn’t even give a second thought too. These people write one book, become a one-time wonder (in fact I am not even sure if I should call them a ‘wonder’ at all) and then fade away like they never existed. I mean seriously, do we even call them writers? Ruskin Bond and many other authors wrote simple stuff too, about everyday people and places and situations. But they were never boring! And not in the least stereotypical! And they did NOT all write the same kind of stuff over and over again.

There are so many issues out there that need the attention of the common people. And by this I do not mean grave things like child labour or sexual harassment or drug addiction or students suicide or girl infanticide. Even simple, less burdening stuff, like lack of interest in theatre among the youth, changing cultural tendencies, fashion trends that make no sense really but are spreading like wild fire, the types and kinds of movies that are made these days, where is the music industry headed to, what is becoming to good journalism, why has the media become the way it has, why do more and more people break traffic rules these days, how you can make a difference in keeping our city greener.

I think writers have a responsibility towards society. But if you look at it more as an opportunity, it won’t burden you. Every writer has the opportunity to affect a change, to create a revolution, to start a movement, to set a trend. Every writer has the potential and the tool in his hand to bring about inception of new ideas. Every writer has the voice that a thousand people will hear when they read his books – and in a world that is soon becoming overcrowded with everybody begging to be heard, and where mobile networks are always busy, that is quite something.

I call myself a free-thinker. I write stuff and put it up on my blog, and facebook. Yes at some point of time in life I want to be a published author, and I am trying to work little by little on my novel that I wrote a couple of years ago. I know how hard it is to get published and not be forgotten by your readers. But when I look at these mushrooms springing up in, I lose all hope and think I am a fool to spend so much time on improvising what I created a few years back. If writers – if at all one is to call them that – like these can get published, I don’t know why I am still posting stuff on my blog.

Please please realise the power you have people. You have a gift – of having your way around with words – that many people out there would give anything for; people with better ideas maybe, but no platform to express them to the aam janta. You have it. Use it wisely.

No I am not against pleasure reading/writing. But it doesn’t mean everyone writes an IITian’s story, or a love story, please! Whatever has happened to other genres? Thriller? Action? Sci-fi? Humour?

I see a wave of change coming in the Hindi Cinema. It is not so big, but it is soon catching up and more and more people are liking it. I hope and wish to see that change come in Indian Literature as well. I will really almost tear it apart if I see another title belonging to ‘the Chetan Bhagat genre’ next time I am at a bookstore, I swear I will! It really fills me with anger and disappointment to look at all these people who could become great writers even, maybe, writing such mediocre stories and books. And what angers me further is that everybody is actually reading these books! I once even met someone who said – I read Chetan Bhagat. Like he is Wordsworth, or Shakespeare, or R K Narayan even. I really honestly have nothing against Chetan Bhagat, seriously. I empty my book cupboard once in a while and pull out my old tattered copy of Five Point Someone and read it all over again, I really do! But not everyone can write another Five Point Someone. And more than that, the point I am trying to make is – STOP trying to. There is a lot more in you that you must explore! And who knows, if you try really hard, you’ll be even better than Chetan Bhagat ever was or will be.

WALKS OF LIFE

2010-07-25T01:14:00.001-07:00

‘I really need to get it done today. Can you please help me out? I will wait back tomorrow to make up for today if you want. But I have to go now. I have to leave. Please yaar…’

I looked at my lab partner and the look of utter determination on her face – determination of non-cooperation. I took one look at her face – and I couldn’t look any more; for I am not a good liar, and I somehow didn’t want to get caught that day. All I needed was some quiet. I wanted to be alone. There was no pressing family matter that I had to attend to – it was my own pressing need of wanting to be home that mattered more to me that day; more than anything else in the world.

I don’t like being weak. And I absolutely don’t like begging or pleading people for anything. I don’t like to ask for help, but this has got nothing to do with me wanting to put up an image of me. It’s just the way I am. I’d rather be on the other side of the table and help people out than ask them for help.

But a lot of things happen in life for the first time. And I was only beginning to discover what all that included.

My lab partner miraculously fell for my lie – or at least showed like she had; for she agreed to cover up for me that day and do some of my lab work. And that to in exchange of nothing. I guess she sensed something amiss. I picked up my books and packed my bag and left before she changed her mind.

To hell with the project and the thesis and my guide and my lab partner and college and everything in life.

To hell with catering to people’s needs.

Today, it was my turn.

I switched my phone off as I climbed down the stairs. Mom was not going to be home either today. And dad was going to come back late. So I had the whole house to me. And I wanted to make everything of it. Didn’t want to attend to or talk to or be disturbed by anything. Today it was going to be just me.

I decided to pick up Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup on my way home and make myself hot chocolate and enjoy the rains, cuddled up on my bed under a big quilt, looking outside my window.

But I was restless. Yes something was definitely amiss.

I tried to put the feeling away and sought after getting home as early as I could. But as fate would have it, one of the loneliest streets in the city was exceptionally busy that day, and I was soon caught in a massive traffic jam. Quite reluctantly I switched my phone on again and played some music. Soon the mood of the song got me and I began to nod my head ever so slightly to the beat of the song. I observed the people around stuck in the traffic jam with me. A guy on the bike next to me tried to strike up a conversation.

‘Music lover, eh?’ he asked.

I just smiled.

He looked away. And suddenly at the exact same moment we had both spotted two street kids – one boy and one girl – sitting under the fly-over, and the kids had looked at us. They started talking among themselves. The guy turned to me again.

‘I bet they are going to be here in no time,’ he said to me – like that wasn’t the most obvious thing at that moment. But the kids surprised us. The boy quickly got up and came running to us from in between all the vehicles. The girl stayed put where she was.

The small kid somehow skipped me and chose my ‘friend’. The guy first denied to give him anything, but then pulled out a one rupee coin and placed it in the boy’s hand. The kid happily bounced off to join his mate under the fly-over. He held up the coin for his friend to see and teased her. She looked at him for a moment and then turned away. I looked at the guy next to me.

‘I can never beg anyone for anything,’ he said.

‘Neither can I,’ I spoke my first words to this stranger. ‘But just imagine a way of life like that.’

We both turned to look at the kids again. The boy had procured a handful of peanuts out of what he had just received. The girl with him looked at him – but there was no longing on her face. She just looked at him as if to observe him. Or just about as casually as we were both looking at them. She then turned to look straight at me – a pair of eyes looking straight into another pair of eyes. Somewhere I had connected with this girl. I could see a part of me in her, and I guess she sensed it too. We both just kept looking at each other for a long time, as if we were only looking at our own reflections in the mirror. Begging was not a way of life for both of us – though the connotations and implied meaning of the word maybe very different in each of our lives – and it would never ever be; we wouldn’t let it ever be. Even in our lowest low, we would rather die than beg.

I let my lips curve up in a very small smile. But the girl didn’t return the gesture. She didn’t need any stranger’s sympathy or friendship. She didn’t need to smile back at me just because I was rich and might take a liking to her and give her some money or nicer clothes to wear or something to eat. She was cordial, in the least; for there was no animosity on that sweet little face with its child-like features and mismatched grown-up eyes. But there was no sign of amity either. And yet, that little face under the fly-over was not blank or devoid of expressions.

I went home and spent that entire day with the memory of that face in my head. Somehow in those few moments I had connected with that girl to such a depth as was unimaginable. Next day was a Sunday, so I didn’t have to go to my project place. But I still went to that road under the fly-over – just to catch a glimpse of that face again. And there she was, right where I had seen her yesterday. Only the boy was missing. I went and stood under the fly-over, a little distance from her.

‘Ikade ye,’ I said. (Come here.)

She got up and walked up to me. Only then did I realise there was blood stain on her torn frock.

I looked at it and asked – ‘Kay jhala?’ (What happened?)

‘Munna ala hota, gheun jayala.’ (Munna had come to take me away.)

‘Mag?’ I asked (So what happened?)

She quietly walked back to where she had been sitting and pulled out an iron rod from under a few gunny bags and showed it to me. I looked at it, and looked back at the girl. There was no sign of remorse or regret on her face.

‘Kaam dein. Paise pan. Khana, pina sagle. Shalet pan jayala milel. Yetes?’ (I will give you work, food and money. You will even go to school. Will you come along?)

She nodded.

I took the girl home. All the way back there was a battle of two voices in my head. On the one hand I was feeling guilty about making a small girl work. I strongly object child labour. But on the other hand, I knew this girl wouldn’t come with me if I didn’t give her anything to do. She was not one to accept favours. And I didn’t want to leave her on the streets, to the mercy of more Munna’s.

I opened the door to my house. Mother was standing near the phone. She saw me and put the phone down.

‘Kuthe geli hotis sakal-sakali? Sangun jayachi paddhat?’ (Where had you gone so early in the morning? Couldn’t you tell me?) She then saw the little girl behind me, and her expressions changed. I turned to the girl.

‘Naav kay tujha?’ (Whats your name?)

‘Sangi.’

‘Avadta tula?’ (Do you like it?)

She nodded ‘no’.

‘Kuthla naav avadta tula?’ (Which name do you like?)

‘Madhuri.’

‘Thike. Chal, anghol karun ghe.’ (Ok. Go and have a bath now.)

She walked away into my room. I told Mom about her. She was glad I had got her home.

I went inside the room and took out an old t-shirt and a pair of shorts from when I was a kid and gave it to her to wear.

‘Udya jaun tula navin kapde gheu.’ (Let’s get you some new clothes tomorrow.)

I smiled at the girl, and I knew she was going to smile back at me; for that was her way of expressing gratitude, she would do no more than that. She was never going to hug me, or touch my feet, or sing false praises to me of how good I was, and God bless me for helping her and all. But she had accepted to come into my home in exchange of work and a better life. And I was glad she had.

The girl smiled back at me. And I knew I had got that younger sister I had always wanted.

RUGBY VS. ARCHITECTURE

2010-07-25T01:13:00.000-07:00

I do not like to start the day with a debate or an argument usually; but today turned out to be different.

As I sat at our dining table having breakfast, mother came and announced –

‘Do you know? Shambhavi has decided to quit rugby.’

‘What? Why?’ I asked, clearly not able to think of one sane reason why a girl in the Potentials list of International Rugby Team would want to quit suddenly; right when she was at the foothill of what could be her pinnacle.

‘She is not able to manage her studies and rugby both.’

Sigh. The age old discussion or career versus sports.

I got into quite an argument with my mother over it – which in retrospect I shouldn’t have, given that Shambhavi is neither my daughter, nor my sister, neither my best friend. She happens to be one of my schoolmates kid sister. But this is an issue very close to my heart.

Even as we have stepped into the 21st century, some thoughts, concepts and beliefs have gripped us so hard – or rather we have held onto them so firmly – that we just can’t seem to be able to dispense them.

Even today a parent is not able to convince her daughter that one can make a career in rugby too – or the parent very conveniently ‘leaves the decision upto’ the child.

Has the daughter really chosen to give up rugby because she can’t cope with studies and rugby together? And maybe she genuinely can’t cope with the two things. But would she have chosen to give up ‘rugby’ if she knew the option of making a ‘career’ in it was open/available, or that her mother would be ok with it?

And we are not talking about any random girl here. We are talking about someone who has dedicated a significant amount of her life to a sport she dearly loves, has crossed every hurdle and passed every level of selection, who has given up movies and get-togethers and maybe even a part of her social life, a boy-friend even, just so that she be able to give rugby time. We are talking here of a girl who has exceled to such a level that she is now part of the Potentials list for the International Rugby Team – a chance to represent a nation’s people for the sport she so dearly loves.

Does one give so much time and energy to something one even has the slightest idea of not being able to pursue further? I don’t think so. Every five years can now be regarded as a generation. And these newer generations are way more liberal, straight forward and free-thinking than we can imagine. Maybe few years ago this would have seemed a ridiculous idea – first the fact that it’s a ‘girl’ we are talking about, and then the fact that it is ‘sports’ we are talking about. But kids today know what they want - from making a career in dance, to becoming a free-lance self-taught photographer, to choosing to study Sports Management in the States.

But just so that their parents are happy, or just so that they don’t have to deal with too much of unnecessary debate, discussion and maybe even quarrels at the end of the day on the dining table, they will chose to travel on the same old road.

I am not trying to say that everyone should go for just exactly what their heart desires, without looking at the practicalities. But definitely a girl of the potential of Shambhavi should not be wasted in a classroom, with 60 other heads to accompany her, learning how to build buildings. No.

I think it is time we revise our concepts about ‘good career’ and ‘bad career’. Had Shambhavi known she could pursue rugby in place of architecture, maybe she would have. Yes we do need to think about money too – and there is nothing wrong in it. There is absolutely nothing wrong in ensuring you are going to be able to fill your stomach and still have cash to buy that beautiful diamond set or that amazing gizmo you saw on your way back home from college or work. But then rugby pays too! Probably more than architecture even! Then why not choose to do the work you love rather than making yourself love the work you do?

Shambhavi has still not taken her final decision… but something tells me she is going to end up quitting rugby. What the poor girl needs right now is just a bit of moral support from her parent and relatives. I know it somehow, just as I know she is going to end up quitting rugby, that she doesn’t really ‘want to’ quit… and till the day she finally decides, I will keep hoping she doesn’t.

MUNGFALI

2010-07-19T07:11:00.000-07:00

It didn’t feel anything like coming home.

I was quite upset with Dad for not getting our new house ready by the time I had to leave the city. But it had been for a totally different reason. Having found my love in a new city where I had gone for an assignment, I was sure I wanted to get married to him, and as early as I can. And as if I had a premonition about the whole thing earlier, I used to keep hurrying Dad to get our new house ready so that we could shift into it as soon as possible, and I would get to enjoy it for at least a while – the balcony in my proposed room, the huge terrace. I had spent nights dreaming of all the barbecue parties I would throw on the terrace when the family got together, and all the sleepovers I would invite my friends to.

But none of this ever happened.

And now here I was, back from my assignment after a period of six months, and I had no clue what to expect from this new place I was going to call home, even if it was for a short while till I got married to my love.

I got out of the car and a smiling Balu greeted me.

‘Ya ya tai…’ (Come come!) he said, as he hurried and came forward to remove my bags from the dickey of the car.

‘Kasa ahes Balu?’ (How are you Balu?) I asked him. He just smiled in response. Balu had been with us for almost 10 years now.

I got into the elevator along with Mom and Dad. And soon we were right outside our house, and then inside the new apartment.

I admit, the new house was very beautiful, much more spacious, and didn’t look like a dumpyard like our last one had looked.

But I just didn’t feel right.

I went into my room. Mom and Dad eagerly tagged behind me, to get my first expression I guess, on seeing my new room and all. It was just like I had wished it to be. But it still didn’t feel right. All the old belonging that I had wanted to keep were there in the room – an old dressing table, my favourite soft toy, my first quilt, the study table and the photo-frame I used to keep on it. And even the new things – right from curtains to the lamp shade, to the new phone connection in my room – were in the place and just as I wanted them to be.

But it didn’t feel right. Didn’t feel like home.

I immediately wanted to turn around and say to Dad – something’s missing. But I saw the look of expectation and anticipation on my parents’ faces, and I lied. They had taken immense pains to make up for not getting the new house ready in time – every minute detail of my room, even stuff I had forgotten I had ever mentioned/asked for was there and had been taken care of. I smiled my best false smile and said –

‘This is beautiful, I love it!’

Mom came forward and hugged me.

‘I am so glad you liked it! Dad has put in a lot of efforts to get it ready!’ mom disclosed finally; and I was glad I had lied.

For many days after that I tried to grasp that which seemed to have gotten lost as we had shifted just few blocks down the road. I tried to find that sense of familiarity, that feeling of belongingness, of comfort. The feeling of home. But I failed everyday. I just couldn’t I kept missing and wishing for my old room, my old house – the house that felt like home. Even with all the matched curtains and sofa sets and the complementary furniture and everything, it still felt like somebody else’s house. I tried to feel what Mom felt when she talked about our new house with her friends, but I couldn’t.

And then one day I woke to the smell of Mungfali’s at my bed-side.

That smoke that rises from fresh mungfali’s after they have been just roasted on coal – it is my most favourite smell in the world. It is the smell of my childhood.

I sat up on the bed, rubbing my eyes and smiled lazily at the same old wicker basket in which Mom used to remove the mungfalis after they had been roasted, and covered them with a thin cotton cloth, to retain the smoke in it just a little longer. I couldn’t possibly count the scores of mornings when I had woken up to that smell by my bed side.

I picked up the basket and came out in the drawing room. I went and sat in the balcony, on the swing, holding the basket between my legs and looked at the first colours of the morning being splashed across the sky. I didn’t even realize when Dad came and stood behind me. All I can say is, he had been standing and observing me for quite a while – because when I happened to look at him, he had the sweetest smile on his face. I pulled my legs together and made room for him to come and sit on the swing next to me.

He came and sat down and put his arm around me and said –

‘Welcome home Mau…’

And suddenly it felt like I had finally come back home again.

25

2010-07-09T08:21:00.001-07:00

Woke up with a wonderful feeling yesterday that lingered till my last waking moment before I hit the bed. Mom had gone out to meet her group of friends at Vaishali early morning, and it was only after she got back and rang the bell did I wake up from my slumber. I quickly put on my specs and opened the door for her. she stepped in. I turned around and went into my parents room and lied down next to my father. Mom came and sat next to him on the other side. I raised both my hands and stretched them out, one at each of them, and wished them –

‘Happy 25th Anniversary!’

Both smiled at me and then at each other very sweetly. Mom immediately got out of the bed. I got pissed off.

‘Bas na ga jara… kiti uthlya uthlya kat kat karte?’ (Sit for a while, no! why do you have to hurry into your chores right away?)

‘Tujha Ajja utarnar nahiye warun, swaypak karayala… baghu de mala kay kay karayachaye te!’ (Your grandfather is not going to descend from the heavens to make food! Lemme go and see what to do…)

She walked out of the room before I could further try to persuade her to laze around a little more.

‘Ashi kay arre hi!’ I said to Dad. (Why is she like this?) dad just raised his hand and let it fall right back onto the bed. I gave him a bear hug. Felt like childhood, when I used to get up and out of my bed, and come and sleep with Dad again for a while, every Sunday. Mom came into the bedroom and started complaining, completing the childhood memory.

‘Uth na ata bande, kay challaye?’ (Come on now, get up dearest! Whats going on?)

‘You should be the one hugging him! But since you are not, I am!’ I teased my mom. That finally did the trick and Mom sat down on the bed, laughing. Dad uttered his first words of the day –

‘Chal we’ll celebrate Lazy Day!’

‘Yay!’ I said.

‘Nandu arre jara aajchya divashi tari uth lavkar!’ (Nandu at least get up early today !)

Dad just nodded ‘no’ sleepily. And Mom agreed. Moither was being very easy to convince and coax today! Maybe she too didn’t want to actually cook food today or anything. I seized the opportunity.

‘Ok that’s it! The head of the family has declared it to be a Lazy Day, and so shall it be! I’ll go get eggs and bread. We’ll have nice omelet sandwiches for brunch!’

‘With cheesh!’ Dad added, his eyes still closed.

‘Okies! With cheesh!’ I said, mimicking Dad. About a couple of hours later we were all enjoying hot omelet sandwiches at our dining table.

‘What yaar! Twnty-five years with the same woman!’ Dad said, eyeing Mom out of the corner of his eye. ‘Don’t you think I should upgrade?’ he asked me.

‘Go and ask barni!’ I said. ‘Barni’ is a nick name we had all given to one of Dad’s very old college friends – Dad had been her romantic interest back in those days. They happened to have met recently at some wedding and were back in touch now.

‘Tereko 25 din bhi she legi na, toh main khud khushi khushi tereko talaq degi!’ Mom announced. (If she can tolerate you even for 25 days, I wil happily divorce you and step out of your way!)

‘No, but you know why I never remember our anniversary, or how many years it has been?’ Dad asked me genuinely. ‘Its because I never had to count…’

I put the sandwich in my hand down in my plate and clapped. ‘Brownie point, Mr Belvalkar!’ I said. Mom leaned in and gave Dad a hug. She served herself another couple of bread slices and went about making her second sandwich, when suddenly she looked at Dad and said –

‘Aila Nandu! Pacchis saal ke baad fir se omelet sandwich yaar!’ (Hey Nandu! Omelet sandwiches again, after 25 years!) And what followed was a Kodak moment. Dad, who is usually quite subtle about his emotions, actually high-fived Mom! And his face was lit up with the happiest smiles I had ever seen on that face, that reflected in his eyes. I looked at the two of them, having their moment, and smiled, satisfied and immensely happy. I wanted to ask Mom what she meant, but I didn’t. It was clear from their expressions that it was a very dear memory and probably also a top secret! And I wished to keep it that way… I continued to devour my sandwich and let them have their moment. Soon brunch was over and Dad had dressed up and was ready to leave.

‘Arre wait! What about dinner?’ I asked Dad just as he was about to step out.

‘If the car arrives, we go to Mainland China… so pray the car arrives!’ Dad said, and pulled the door shut. Me and mom eagerly prayed out new car arrive in the evening, and arrive it did. to complete a perfect day, we went and dined at Mom’s favorite restaurant and had a nice time together, just the three of us after a long long time. I didn’t attend to any friends that day, Dad canceled his Harmonica batches in the evening, and Mom actually asked me to give her a facial at home! – which is so so so unlike her!

We had one of the loveliest dinners we had had in a long time. Mom and Dad were both elated and in a world of their own. I felt a little like an outside, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I felt very happy for the two of them. And I know I am their daughter, but I still silently blessed the two of them in my mind and in my heart. When our drinks arrived we all raised a toast to ‘another twenty-five years of togetherness’… and it was perfect. The last images in my mind before I went to bed that night were of mother waiting for Dad to return in the evening. There was something very different in her eyes, on her face that day. And it was beautiful.

If in another twenty-five years, I can be even half as happy with my husband as Mom and Dad are with each other, I will consider myself blessed. God bless them.

WAKE-UP CALL

2010-07-09T08:20:00.001-07:00

Fresh beginnings.

Brand new starts.

Sound so tempting, don’t they?

But are they possible in a place you have spent the last four years in?

I discovered the answer to that today – YES.

Cos the change is not in the place, its buildings, its furniture, the people inhabiting it, the new faces that have invaded it or the old ones that have faded away.

It is not about the people who now suddenly seem too far away.

It is not about the change of attitude of your friends or peers or colleagues or subordinates or seniors; or a lack thereof.

It is never about ‘the without’.

It is always about ‘the within’.

And change ‘within’ can stem from anything and nothing.

A book.

A break-up.

A friend turned foe.

Discovering anew that you don’t really hate that cousin anymore.

Realizing that you are living without something or someone – forget whether you could, should or would.

Doing away with your prejudices – even if only to replace them with new ones.

Or just getting off the wrong side of the bed someday.

Change comes to you when you are ready for it. It won’t before that – no matter how hard you try or struggle. And it won’t fail to when it should – no matter where destiny puts you.

It is nice to know that the opinion of each and every person around you doesn’t really matter or bother you anymore. It is a relief to do away with peoples’ expectations from you – especially people who you had raised and put up on a pedestal. It is never too late to come to realize who really matters in life, who shouldn’t and who never was a part of your world at all.

If you don’t love yourself, who will? How can you even expect someone else to love you when everyday you torture yourself, worry yourself sick about what unnecessary people think about you, give unfair importance to things that are not even sure to be with you in the next moment, burden yourself beyond capacity and reason with your own concepts of right and wrong, worthy and unworthy?

Everybody wakes up to that moment at some point of time, when they realize who’s in, who’s out, what’s more important than what and who they really want to be. What one should do is not shut their eyes and pretend to be asleep when one does truly wake up.

THE LEAP OF FAITH

2010-06-25T21:37:00.000-07:00

Today was the third time that I heard the same thing coming from three different friends of mine who'd been through three different situations recently -

I don't let dependency on anyone grow too much.

I smiled. Sometimes thats all that you can do - smile.

I have let dependency on people take its toll on me. I of all people have every reason NOT to let it grow in me.

But even then I really feel for these friends of mine. These cautious friends of mine - with all due respect to them and whatever it is they had to go through to arrive at that conclusion/decision - are NEVER going to know what it is like to totally surrender yourself to someone, something, anything... a situation, a lover, a time, a habit, an enemy, a feeling... for it is not only people we are dependent on. They will probably never know what it is like to put yourself in someone else's hands and then just close your eyes and wait for whatever it is they are going to do with you - toss you out, raise your to their lips and kiss you, or keep you like a rose in a diary... treasured but out of sight.

It takes strength - a lot of it too - to do something like that... to let someone control you completely, even if for a moment... to know that no matter how cautious we are, we are never going to be cautious enough for LIFE... never prepared enough for death - of people, of relationships... we plan and construct and design and strategise for a tomorrow that we do not even know is going to be there. And we still think we've got it all figured out, we've got the answers, the keys, the secrets; so sure we have it all...

Its like the leap of faith in dance... you could never have practiced it enough to be sure your partner is going to be able to catch you when your feet leave the ground. But you still do it, hoping he will... and thats how we are all living life... breathing out every moment, though we are not sure if we are going to be able to breathe in again the next moment...

ON SMOKING, CONNOTATIONS AND BEING AT PEACE WITH YOUR ISSUES

2010-06-20T10:39:00.000-07:00

I had a wonderful evening with one of my childhood friends last evening. It is amazing how you just tend to bond with some people and how some people, the mere sight of, can repel you so strongly. We’d placed our orders and come and sat at our table when she asked me –

‘Do you mind if I smoke?’

And I almost instantly said – ‘Not at all.’

She may have been quite surprised with my response, because she soon told me of a number of incidents when the same question had evoked a string of unpleasant feelings in the person who she had asked the question to. But I was only partly listening to what she was saying; rather than her, it was me who was quite surprised. Until yesterday, or rather up until that moment, I had big issues about smoking and smokers and people who smoke in public. But I still said ‘Not at all’. I don’t know why. I honestly don’t.

What I do know however is that something changed in that moment. I don’t know what or how or why, and I don’t want to delve into it either. But today when I think of it, I am more at peace with my issues.

A lot of times people don’t really let themselves react to a situation, or other people around them, as individuals. People always relate everything to something in the past – an incident, an accident, an upbringing, it could be any of these and a number of other things. Connotations. I’m not saying I don’t – I do it too sometimes. And up until yesterday I had never given it a thought. Just as my friend took the first puff (I’m not even sure if that is the right word/phrase – I am completely alien to smoking) a couple of heads turned, even subtly, to look at this attractive female, who was smoking at a coffee shop. I can sort of comprehend what must have been going through the minds of those people. Some just glanced at our table and went back to what they were doing the next instance. Some kept staring till it was embarrassing. And some even stared at me – with eyes that said ‘Eew-how-gross-get-up-leave-do-something-stop-her-girls-today-the-friends-you-keep’ and the like.

But I was so much at peace with my qualms – it was as if they had never existed. Yeah my friend is a girl and she smokes. So? That doesn’t make her any less likable, or friendly, or fun to be with, or talented, or attractive, or honest, and scores of other things. And even if it does for some, I would like to ask – is it really because she smokes? Or because the things that smoking implies? Things like she is available, loose, cheap, a speed-dater? Who associated all these tings with smoking? And forget about who and why – do you really believe in all that? Have you ever given yourself a chance to think, question what you really believe?

It is the same with smoking, as it is with a number of other things – girls who always hang out with guys, girls who drink, girls who live in hostels. It is a crazy thing, this whole connotations business. Not that I am defending my friend, but if I were to say anything in her defense at all, I would say that – smoking, like eating with your hands even at a restaurant, or wearing only black, or washing your feet every night before going to bed, or biting your nails, or being obsessed about your hair looking perfect, is just a habit. And it implies nothing. Nothing at all. Period. Yes I would like it if she quit – it is not a healthy habit. But in the meantime, I am not going to let the connotations associated with smoking worry me about whether I should hang out with my friend, and allow her to smoke in my company or not. I have known other people who smoke. Hell, I even once got up and walked right out of the same coffee shop because the guy I was with – meeting for the first time in fact, if you must know – just pulled a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it and started smoking, right in my face. Without even asking me if I was ok with it, or if I had health issues, or anything. My friend was at least decent enough to smoke away from the table and not right into my face! And as luck would have it, she had a pack of the same brand my dad used to smoke…! Funny coincidences.

In the end it is all about how you carry yourself, how you project yourself, where you draw the line, and how honest you are to yourself. Cos at the end of the day, it is not the society that you live with – it is yourself. Nothing we do – and that includes smoking in public – or don’t do, should be because of the connotations it implies. Cos that is a sure way to hell. What matters is your peace with yourself and who you are – your peace with the good and the bad in you. Parents, relatives, friends, neighbours, acquaintances, society come later – come after yourself. Give it whatever name you want to – conscience, sense of right and wrong, your soul – I like to call it ‘you’. You live, eat, drink, travel, and go to movies, smoke, with yourself first. And what matters is your peace with your own company. At first it seems/sounds strange – your own company? What the hell has that got to mean? But sit on it for a while, and it makes perfect sense. At least it did to me. And I hope it will to you.

RETREAT

2010-01-15T07:42:00.001-08:00

‘Then why are you doing it? If you know it’s not good for you?’ he asked me.

And I couldn’t answer.

Try as I did to make my best friend see why I was back in touch with my ex, it was a weird experience – weird because I had never had a problem to make him see my point before, or to explain my side to him. But exception proves a rule, and me getting friendly with my ex again was one of the exceptions, clearly.

There are things in life that you just have to do sometimes. You don’t know why, but you just feel this obsessive compulsive need to do them, and that is reason enough to do them.

No one can really judge or even fathom to figure out a relationship. Not a best friend, not a parent, not a relative; and least of all the people around. What goes into a relationship, who draws the line where and puts up with exactly what and how much… no one can really tell.

One can’t understand, and one shouldn’t even try to make sense of it all. Not if you are a third person, and not even if you are the person; for it is easy to want to believe we are always either black or white. But it is not the truth. Everyone has a shade of grey, no matter how small it maybe, how insignificant – it is still there, unmistakable. And it is good if you get to know this side of you. It humbles you. It makes you less judgmental. It makes it easy for you to consider people’s mistakes.

And most importantly – it helps you forgive yourself.

It makes ‘the after’ easy.

Only you know what you have given to a relationship. And only you know what you can’t get back. Only you know how much you miss that someone special. Only you know what it means to not have that person in your life – what that emptiness feels like.

And only you can comprehend the need to want to be with that person again. Only you know why you want to go back to that person – to give yourselves a second chance, or just to have that person back as a friend, whatever the reason. For sometimes people you have had a relationship with become your friends in a very different way that is both weird and nice at the same time. It has its own comfort zones, its own ‘being yourself’ feel… and there’s nothing that can equal or replace it. Emotions, feelings, can never be right or wrong – they are either there or not there… that’s all.

Sometimes even your best friends fail to see your point. Or understand you. The one person who you thought knew you better than yourself can also not be able to comprehend your acts at times. But you shouldn’t let that bother you. Some paths you have to tread through alone. And it can’t be such bad a thing, right? It isn’t.

AN AFFAIR TO FORGET

2009-09-30T04:20:00.000-07:00

What surprised Kamini was the fact that even the realization of not being disgusted about it today didn’t surprise her – as if she had known all along it would come down to this. What seemed like torture, an unbearable ordeal until a couple of weeks ago was nothing more than a job for her today, a task she had to perform to get Karan out. Yes the fact that she hadn’t come to visit the police officer and pay him her respects last Tuesday and Thursday guaranteed the fact that this last encounter was especially going to be something she’d carry the scars of for a long time – but it was the last time after all. And she was ready for it.

And yet somewhere deep down she knew – that wasn’t the only reason she felt different about it. Point in fact, that was not one of the reasons at all – although there were several others. Like the fact that the police officer had grown milder and didn’t hurt her anymore; and the fact that there were no subordinates placed outside the cabin to keep a watch; and the fact that the cabin to which she had been coming twice a week, every week for the past seven months itself seemed a little cleaner now than the first time she had entered it and laid down on its dirt laden floor, squeezing her eyes shut as she tried to ignore the stench of her surroundings or the pressure of the police officer’s body on her own – chanting incessantly in her mind ‘I am doing this for you Karan, I am doing this for you my love…’

Whether the subordinates were relieved of their duty to save her the embarrassment, or to prevent them from lusting her she’d never know. But yes, there was an unmistakable change in the police officer’s demeanor over the past couple of weeks.

And still nothing in the world could ever make her think of any other man even for a moment – or so she thought until two weeks ago.

The police officer heard a rap on the door.

‘Come in.’

The door opened. Kamini stepped inside. She shut the door behind her and began to unbutton her shirt.

‘That won’t be necessary.’

Kamini froze. Her hands dropped to her sides as she looked at the police officer.

‘Sit,’ he said without looking at her.

That’s when she looked around and realized – the place had been thoroughly cleaned. There were clean sheets on the cot; the junk was gone, and there were wild flowers on the table.

Kamini tried to absorb her surroundings, still rooted to the spot where she was standing since she came in.

‘Sometimes you can’t explain why you do or don’t do things in life,’ the police officer began. ‘But what you can at least try to do is understand situations – for they are the fact. Not like your emotions – something that even you yourself can’t be sure of at times.’ Pause. ‘I fucked you – I fucked you over damn hard. But I had my reasons, twisted as they were and still are.’

‘Just as you made me construct and come up with mine to comply with your demands,’ Kamini thought, as she recalled the day Karan had been dragged by his arms by two of the police officers subordinates and dropped onto his chair across the counter. She had sat and watched him bleed and cry, slipping in and out of consciousness, as the officer’s voice rang in her ears – ‘You just wait and watch what I do to your sweetheart now.’

‘I am not going to try and explain or justify what I did,’ the police officer continued, ‘for it can’t be explained or justified.’

Kamini waited for him to go on.

‘That’s all.’

Pause.

‘You may leave.’

‘But what if I don’t want to?’

The police officer glanced at Kamini. Her face was blank – at least it didn’t look like she had just said the words he thought she had.

‘I think – did you just –‘

‘Yes.’

Kamini’s posture was still absolutely composed and calm, and self assured, and everything that her voice was not – which was insecure, sad and hurt.

‘Twisted as they were and still are, you had your reasons. But what reason did Karan have to call me a whore?’ Kamini said.

The police officer got up from his chair and walked over to Kamini. He allowed himself to look at her for the first time since she had come. He saw her shirt was still unbuttoned – but the bosom that awakened his deepest, fierce desires didn’t even tempt him today. He slowly pulled her shirt together and buttoned it up. Kamini didn’t move even as he finished. He hesitated for a moment, and then lifted her face to look at her – and the sight stabbed him.

For he was looking into the eyes of a woman defeated and crushed beyond he thought was possible. The faith, the determination that the big black beady eyes had carried all these weeks and which drove him mad and to the extreme were now replaced with a sadness that was unthought-of to ever be able to be possessed by them.

‘Kamini!’ he exclaimed.

And their lips locked in the most passionate kiss ever.

And the passion was on both sides.

Tears streamed down Kamini's eyes – the tears she had fought back all this while, and which she knew were to betray her as she faced the police officer today. He tore himself apart from her and looked at her face again. And he pulled her close again and put his arms around her and held her as she cried and cried.

– x – x –

She looked at the man coming out of the door.

He smiled at her.

Her mouth curved in a semi smile.

He walked upto her and hugged her. He had gone over this moment in his head scores of times since he entered the prison cell, and every time she went away after their visit, and every night he slept. He had gone over it while eating his food, while exercising, while being beaten…

But it didn’t feel anything like it was supposed to.

And he knew what he had done.

His embrace loosened slowly.

His arms dropped.

And he watched her as she slowly walked away…

ESSENCE OF EX-ES

2009-08-19T21:29:00.000-07:00

‘so…’

‘no Sojwala is not here…’

‘oh come on…’

‘no yar… we just got back na… I don’t want to go anywhere now…’

‘ok the beer’s getting to you…’

‘come on!’

‘what come on! You were the one who said you don’t want to go anywhere!’

‘I know, m just sayin we’ll go chat in my room… mom, dad, bro are not used to this kinda stuff…’

‘why they never had a best friend?’

‘maybe they did. I dunno… we never talked…’

‘my god! How have you been managing to keep mum past 20 years!’

‘it wouldn’t be so difficult for anyone you know, if they had my family.’

‘oh well, to each his own…’

‘her own, you mean…’

‘are you sure? Why does it have to be ‘his’ or ‘her’ all the time?’

‘yeah like we don’t know ‘they’ exist too…’

‘god is the beer getting the better of us or what…’

‘how would god know?’

‘god knows…’

‘no he doesn’t! he wasn’t there lifting up his glass n saying cheers to us!’

‘oh he was… didn’t you see mutthu?’

‘oh mutthu darling… don’t you remind me of that devil…’

‘and his devilicious smile…’

‘MUTTHU! MARRY ME!’

‘oh he might just say yes…’

‘is he single?’

‘oh yes…’

‘you bitch! Why didn’t you tell me before?’

‘cos then you’d go be the bitch right there and then!’

‘n what is wrong with that?’

‘nothing really…’

‘give me your mobile.’

‘I don’t have his number…’

‘n you call yourself my best friend! You can’t even hook me up!’

‘whatever…’

‘god… I can’t stop thinking of him…’

‘hmm I can’t stop thinking of him too…’

‘lay off woman! He is mine…’

‘sure…’

‘oh by the way… give me the bill, we need to split it.’

‘gosh! The beer was on the house!’

‘now you are really drunk darling…’

‘you know…’

‘yeah I do.’

‘what?’

‘a lot of things…’

‘go on… tell me one…’

‘I know you are my best friend…’

(Kissing sound)

‘yeah… ever the bitches, aren’t we…’

(Laughter)

‘you know, I know something too…’

‘what?’

‘we’re drunk and talking shit.’

‘oh no we are not!’

‘come on! Of course we are drunk!’

‘yeah we are, but we are not talking shit…’

‘prove it…’

‘well, sameer does really not love me… its true.’

(Silence)

‘and I don’t love him either.’

‘oh now you are talking shit.’

‘no.’

(Silence)

‘well good for you then…’

‘now you are talking shit. This isn’t good for me… its not. In fact it’s a total 100% complete the opposite of good for me.’

(Silence)

‘well you know… that is actually feeling good.’

‘what? Talking shit?’

‘no. accepting it.’

‘shit.’

‘what?’

‘you are losing the whole essence of our evening…’

‘what essence?’

‘getting drunk… talking shit about our ex-es…’

‘well we are, aren’t we?’

‘we are?’

‘yes.’

‘how? Enlighten me!’

‘aren’t they in deep shit that they’re our ‘ex-es’ already?’

(Laughter)

‘yeah…maybe you’re right.’

‘I’m always right!’

(More laughter… and ribaldry of course…)

LUCK BY CHANCE

2009-07-16T23:04:00.000-07:00

Ever wondered why we just lose touch with some of the best people we meet, and yet stick to some others we don’t really want to...? Some people you just tend to not be able to get rid off, in spite of a thousand things that happened… and some people – they come in our lives for a short while, and then just disappear. And we never see them again…

Do you believe in karma? Fate? Destiny? Luck? I do… I think everything that happens in our life has at least a little to do with either or all of these things. At least the part about meeting the right people at the right time – or even the wrong ones at the right time – at least the part about who we meet in life, get in touch with, befriend or don’t has got a lot to do with either or all of these things.

What triggered me to rant about all these things right now, you ask/wonder? Like everything else – or most other things – that I rant about it, this train of thoughts was triggered by what me and a friend of mine went through recently…

He was an online friend... but someone I went to school with for a couple of years, until he changed school. We were pretty dormant for a while... there in each other’s friend-lists, but conspicuous by our absence in each other’s scrapbooks – which is to say we hadn’t really ever had a conversation, or so much as even exchanged a few words online. Then one day we just hit it off – just like that – and got along so well, we wondered why we hadn’t done this before!

Now in a short time we got along really well – with similar interests, same zodiac signs, roughly the same attitudes in general, same experiences as school kids... you get the drift, ya? Then one day he told me about this friend of his that he had had a big row with and was not talking to since a very long time. I having gone through similar situation just a few months back, felt really bad for the two of them. With considerable possibility of sounding like a Grandma, or like a ‘been-there-done-that’, I am going to say that, I know what it is like to lose a best friend. So I kind of tried to persuade him to talk to his friend. Of course I didn’t do it too passionately, just a little elbowing, if you know what I mean... but nonetheless, it worked. The next time his friend was online, my friend talked to her, and they talked and talked and talked. And the bitterness dissolved somewhere in between, and they became friends again.

And as if that completed my role in his life, the very next day my friend sent me an e-mail, to which I gave a strange funny reply, and then we had a fight, and he chose to break it up. And I didn’t resist.

It seemed so strange to me at the time it happened, that I didn’t know what to make of this whole thing. The way I had reacted to his mail was not me – that person writing a reply to his mail was not me. The person who spoke to him when he called after reading my mail was not me. The things I said were not my thoughts! It was incomprehensible. I don’t give up on people so easily, never on friends at least! But with him, I let go like I never knew him.

As you sow, so shall you reap; tit for tat; karma – there’s a lot of ways to say it, but it all means the same thing. But sometimes it is beyond our control to explain things that happen around us, things that happen to us. I have had and lost some of the best friends life can give anyone... but one thing I have learnt from all this is to not feel bad if at some point of time, someone just drifts away from you – or rather when people leave – and to not try and hold on to them when they do drift away or leave. Of course there is a difference between trying to make a friendship – or any relationship – work out, and to cling onto something that’s already not working out. We are all after all instruments who carry out, work for and work against each other’s destiny’s... all of it, or part of it. Sometimes people enter in our lives only to make us experience or face or go through something, and that is all that their role is in our lives... our paths stick along as long as this purpose is fulfilled, and then, life just moves on. Sometimes we are meant to be cheated by our most trusted people, or be surprised by the most unexpected… or even be loved by the ones that we never thought would give us a thought, or someone we’d never give a thought to ourselves... that’s just how it is, nothing official about it!

But if there’s someone out there, keeping an account of all this, phew! He’s gotta be one hell of a mathematician...

ON BODY ODOR, LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT AND SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST...

2009-05-28T09:30:00.000-07:00

Came across a rather interesting article in the paper a couple of days back that said something like: men and women are attracted to each other depending on the smell of their sweat; or rather body odor. I am sure many of you will react to this by saying: duh, doesn’t everybody know that by now? But what really caught my attention was that scientists believe it is the genes located in the HLA Complex – Human Leucocyte Antigen Complex – that play the key role of finding our ‘true love’ for us... (For all the non-Biology students: the HLA Complex is concerned with the immune system of man; and that is all I am going to say here… it would take me eons to explain how and why! Google it... :) )

Chemistry of attraction, eh?

This kinda explains why there might be instant attraction towards a girl who is not necessarily breath-takingly beautiful, or a guy who is not Brad Pitt. (Although let me please mention here – and I do NOT care what you think – I DON’T like Brad Pitt. I think he looks nice, and acts decent. But I will not drool if ever I find myself standing in front of him.)

This also somehow explains the age old concept of ‘love at first sight’ (only it should be love at first ‘smell’!)...

But pray, how does this explain falling in love with someone you haven’t ever met in person?

Like maybe someone you met on a social networking website maybe?

Or someone you saw at a party???

Crazy man... really...

After the first read, I casually joked about the article with my Dad (yeah yeah, he is a very cool person I have no problem discussing sex with... :) ) and then totally forgot all about it... until today when I saw a Marathi Film not really related to the issue, but which had physical relations playing a major role in the story. (I won’t mention the name of the movie; but if you know me personally, and if your curiosity gets the better of you, contact me!)

‘Shevati donach goshti/bhavana kharya... pot ani chambdi.’

(In the end, only 2 things matter... hunger and sex.)

Is it really so?

If one really thinks very objectively about this whole ‘falling in love’ business, then it is all only about finding the right match, or the ‘most-fit mate’ for yourself, so that you can be sure your species isn’t gonna go extinct, and that your off-springs shall be fit and healthy and shall survive; and even science can be said to have proved it (according to the article I just mentioned about... you know, HLA - immune system - body odor - falling in love – love at first sight etc etc...) Does this reduce all the feelings, emotions, love, attachment, affection, attraction, and scores of other things we feel for our partners to just the skin? And just sex? And if ‘yes’ then who are better-off? The ‘good guys’? Or the ‘flirts’, the ‘chaplus’ guys, the ‘romeos’, the ‘Casanovas’, as they are variously called, who have only one thing on their mind?

Probably all this emotion-play came into being to keep us engaged! They say guys like the chase... girls like the suave ones... unpredictability... mysteriousness... this, that... falana-dimka... imagine if all this was gone, and finding ‘the right one’ was reduced down to one sniff... we’d be really bored! With all the ‘worldly comforts’, inventions or whatever, taking care of all the things we have to do, we’d be left with a horrible amount of free time and nothing to do!

I guess that’s why, we need ‘sex with ALL strings attached’... rather than with no string attached!

OF STOLEN KISSES...

2009-05-14T07:50:00.000-07:00

My legs are aching out of wearing high-heeled footwear for so long. Not that I particularly like high-heels, but I had to match him. The heels reduced our height difference from 7 inches to 5. Not much, I know, but still better.

We reach the apartment and park the bike in the parking.

My heart sinks, for I know his mother and sister and brother will be upstairs, and we will have to go back to being ‘polite’ in front of each other... not carefree and bindaas anymore... and not even slightly romantic. Not that we are going around... but I guess we are at least heading towards it.

The thought of climbing up the stairs makes my legs ache even more, although his flat is only on the first floor. I sigh.

‘Is your tongue still heavy?’ he asks.

We have just had coffee in Barista; and mine was sinfully strong and bitter and without sugar – the exact way I like it – but with two scoops of Vanilla ice-cream. My tongue had become a bit numb in the café with all that ice-cream, and we had had ourselves a big laugh with me trying my best to say my name properly.

‘No! Its fine now. It doesn’t stay that way for too long.’

‘Really?’ he asks.

‘Yeah,’ I say.

‘How about we find out?’ he says.

And the next moment he has pulled me into his arms and is kissing me like there is never going to be a tomorrow.

I am zapped.

I lose balance.

He catches me and holds me up against the wall.

I am breathless.

He lets go of me, looks into my eyes, and smiles... only for a second... his smile one of triumph, challenge, and extremely coy... all at the same time…

And then he starts walking up the stairs again... as if nothing happened.

And I am left begging for more...

THE PATRIOT

2009-04-24T10:39:00.001-07:00

I drag myself to the footpath and look around me. I see my blood spattered over the road, my shirt lying soaked in blood somewhere.

I curse myself and the moment at which I had looked at the statue of my beloved leader at the crossroad. The dirt is still not gone from his face. It is splattered across his specs. My heart cringes at the sight. The statue of one of the greatest men in History – smeared by feces.

If only I had not noticed the horrific sight.

If only I had not been angered.

If only I had not tried to wipe it off.

If only it had not been the day of elections.

If only the Party who considered my very hero as their ideal had not seen me in that position…

… I wouldn’t have been lying half dead by the footpath, beaten till I could hear my own bones split within my body by the supporters of the Party and the mob.

Where had so many people poured in onto the street from at that hour of the day anyway? There was never a soul on the street every morning that I jogged on it.

I tried and tried to comprehend what had happened in the past few minutes.

‘Aye!’

I turn. I see members of the Party. I get off the statue.

‘Kay challaye?’ (What’s going on?)

The man standing ahead of the mob, hands rested on waist asks me. He could pass as a typical ‘member of XYZ Party’; dressed all in white, Kolhapuri chappals in his feet, hair gelled back and not daring to move even with the breeze, thick black moustache, with the corners purposefully turned up.

‘Kahi nahi…’ (Nothing…)

‘Kahi nahi?’ (Nothing?)

‘Ghan lagli hoti putalyala… Pusat hoto…’ (There was dirt on the statue… was wiping it off…)

One of the other men standing behind the man pulls him by his shoulder. He signals at my feet.

I look down at my feet.

The Party looks down at my feet.

My shoes are covered in shit.

I stare in disbelief.

Suddenly it comes back to me. My neighbor’s dog had done his morning job close to my house. I had stepped into it.

I panic.

‘Aho, mi kharach kahi nahi kela!’ (I really haven’t done anything!)

‘Amhala kay angutha chhaap samajlaye?’ (Do you think we are uneducated fools?)

'Aho kharach, mi nahi - ' (Trust me, i didn't - )

'Hana re haramyala!’ (Beat the bastard!)

I try to run away. But I know there is no escaping the situation.

And now here I am…

Thousands of questions cross my mind… doubts… fears… but the most overwhelming of all feelings is disappointment and sadness… at the whole situation we, as the People of our country and of the world, are in. And its not just politics I am talking about.

I look up at the sky… the sun is beginning to rise higher over the horizon.

I look back at the statue.

I will myself to get up, despite the pain.

I lean on the street-light and drag myself up. I look at the face of my favorite hero. I think of his co-workers… all great men who did things we probably can never comprehend completely.

It gives me strength.

I take a deep breath, and heave my body.

I am standing on my feet.

My legs hurt till I want to cry out loud. But I look up at the statue and smile.

I raise my hand and put it to my temples.

I salute.

I collapse.

Author's Note: it is a request that the reader view this only as a piece of creativity... there is nothing I want 'to hint at' or 'suggest'. No names of any political parties were mentioned, and I leave it upto the reader to give the statue the name of whichever leader he/she wants to give. This was just a piece that popped up in my mind, and I penned it down. Heck, I am not even interested in politics! Still if anyone's feelings were hurt, all I'll say is, it wasn't my intention...

.....................

2009-04-23T00:44:00.000-07:00

Got up at eight today morning and took to cleaning my room immediately. Dust had settled all over. I had been putting it off, waiting for exams to get over. And now that they were over, I couldn’t stand all the mess!

Started with my clothes cupboard. Then my dressing table. My bed. And lastly, my study-table. I always save it for the last. Every year, I have to think and think of how I am going to make place in my already over-full study table for the whole new stack of books. And this being my final year, I had not one, not two, but 11 reference books with no place to go! And they were only the bare minimum.

About 20 minutes later, both the cupboards to the sides of my table were open, their contents spilled out on the floor – and me spilled out somewhere between them. I looked around me and sighed heavily. Books, papers, magazines, school report cards, class photographs, pen stands by the dozen, stationery enough to go into 3 bags, novels, encyclopedia, my diaries, old greeting cards, medals, colours, paints, palette, drawing books… even charcoal, from the one time I tried to do a sketch in charcoal and ended up looking like an adivasi...

Mom came in, took one look at the mess, and burst out laughing.

‘Mom! You should help me out! Not laugh at me!’

‘I would… but you don’t want to throw any of this, or give it away… how else can I help?’

I made a face. Mom laughed.

‘Ok, I am off to Veena-maushi’s… will be back by 5.’

Mom had a lunch date with her friend that day. And dad had left early morning. I was gonna be home alone.

‘Ok, have fun!’ I said following Mom out till the door. I saw Mom walk down the stairs, and pulled the door shut and returned to my den.

I looked at all the mess and sighed again.

‘Ok! Looks like I am gonna have to throw a few things away I guess!’ I said out loud to no one ion particular.

But I just kept staring at the mess for half an hour, sitting on my bed.

I couldn’t possibly throw anything away! Each of the myriad little things lying on the floor was so important to me! And special. Each had a story behind it. Like the first piece I had knitted. Or the cards I had received from my Atya for each of my birthdays. And those pressed grass twigs in that big fat story book! I used to make greetings out of them and used to post them to all our relatives for Diwali. And how could I possibly throw away all those paintings! No way! And the Japanese Fan! The Japanese Fan I had made! The straw hat from my first dance in school... As I went through these and many other things I had even forgotten I had kept still, I thought of all the summer vacations and all the crazy things I used to do back then… from making greeting cards, to fabric painting, to pottery, to lying on my bed reading a book and listening to songs… working on a painting the whole day, and then calling all my neighbors over to see ‘my new creation’… I couldn’t remember the last time I had held a paint brush in my hand, or spent a lazy afternoon just dreaming. Each of us has a fantasy world… a world full of all of our favorite things. I had one too… in fact, I still have one. And it still is full of all things that may seem ‘childish’ or immature’… but heck, it’s my world… where anything is possible…

I looked at all the greeting cards, and read all the messages penned down for me… the last card I had received from my Atya was for my 12th birthday… why do we stop doing things like these when we ‘grow up’? We cross a certain age, and suddenly birthday cards with cake and balloons seem childish…. Or embroidering your initials on your handkerchief seems like a stupid thing to do. I was so serious about becoming a painter as a kid… and somewhere down the line; I just gave it up… for a worldlier career… why? Why do we give up on things, but still cling on to their memory?

As I cleaned my room, I ended up dusting my mind too. It was like I had met myself after a long time…

That day, I did a lot of things I had not done in years.

I started working on a painting.

I spent the afternoon reading a novel.

I made a few snacks and called my neighbors over for tea.

I even went for a walk with Dad in the evening, on the hill, and came back with a bag full of colorful odd looking stones!

And it felt amazing doing all those things…

JENNIFER

2009-04-18T23:45:00.000-07:00

This one’s dedicated to the loving memory of Jennifer, the finest female Golden Retriever I have ever come across. I just met her owner – a loveable 65+ Grand-pa by the name Mr. Nandu Kulkarni – a couple of weeks ago, and came to know Jennifer passed away month-and-a-half ago.

Sweetheart, this one goes out to you…

They say a dog can understand upto 500 human words. I don’t know that, and I can’t vouch for it. But this I can say for sure – dogs do understand human emotions perfectly. And they particularly can tell a dog-lover from a non dog-lover.

I used to see Jennifer everyday when I was in school. She was easily the finest female Golden Retriever I had ever come across. Driving to school, parking my bicycle in the parking lot, going up to my classroom on the fourth floor, and then waiting by the window to see Jennifer had become a routine for me. As for Jennifer, her eyes would begin to search for me as soon as Nandu-kaka crossed the street to the side on which my school was. She would look up at my classroom, and would give me a friendly bark everyday – every single day.

It all started one day when Nandu-kaka was stalled close to our school by one of his friends I suppose – and Jennifer had nothing to do. She was sniffing the ground when I reached our classroom and saw her from the window. She might have been 6-7 months old back then. I could make out she was beginning to get restless and wanted to continue with the walk. I decided to entertain her.

I looked around to check no teachers were anywhere within ear-shot, and I whistled.

Jennifer was as if frozen on spot. Not a muscle moving. I smiled. I leaned a little out of the window and whistled again.

This time Jennifer turned to face our school building. Clever bitch! I laughed.

The third time I whistled, Jennifer precisely looked up at the exact window in which I was standing and started barking. That caught Nandu-kaka’s attention. He followed Jennifer and looked up at me. I smiled and waved at him. He smiled back.

‘Such a fine pet you have! What’s her name?’ I asked. It was quite early in the morning and there was practically no one on the road, so I didn’t really have to shout.

‘Jennifer!’ the old man replied.

The incident repeated the next day. But by the third day, I didn’t have to whistle to catch Jenny’s attention. She’d by default look up at my window when Nandu-kaka reached our school.

I started to come a little late to school everyday, in the hope of catching the old man and Jennifer someday. But somehow things just didn’t work out. They’d always come only moments before our school began. But one fine day, I got lucky. I reached school about 20 minutes early – we had to put up some charts and all in the corridors – and was in the parking lot when I heard someone call out – ‘Good morning!’ I turned around and saw Jennifer and the old man. I was so happy! I immediately sat down on my knees and called out –

‘Jennifer!’

She looked at me for a split second, and in the next she was bounding and leaping towards me! She came and crashed right into me and within moments I was slobbered all over! Jennifer was licking my face, my hands – it was crazy! She was barking and jumping and going round in circles around me! And I couldn’t stop laughing.

Dogs can always tell dog-lovers from non dog-lovers.

I had to ride back home that day and change into my other set of school clothes and go back. Obviously the ones I had been wearing went straight into the washing machine. But I was still smiling when I reached school.

I continued to see Jennifer every day till the end of that year. After that I forgot all about her in the summer vacations. But I never saw her after school re-opened.

Just a couple of weeks ago, I met Nandu-kaka. It was great to see him after all these years, and I was surprised to realise we both still remembered each other so perfectly. He told me they had shifted to another part of the city, that’s why I never saw them again. And with that he gave me the news of Jennifer having passed away – peacefully, in her sleep.

That meeting brought back all the memories of Jennifer, and particularly of that day when she licked me all over. It felt nice to know she had not suffered in her last moments. May her soul rest in peace.

BEAUTY

2009-04-01T05:47:00.000-07:00

I get off the train – sticky, sweating and smelling like a pig.

I lay eyes on her.

And suddenly I am not feeling tired anymore, and my fatigue is gone..

She’s not beautiful. Not even close. She is just an average looking Indian girl.

But nothing about her is average.

She is wearing a beautiful sky blue colored salwaar kameez, and long dangling ear-rings. Ok, the ear-rings are a bit too long for my taste. But it really doesn’t matter. Everything else about her is so beautiful.

I look around, as I try to comprehend what I am feeling.

I would never otherwise describe her as beautiful.

But that sight… of my best friend… whom I am seeing after all these years… the sight is beautiful… the light scent of her perfume, which is still the same after all these years… the wait in her eyes… her frantic search for a familiar face in the crowd… for my familiar face… the stillness in her stance, her calm body language contradicts her state of mind, which she cannot hide no matter how hard she tries… for her eyes are too innocent… and bare… I see her anticipation, her excitement right through her efforts to conceal it. And the child like beauty amuses me and pulls me like a magnet.

She still hasn’t seen me, almost as if purposely. She is looking in every possible direction but mine.

I linger close to the edge of the platform where I got off, and enjoy the moment… the moment that will soon be gone…

I’m almost crushed as I realise it won’t last too long.

She looks at her watch, as if to remind me how long it has been since I have seen her.

I pick up my bag and start walking towards her, and I laugh as it comes back to me…

I had asked her for a recent picture of her, just in case I don’t recognize her. And I realise that at that moment, the picture just isn’t coming to my mind…

LIVING WITH YOU

2009-03-26T06:36:00.000-07:00

I stop writing suddenly. The pen falls out of my hands.

A gentle breeze brings in that peculiar smell that I have just begun getting used to.

I sniff.

I can’t believe it.

My heart starts racing.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath till the smell fills my lungs. I take a deep breath till your smell fills my head and drives me mad. That typical smell after you have just had a bath.

I breathe again, and I forget all about my submissions and notes and books.

It couldn’t be!

Has your love driven me so mad that I am imagining and feeling things like they were real?

How could you be in my house!

But the smell… it refuses to go away.

I get up from my chair and walk out of my room. My heart’s begun to race faster, if at all it can. I tip-toe towards my door.

I open it.

The smell hits me. Stronger.

I am sure by now that my olfactory has gone haywire.

I track the smell to my parents’ room.

My parents’ room?

I reach for the door.

I open it.

My heart stops beating

“Hey, you up already?” Dad asks, looking at me.

“What’s that smell?” I ask.

“You like it? One of my friends gifted it to me,” Dad says, throwing a bottle of cologne at me.

I catch it.

I open the lid.

I smell it.

I close my eyes.

I smile...

ITI

2009-03-18T10:08:00.000-07:00

There was once a scene I randomly came across in a daily soap on TV. The girl’s face was new, and for a change she looked sensible. I paused momentarily. The girl was reading a letter. From her father. A sentence in the letter kind of stayed with me for a long time… ‘There is no one in the world who hasn’t at least once felt like ending it all and taking his/her life.’ I pondered over it for quite some time, and it led to me filling up over six pages of my personal diary.

But I couldn’t recall any of those pages.

All I could recall that moment was that line I had randomly heard that day.

There is no one in this world who hasn’t at least once felt like ending it all…

I looked at the white hills around me. I took a deep breath in. One among my last few ones. I felt the cold air pass through my nose and into my lungs. It filled my lungs. The cold was getting to my bones. I could feel it. I looked up at the sky.

I threw my shirt off.

My upper body was bare.

I began climbing again. My mind clogged with thoughts for a few moments, and then cleared into an emptiness that I never thought I was capable of feeling… just like the clouds were clearing from time to time to reveal a plain, blue-grey, empty sky. With no airplanes. No birds. No eagles even, when it is known they ‘fly above the clouds’. But then I realized.

I was above the world.

Just like I had once been.

But this time, I was really above the world. Up and above. Where no one could reach me. Or find me.

Up and above the hypocrites.

Up and above people.

Beyond the reach of mom and dad.

Beyond the reach of anyone.

It felt amazing.

My pace quickened. I was almost jogging up now, the stones cutting at the bare sole of my feet. The blood caked around my toes almost as quickly as it started flowing. It froze, and the red crystals fell off my feet and crushed beneath them as I broke off into a splint___ or as close to a splint as my condition could allow me. No clothes on, except my thin track-pant. No shirt, no shoes. Nothing. Except the cold cold wind blowing across my entire body, determined to throw me off my feet. To bend me. Break me. And I determined not to be broken.

Not to be broken before I decided.

Before I chose to break.

I felt small drops of water freeze over my body and melt___ for surely I couldn’t possibly sweat in these conditions. Even with all the running. I possibly couldn’t. You don’t sweat topless and in below freezing temperatures. The wind was cruelly cold. It stung my bare body, as I ran against it.

I ran like my life depended on it.

Ha.

How far the truth was from this thought. This stupid stupid thought that had entered my mind.

Even in these final moments, I hadn’t given up being stupid.

Stupid.

Fucking stupid.

But no more now. It was all going to end. Shortly.

I had reached the highest point I could. I looked around me and took in the earthly beauty, as an unearthly calmness settled over me. My breathing grew steady. I wasn’t feeling cold anymore.

I looked up at the sky. It was blank. Empty. Just like my mind, at that instance.

I looked down, into the valley.

My final resting abode.

I looked up at the sky again.

I saw her face.

The only truth of my life… which had ceased to exist… which stole away from me any reason to live.

I closed my eyes.

I spread my arms.

I am coming…

I jumped.

BLANK CALL

2009-02-07T04:29:00.000-08:00

Aditya entered the board room and the lights grew dim. Geet was standing in front of him, wearing the bright red skirt, flamenco-like white shirt and black jacket she was wearing when Aditya last saw her. The chorus began.

‘Aa-a-a-aa-a-aa… Aa-a-a-aa-a-aa…’

A tingling sensation ran through my body, and after months and months passing by without a thought of Neel, my mind suddenly floated back to the memory of my calls to Neel when ‘Tum Se Hi’ was his caller tune.

I smiled.

I lingered in the moment for a while. I could almost hear his voice, happy and clear like the morning sun.

‘Hi,’ I would begin.

‘My God! I thought you were dead! Or probably that you thought I was dead. Where’ve you been!’

No matter how often I called Neel; either of us had to be dead, to account for the gap between two calls.

‘I am good, just been busy with college. You say how is office going?’ I would ask him.

‘Ah! Going on…’

‘And how is Sheetal?’

‘Can we talk about you and me before we move on to that subject?’ he would suggest, only a tad angrily. I would laugh.

‘Ok, ok! So how have you been?’

‘Okay-ish man. I told you about our trip?’

‘No… What trip?’

‘Oh all of us from office are planning for a trip to Kanyakumari…’

‘Oh that’s great!’

‘Yeah, but what is not so great is, I have been given the responsibility to make the reservations.’

‘No way! Then I am sure you guys are going no where!’ I’d tease him.

‘Shut up!’ he’d say.

And so we’d go one for at least an hour. Talking rubbish at times, talking things too mature for our respective ages sometimes, and just enjoying the comfortable silence that fell upon the conversation sometimes. Neel. My best friend, albeit an online friend. Frankly, I don’t remember how we bumped into each other. But Neel does still remember… or so I think. Sometimes I feel I live with him, I know so much about him! I’m sure I would be able to find a small ear-ring lost in his apartment if ever I get the chance to be there actually. I could probably draw a map of his apartment for you. Or even a road map all the way from his place to his office, although he is just about more than 1000 kilometers away from him. We talked about the silliest of things. Neel. I feel like something’s gone terribly wrong if I don’t talk to him once every couple of days.

No I haven’t met him in my life ever.

No I am not in love with him.

No he is not a long lost friend.

He is like the best friend I never had. Miles away and yet right next to me when I want him to be. Few can understand the chemistry we share. A lot more ridicule our friendship for the mere fact that we haven’t met each other in person as yet. Right from the day we became friends in fact.

But there is a part of Neel that lives in me, and a part of me that lives in him.

I would tell him anything in this goddamn world if I had to, and not feel scared or insecure or like I maybe ridiculed. I could tell him I don’t ever want to talk to him again and that he was the most heartless person I ever met, and as sure as the sun rises in the east every morning, he would call me the next day, and we’d talk like nothing happened, or like whatever happened happened so long ago, we don’t even remember it. He knew my darkest fears, my deepest secrets. He knew things my mom-dad didn’t know. He knew things I’d not dare to tell my gal-pals about.

He actually knows me inside out… or so I think.

And now its been almost 5 months since our fight. 5 months since we last spoke with each other.

And now that I am listening to this song after all these days, I remember him.

His laugh rings in my ears.

His voice fills my head.

I miss his laugh.

I miss his voice.

I miss him.

I miss the senseless conversations we used to have.

I miss the times when I cried over the phone and he consoled me like no one else could even in person.

I miss the times he got angry at me and shouted at me and then felt bad about it and called me up and apologized.

I miss the times when we spoke till 2 in the night and I cut the call as mom got up and called him again when she went back to bed.

I miss having someone by me who was dearer than the dearest.

As I come back to reality, I realise the song is over, but I’m not in the mood to finish the movie now. I turn the TV off and sit on the sofa with the remote control in my hand for a while. I look at the clock on the wall… its still a while before mom and dad get back from the dinner. The song keeps playing in my mind, and with it my conversations with Neel.

Suddenly I get up from the sofa and dash towards my room. I rummage through a countless number on things lying on my bed and finally find my cell phone. I go to the contacts and type ‘Ne’. But Neel’s name doesn’t appear in the list. My heart sinks deep down in my chest as I remember having deleted his number just a couple of weeks back.

I sigh. I sit heavily on the bed. My eyes start to well.

Out of the blue my old diary pops up in my head. I lift a shoe box thats on the top of my cupboard and put it on my table. I open it and go through my old diaries until I come upon one that’s covered in brown tinted paper. I open the last page of the diary, and my face splits into a wide smile as I see the number.

I take the diary and go sit on my bed again. I pick up the cell phone. I think for a minute and toss it aside. I pick up the cordless and punch in the number. And just as I am about to hit ‘call’ my doorbell rings.

I jump. My heart is racing. I quickly gain control and open the door. Its my neighbour. I remember I had asked her to pick up a parcel that a courier-man left with me when she was out earlier in the day. I give her the parcel. She thanks me and goes back to her apartment. I close the door and go back to my room. I look at the phone and Neel’s number typed onto the screen. I pick up the phone and sit on the bed again. But now I cant bring myself to press the ‘call’ button. I keep staring at the screen for a long time.

I finally hit the ‘call’ button.

The bell rings. I realise Neel no longer has a caller-tune.

I start counting the bells.

I put the phone on the ‘speaker’ mode and put my hands under my lap to prevent myself from cutting the call.

Neel answer’s the call.

‘Hello?’

I take a deep breath. I am scared to exhale. I begin to tremble.

‘Hello, who’s this?’

I open my mouth to say something, but suddenly I feel like I have forgotten to talk. I try to think of something to say. I can’t.

‘Is anybody there?’

Neel’s voice! Hearing his voice after all these days makes me want to burst into tears. It makes me want to scream with joy. But I sit still, not moving a muscle. I have no control over my body and my voice.

There is a long pause. The silence is deafening.

I can hear him breathe – slow and steady.

He begins to say something but stops. I silently pray he’d go on, for even though it was for a nanosecond, I heard his voice – he was going to call out my name.

Please... please...

But he doesn’t go on.

The line goes dead.

I finally breathe out.

My body relaxes.

I unclasp my fingers. They hurt.

I look around.

Lost.

Numb.

I keep staring out of the window, willing myself not to cry. Suddenly the phone rings and shatters the silence. I pick up the cordless and see the number that’s flashing. It doesn’t look familiar. I take a deep breath. I swallow. And in the best voice that I can manage, I answer the call,

‘Hello?’

Silence.

‘I knew it was you…’

Its Neel.

I hold my breath again.

I try to control it, but I can’t. I sniff. Really softly.

But who am I trying to fool? I forget its Neel I am talking to.

He hears the sniff alright. He responds with a sigh.

‘God, I missed you so much…’ he says.

And the tears finally run down my cheeks.

BULLY

2008-06-29T09:46:00.000-07:00

I frowned as I got out of the lift and banged the doors shut. Never had I hated going to school so much. But school is not really fun when the biggest bully in the class is made to change places and sit right in front of you. I mean, ya he is the brainiest boy I have seen in my whole life, but, so what?

He was a bully. He is a bully. He will remain a bully.

And I hate bullies. Anyone would actually, especially if you are on the receiving end. I mean ya, being a girl, and him being a boy, I didn’t really suffer much. But God! That didn’t make him any less annoying.

Plus I was about as tall as he was. Maybe that is what made him stay at an arm’s distance from me. But still, there are a number of ways to bully someone. And I was seeing them everyday.

Really. Every single day.

Each day, Monish would enter the class, and catch the first person he could see as his first bakra. And the day would begin with getting some homework done. It would be followed by scrawling the black-board with some stupid stupid cartoon which only he found funny. Of course, the cartoon would carry the artist’s name, and that would be his second bakra for the day. In the recess, no matter how much you tried to hide it, Monish would come to know if there was something yummy anybody had got in his or her lunch box. The periods between the first and the second break would go quite uneventful, and the day would again conclude with one of the teachers probably getting her sari or dress wet as she sat on her chair. And finally, as school came to an end, Monish would run down the stairs, pushing practically anyone who came in his way aside, without much caring to see the consequences.

Really, what went wrong when boys came to fifth grade?

Like many other bullies, Monish had a huge gang of boys who followed him everywhere. They would literally lay their lives down for him I guess, if he asked; they all liked him so much.

Puh-lease!

But my guess is, they were all scared of him.

Oh by the way. I guess I didn’t tell you what he did to me.

He untied my hair.

Everyday.

Without fail.

So what was the big issue?

I had hair that came down to my waist. Mamma would braid them and fold them up and tie them so that I had two short plats that just touched my shoulders. And Monish simply loved to untie them. He took care to not let me notice it, obviously. He would just loosen the knot, and the next time I turned my head, my hair would all come loose and fall on my back.

Boys. They can be irritating, I tell you.

I reached school bang on time. I parked my cycle in the parking area and bounded up the stairs. We had a ‘half day’, since it was the last day of the month. My bag was a little lighter hence, and my tiffin a little interesting. Not the regular poli-bhaji. I had corn and potato sandwiches, my favourite! A part of me was happy, and a part of me was, scared. i didn’t want Monish to eat up my tiffin! Please! At least not today, considering he ate half of it almost everyday.

He liked everything my mom made.

I hate bullies.

I HATE BULLIES!

But today seemed different.

The first four periods went uneventful, and I could see the Monish’s impatience build up. All the teachers had come bang on time too, giving Monish almost no time to plan anything. I feared this was the quiet before a huge storm, but prayed for the best.

Recess came, and my stomach sank. Me and my bench partner Kaustubh both took our tiffins out. I looked around. Monish was not in the classroom. I quickly opened my tiffin and started eating.

Suddenly the table shook.

I looked at Kaustubh. He was banging his tiffin on the edge of the table.

“What are you doing?” I asked him.

“My tiffin… it’s not opening,” Kaustubh said, and banged the tiffin on the table again. My tiffin inched towards the edge of the table.

“Arre bang it against the other desk na!” I said. “My tiffin will fall.”

Kaustubh continued banging the tiffin on the table. And with his fifth bang, just as I was about to gather my tiffin Monish entered the classroom.

“Boo!” he shouted.

I looked up.

Kaustubh banged the table again.

And my tiffin fell to the floor with a big clang.

There was a momentary silence, and suddenly everybody burst out laughing.

I looked at the spilled sandwiches.

I looked at Kaustubh. He was laughing. I turned around to hit him, but he quickly got up and ran out of the classroom.

I looked at the sandwiches lying on the floor in a mess. My stomach was rumbling with hunger. I was sure the sound was almost audible to everyone around me. I got down and started cleaning the mess. Suddenly fat tears started rolling down my cheeks. I looked again and again at my empty tiffin and the sandwiches on the floor. The tears kept coming. And just about as suddenly as my tears had appeared, two more hands appeared on the floor beside mine. I looked up.

It was Monish.

I looked at him. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Was he so mad as to eat food off the floor?

He put the pieces of sandwich into the tiffin in my hand.

“What happened?” he said.

I told him the incident.

Within a few moments, his gang had brought Kaustubh in front of me.

Monish got up and hit Kaustubh.

“Say sorry,” he said, and immediately Kaustubh said ‘sorry’ to me. He helped me clean the rest of my tiffin.

My crying still didn’t stop.

“Why are you crying?” Monish asked, after Kaustubh had cleaned my tiffin. He was standing next to my desk, mute.

I didn’t answer.

“Should I hit him again?” Monish asked.

“No!” I exclaimed.

Monish looked at me.

“Then what?”

I looked down at my tiffin.

“I’m hungry,” I said.

Pronto Monish pulled Kaustubh’s tiffin out of his hands and opened it and held it in front of me.

Mooli ke paranthe.

I didn’t move.

“Eat na! He won’t say anything,” Monish said, glaring at Kaustubh. Kaustubh looked down at the floor.

I didn’t touch the tiffin.

“You don’t like it?” monish asked. I nodded. Monish immediately turned the tiffin upside down. The Paranthe fell to the floor. Kaustubh didn’t budge. Monish opened his tiffin and held it in front of me.

“Eat na!” he said.

“What about you?” I asked.

“I’m not hungry,” he said.

I looked at him

What was wrong with this guy? He wasn’t hungry??? What was he saying? How could that be?

“Really, you eat,” he said. I took a bite from his tiffin.

“Thanks,” I said. He smiled.

“Put it back in my bag after you are done,” he said. “I have to go!” and before I could say anything he had stormed out of the room, faster than he had come in.

Nothing altered much after that day. Monish was still his annoying self. But, I had seen the side of a bully which I had never expected to. And Monish now smiled at me every time we saw each other.

THE WAIT WAS OVER

2008-06-05T23:59:00.000-07:00

I looked at the sky as I stepped out of the hospital. It was a bright blue colour. Absolutely cloudless. I smiled.

The first thing I saw ahead of me was a mother playing with a small kid in a pram. The kid had a rattle in his hand and was shaking it wildly. He got his mother on the head with his rattle a couple of times, but she seemed not to mind it. I walked over to mother and child and got down on my knees. I ruffled the kid’s hair and he looked at me. I smiled, and the baby chuckled and let out a delighted squeal.

I was thrilled and made to pick up the baby.

‘He must really like you,’ the mother said. ‘He is not so good with strangers.’

I smiled at the mother and looked back at the baby. His eyes were a sparkling blue. Ice blue. Ocean blue. Baby blue.

‘He is adorable,’ I said as I handed him back to the mother. She took him and put him back in the pram. I was too elated to say anything. I just smiled at her and started walking back to my car.

I got in and started driving towards our home.

I stopped at a crossing as the signal turned red. I glanced around me. my eyes fell upon a small girl sitting in the car next to mine. She must have been about two years old. She was wearing a white coloured frock. It had a lemon yellow ribbon around the waist and beautiful big balloon sleeves. She had a doll seated in her lap and was busy combing her hair. She happened to look at me. I smiled at her. She turned pink in her cheeks and looked away. She made a straight dive for her mummy’s tummy. The mother jumped in her seat and looked at her daughter. Then she looked at me. I smiled at her. she smiled back.

The signal turned green, and we were on the roll again.

I stopped by a toy shop, just a few minutes before our home. I parked the car and went inside.

The spirit of the place gripped me and I literally felt the ‘kid-in-a-candy-store’ feeling. I looked at all the bright coloured soft toys, play stations, dolls, teddy-bears, stuffed puppies and kittens that looked so amiable I felt like picking them all up and stuffing them into my car. I looked at the fur pillows, at the jigsaw puzzles, at the play-houses. The shop was almost empty, except a few kids and their parents. Suddenly I felt this compulsive need to go talk to each of the women and befriend them… I felt like one of them.

I picked up a huge life-size koala bear. The girl at the counter helped me carry it back to my car and get it in. just as I was about to thank her and get in myself my phone buzzed. It was a message.

‘wer r u? cnt wait. come coon.’

I smiled. I got in the car and drove straight home.

Just as I entered our front gate, I saw Siddharth come out of the bungalow. His face was tensed. I purposely took my own sweet time to park the car. Siddharth’s eyes caught the back seat till then. I could see his face go from tensed to confused as he tried to figure out what it was that was occupying the back seat top to floor. Finally I turned the car off and got out. I opened the rear door and set about trying to pull the koala bear out. Siddharth looked upon. Just as he saw the furry arm of the toy emerge out of the door, he grabbed my hand and pulled me towards himself. I threw my arms around him and hugged him tightly. I could feel his heart beat against mine. He pulled me away. I was smiling ear to ear, too overwhelmed to say anything. My eyes welled up with tears. He looked at me, into my eyes.

He put a hand on my tummy.

He raised his eyebrows.

I blinked.

The tears rolled down my cheeks.

I smiled, blushing ever so slightly.

And the next minute, Siddharth had scooped me off the ground and was turning round and round in circles.

When he finally put me down on the ground and helped me remove the koala bear from the car, we walked back into the house, me holding the bear by its tummy, Siddharth holding me in his arms. My head tipped onto his shoulders, as his hand came down and rested on my tummy. I put my hand on his hand and he grabbed it.

The wait was over.

MOM LOVES ME

2008-05-02T03:05:00.000-07:00

I looked down at the floor

Two big fat tears fell on my dress. They blotted it and made it a shade darker___ a strawberry pink from a rose pink.

I bit the insides of my cheeks trying to stop the tears from coming. As if rebelling, they came bigger, faster, as I clenched harder.

I tried to swallow; my throat had gone dry in seconds. I tried to breathe, but my nose had choked. I opened my mouth and took deep breaths. I ran a tongue over my lips. They desiccated within splits seconds.

The more you try to avoid something, the more it gets back at you.

A thousand voices screamed inside my head. An army of thousand men, marching… a thousand firecrackers bursting in the sky… a thousand drums beating in perfect synchronization… nothing could have equaled the pandemonium in my head at that moment. Altogether, at once, I went back in time to when I was in seventh-grade… tenth-grade… college… last month… last week… I grew taller, bolder, smarter, wiser, more sensitive, more responsible, more mature…

But Mom was the same.

Judgmental.

Strong-headed.

One-track minded.

Hypercritical.

Insensitive.

Uncaring.

Mom was still the same.

My vision blurred as the tears pooled in my eyes. I blinked. The tears ran down my cheeks.

‘You say my behaviour hurts you. Your behaviour hurts me too.’

The words were out of my mouth before I knew what I was saying.

There was a moment of dead silence.

‘But I never say it.’

Pause.

‘Because I don’t like to. And because I love you.’

I had finally found my voice. Thousands of words were on the tip of my mouth, but I clenched my teeth and stopped myself from saying them. ‘Cause I knew myself and I knew that I was capable of inflicting stinging tears by saying fewest of the most vicious words. And I didn’t want to do it. I was trying to learn not to do it.

And still my mother said I didn’t love her.

That I didn’t care for her.

How could she?

My ears felt hot. They were burning, red. The tears kept coming in steady streams.

I tried to think of our best times together.

But they kept coming.

I tried to think of the many times when we had laughed till our stomachs ached and jaws went numb.

But the tears kept coming.

I squeezed my eyes shut again to clear the pool of tears in my eyes. As I opened them I sensed some movement towards my right. I didn’t look up.

Mom came up to me. She put her arms around me.

And all dams broke loose as I heard her whisper in my ear…

‘I’m sorry.’

I put my arms around her and put my head in her bosom and cried.

It felt nice to be held by my mother, in her arms… after all these years…

It felt safe.

It felt secure.

It finally felt like… despite all my faults and the times that I had unknowingly hurt her, Mom still loved me…

Yes. Mom loves me.

THE WEDDING

2008-04-24T08:05:00.000-07:00

Riddhima looked around at the people sitting in the drawing room and stifled a yawn. The clock struck twelve-thirty. It was pitch black outside.

‘Well, we certainly can’t do anything. At least till Dada is back,’ her father said, and everybody else in the room nodded in agreement.

‘But how are we going to break the news to them when they do get back?’ her mother said.

‘Parvati calm down,’ Riddhima’s grandfather said. He turned to look at his younger son. ‘When is Nikhil supposed to be back?’

‘Dada is coming back tomorrow Baba,’ Rohan answered his father. ‘He will be here by seven in the morning. Mala tar Wahinichich kalji wattiye,’ he said. I’m more worried about Wahini.

‘Don’t worry about them,’ Baba replied. ‘You take Parvati and Baby back to your room, and all of you get some sleep. We are going to have a long day tomorrow.’

Riddhima tore her eyes open as she heard Baba mention her. She got up as her father took her mother’s hand and walked to her. She held his hand and the trio walked back to their room.

Rohan lay in his bed, looking out of the window, a thousand thoughts crowding his mind…

“... this shouldn’t have happened. But then, who can stop the inevitable?... Dada-la itkyanda bolun pan... (Even after telling Dada so many times)... kids become rebellious. And then Melody wasn’t a bad girl. And Parth and Melody were both mature, and they were adults by law. Had Dada treated the issue with just a little bit of more sensitivity, maybe Parth wouldn’t have eloped with the girl...”

Baba looked at his son, his daughter-in-law and his grand-daughter as they walked back to their room. He heaved a sigh. He took his specs off.

“Why did you do it Parth? Couldn’t you come and speak to your Baba at least, before doing something like this? Have I not supported you, and helped you out of situations, and reasoned with you when I thought you were wrong? Did I ever force anything on you? Did I not help you solve things between you and your father?... Yes. Most certainly what you have done today is wrong... but at the same time, I guess I have no right to say this either... hadn’t I done quite the same thing as a young man? I can’t condemn you... but I had no ‘Baba’ to stand by me. You had one... why didn’t you trust me? Or anyone of us for that matter? I believe we have failed as a family... for you found it easier to confess into your friends and take them into your confidence than us... I guess we have failed... Yes. But still... you shouldn’t have done this Parth...”

Riddhima tip-toed out of her room and peeped into her parents’ room. They were fast asleep. She tip-toed back to her room and shut the door. She turned the light over her study-table on and took her diary out of its drawer and started writing.

“God! Eeeee! I don’t believe this. I so can’t believe this! Is it really happening? I like Melody... she is such a nice girl! And you two look so good together! But Kaka is going to be mad at you... really mad. You have any idea what you have gotten yourself into Bhaiyya? Its like, a part of me is very very happy for you. But a part of me is very worried too. I mean... surely there had to be some other way! Maybe you could have convinced Kaka. We could have worked out something... anything! There had to be a way! But God! This is so romantic! Just like QSQT! And as much as I hate you for leaving like that and not telling me and involving me in the planning, I am happy for you... I pray you will survive and make it through... and well, I received the pre-paid card you had kept for me in the drawer of your study. I will keep it on for an hour every night. But I hope this is not yet another of your jokes, and that you will really call me one of these days...”

Parth put an arm around Melody. She was fast asleep, with her head on his shoulder. He looked at her, looked down at her tear stained face, and an ever-so-small smile danced on his lips, even as his eyes filled with tears. He looked out of the door and saw the fast-receding railway tracks in the moonlight, running parallel to the track their train was on. His mind went back in time and a small voice in his head read-out to him the letter he had read and re-read several times before leaving it in his parents’ room, on their bed.

“... I don’t know if I have done the right thing Papa. But doing it felt right enough. I know you want the very best for your son Papa and that you would have had me marry a nice girl from a good family. But I love Melody. I know she is not going to live for more than a year, and I know I am going to be alone after she dies. But just think about Melody. If I had abandoned her, she would have crashed. And so would have I. I didn’t choose to elope Papa. The choice I made was to be with her and be happy for a short time, over abandoning her and being unhappy for the rest of my life. I know you may perhaps never understand my decision; that you will find it unreasonable that I waste my life for a happiness that is so short-lived. But sometimes you have to do things in life. There is no reason; you just have to do them. Melody is my Fate, and I want to take my chances. If you have ever loved anyone from the bottom of your heart you will someday understand me..."

A LETTER

2008-04-22T01:42:00.000-07:00

DEAR TAI,

Congratulations! Heartiest congratulations on your wedding, and may God bless you and Jiju with his choicest of blessings.

I am sure you didn’t expect to get a ‘gift’ from your younger sister today, and definitely not a letter. But then, it is the best I have to offer. What else can I give you? I don’t work or earn! Hee hee…

The first time Dad told me you are getting married, I was stunned. For a moment, all was lost to me, and I was lost in nothing. And then suddenly, I was smiling ear-to-ear and hugging Dad tightly. I was so happy! Ecstatic! And even more so when he told me you are marrying Sanjay. I was so pleasantly surprised! You wont believe me, but in that insane moment, I tried to imagine marrying one of my school friends; God! I went crazy rolling with laughter. But I was so happy for you… really. ‘It must be the best thing to marry your friend,’ I thought to myself… atleast that’s what I think. But then, I’m only 16, so I maybe wrong. But I’d like to believe I’m right; it makes life so much easier.

I was very nostalgic the day Dad told me about your marriage. I found it pretty surprising, and I shocked myself with what I felt about your wedding. I mean, I never saw much of you, but then, you are my real sister after all, even if we don’t live together, and never will perhaps. And now I was not going to be able too see you at all; what with you migrating to Switzerland. I am going to fight with Jiju over this some day…

I have always wanted to have a real sister or a real brother. I used to look at you and Dada, and my heart used to fill with envy. And I used to hate myself for envying you. I used to be so excited when we met at all our family get-togethers. Really! Even before Dad told me about us being real brothers and sisters__ about us being real siblings__ you were always special to me. I don’t know why. On the very few and extremely rare occasions that you’d come to live with us, I would be so fascinated! I used to copy everything you did. I used to get up and laze in the bed. I used to sit in my window, close to you, with my toothbrush in my hand. I used to shake my head left-right vigorously after my bath. You’re hair was shorter than mine, so it was ok for you. But my waist-length hair used to get entangled so badly, Mom used to really have a tough time untangling them, and I used to often get a slap or a rap on my back for my stupidity. I never used to cry.

I remember the night very clearly when Dad told me about us. I remember his exact words, and how shocked and surprised and confused I was. I tried to make head or tales of what he had told me for a long time. So many of my questions had been left unanswered… Why you and Dada didn’t live with us, when we were real brothers and sisters; why did you never even come to stay with us and play with me, atleast once in a while; why you didn’t call my Mom ‘Mom’ but called her ‘Maushi’… I struggled to try and understand why things were the way they were. I was too young to understand the situation. It was more like, I knew the situation, but didn’t know what it meant.

I never ever felt depressed though. Never. I was never ‘sad’ or ‘depressed’ or ‘angry’ or any of the things. I never for a moment hated Dad, or even you or Dada for that matter. In fact I felt more and more close to you, and I loved you and adored you and idolized you even more day-by-day. But I did feel deprived; very deeply deprived.

As I entered secondary school, I began understanding what it meant… us being siblings and not staying together. And that is when it really hit me. I felt so terribly deprived. It was like, I had a brother and a sister, a Tai and a Dada; but I could never tell it to anyone. I would always stumble when my new-made friends would ask me: So do you have a brother or a sister? Only briefly, but I would feel… awkward. And more often than not, I’d end up lying: Nope, I’m alone. And if my friend had a sibling, he or she would call me ‘lucky’; and if they didn’t, he or she would say ‘me neither; join the club!’ they’d say they were glad to be alone, and I’d nod, pasting a smile on my face.

Every time we all gathered for any festival or festivity, you would all talk about the fun you had as cousins; and the stuff you confessed into each other; and the way you covered up for each other; and I’d feel like an alien amongst my own cousins. You had grown together, and it seemed to me like I had tagged along. I had attached myself to a group of brothers and sisters whom I had nothing in common with. I know you didn’t do it on purpose. I would always closely listen to you guys, and try and think what it must have been like. I tried to do stuff that would make you notice me and talk to me. I listened to English songs in hope that I would get to talk to you about them. I tried to adopt the several things you guys did to try and blend in with you and be a part of you.

But most of all, I always tried to be your younger sister Tai; your ‘kid’-sister. I always tried to bond with you. I loved you so much! I was in awe of you. I was fascinated by you; by the thought of having a Tai I could share my stuff with__ ear-rings, clothes, boyfriends, break-ups. I always wanted to be your ‘kid’-sister. But I never got to be.

Every time I was at your place, I’d go through your stuff and try to find out more about you; your likes, your tastes; so that I could adopt them and then probably have something in common with you that would help me strike a chord with you and make you think of me a little more and talk to me a little more and notice me a little more. I would go through the books you read__ Archie’s, Comics, Garfield, Sherlock Holmes__ I’d leaf through them. I never meant to pry through your stuff or take it Tai. I never ever meant to steal it! If I had known you did not like anyone going through your things I wouldn’t have dared to even look at your things. I wouldn’t have dared to enter your room. All I wanted was to be your sister and all I wanted was you to be my ‘Tai’. All I wanted to do was connect with you and feel at least for a moment that I had a sister; a real sister.

I was deeply hurt that day when you told Dad that you didn’t like me sneaking in your room. But I didn’t say anything. And unknowing to me I started detaching myself from you guys, from my cousins, from you. I started having my meals with Ajoba on the dining table when ever we gathered, instead of sitting among you guys and chit-chatting and having fun. I used to pretend to feel very sleepy after my meals and used to go off to the bedroom of whosever house we had gathered at and used to try and fall asleep. I had come to accept that I never was and probably would never be a part of your world; a world which you had all shared together as cousins, but which you were too old to share with me now. I never thought there would be a ‘generation gap’ between us, but that is what happened… to an extent. With you, the youngest of you all, being 9 years older to me, I was another generation for you guys, and I tried to accept it.

I am sorry. I am sincerely sorry for going through your stuff and for doing those things I did. But believe me, I never meant to be privy. All I wanted was to get to know you…

As I see you standing on the stage with Jiju today, I know you have changed. I can see it in your eyes. I can feel it in your gestures. I can feel the aura that you seem to be radiating. I felt it the day when, on our recent get-together, you asked me why I had chosen to sit on the oldies’ side of the table in the restaurant and not with you guys; and it’s stronger than ever today. I can see that you have ‘come of age’ as they say…

I wish you all the luck and all the very best things in life. It is great to see you so happy, and I am happy for you. In fact, I am sure I am the happiest person in this wedding-hall right now; next to you and Jiju of course!

I have put a bet with Dad that I won’t cry when you leave. But I know I am going to cry buckets when I’m alone later in the day.

Don’t tell Dad though! Or I will lose the bet…

I love you! And I am going to miss you a lot…

YOURS TRULY.

ANALOGY

2008-04-05T06:23:00.000-07:00

‘But I have nothing to give you! My hands are empty!’

‘Not any more!’

I smiled as Jo slid her hand into Friedrich’s and they kissed under the umbrella as the rain poured down on them; and the picture blacked out and the credits started to roll. I kept staring at the TV-screen for a moment, lost in the world of ‘Little Women’… In a time when girls wore dresses that were hideously impractical and huge and made them trip over every time they tried to be elegant and walk… specially girls like Josephine March! I got lost in a world where boys actually meant all the things they said when they proposed a girl and asked her hand in marriage. I got lost in a world which though it existed only a few decades ago now seemed like eons ago.

I tried to imagine what life would be like in a world like that. I for sure would be a ‘Jo’; caught between someone I was and someone I wanted to be; clumsy and not much of a girl, or a ‘lady’… and with thoughts and questions like ‘Why do we have to marry at all?’ in my mind. But then, I realised, life wouldn’t be all that bad either; if it was going to end up in my meeting a ‘Friedrich Bhaer’! And also if it meant that I would be a published author for sure someday!

I came back to the present as the credits rolled out and the advertisements started. I quickly put the TV off, but not without hearing ‘Das saal se mera sathi’; Aaah! What a stupid stupid ad! (Sorry if you are an ardent SRK fan… actually no; why should I be sorry! I take it back!) I always hate it the way the commercials take away from all the aftereffect of a nice movie; especially a movie like the one I had just seen. That’s why I prefer seeing movies at the theatre. I cursed no one in particular and turned the TV off, the frown on my face refusing to go away. I squeezed my eyes shut, and tried to go back to Jo’s world, but with little success. But the frown sure did fade away in the process. I went to my room and shut the door. I propped onto the pillows on my bed, lying on my stomach. I looked out of the window, now the smile on my face refusing to go away. I could see a clear blue sky and the leaves of the almond tree planted in our parking. It had grown tall and I could almost reach out and touch a few of its leaves from my window. I looked at the leaves, now turning into a shade of bright crimson-orange red… quite similar to the shade of orange-red leaves I had just seen in the autumn of the Little Women’s world. I smiled. Again and again, my mind flashed back to Teddy’s proposal and to Friedrich’s kiss, in the opera, and outside Jo’s house. Suddenly a sher I had once received as an SMS came back to me…

Jisne hume chaha, usse hum chah na sake
Jise chaha, usse hum pa na sake
Yeh samajh lo dil tutne ka khel hai
Kisika toda aur apna bacha na sake

I don’t know why it popped into my mind at that very moment. The very next moment though, I found myself trying to see myself in place of Jo. I have always liked Jo the most, of all the four March sisters; probably because in ways more than one, she seemed to be my alter ego, my twin soul, running around the house shouting ‘Marmee’ every time she called out to her mother. I felt like he was addressing me when her father comes back from the army and addresses Jo as she flies into his arms as ‘The Wild One’. Jo, who lived in a world of her own where Vampires were a reality. Almost immediately I hoped though that my writing wasn’t as bad as Jo’s, or as bad as Friedrich made it out to be. I tried to decide which would be worse, it being bad, or it not being appreciated by a ‘Friedrich’; and my smile faded a bit as I realised there was no ‘Friedrich’ in my life… sigh… or was there? Yes… sure there was! I had found ‘my Friedrich’… yes I had. But he was miles apart at the moment… but then so were Jo and Friedrich at some point, right? And my smile grew wider than before at the prospects…

If only this one analogy, which was the only difference for the time, turned out to be true too, it would so be a happy ending… just like in the movie…

THE GLINT IN HIS EYES

2008-03-27T09:19:00.001-07:00

‘Collect your pictures in half an hour,’ the lady who had just taken my picture told me.

‘I hope there is no confusion,’ I said.

‘Yes ma’am; ten stamp-size copies and ten passport-size copies,’ the lady repeated my order.

‘Right!’ I said and smiled. She smiled back. I stepped out of the studio and walked down the stairs. I came out of the complex and took a deep breath. I looked at my watch. I had come quite a long way from my house to go back and come in the evening to pick up my photographs. Besides I could do with getting them early. I decided to spend some time in the Crossword outlet across the street while I waited for my pictures to be developed.

I crossed the street and entered the store. The blast of the cool AC-air felt like a blessing, with temperatures hitting 38 degrees. I deposited my hand bag at the counter and took the coupon. Stuffing it into my pant-pocket, I started walking towards the ‘New Arrival’ section.

Visiting book stores somehow leaves me feeling rejuvenated. Every time I look at the stacks after stacks of books, piled ceiling to floor, I can’t help but contemplate over the treasure that might be hidden in those millions and millions of pages. There could be stuff out there that could change my life forever, make me a believer of something, make me hate something; make me long for something… anything. The power of words. Words, words, words.

That’s probably why I always like to go to bookstores alone. It makes me feel great. Nothing makes me feel as great as after a visit to a bookstore.

And we come there to choose one out of thousands and thousands of books...

I read somewhere that its not we who choose; the book chooses its reader. It should be true. I like to try new authors. Somewhere I believe it’s our responsibility to give them a chance. Encourage them, buy their books; atleast give them a try. We spend so much money on so many things. It’s ridiculous that we should think and debate before spending a few bucks on a book, just because it’s not by Jeffery Archer or Agatha Christie or Stephen Hawking or Paulo Coelho. And even though it sometimes boomerangs, it’s ok. Atleast for me. I still keep trying new books. I read them and I pass them on among my friends... And just as the book chooses its reader, it also chooses when the reader is to read it. I could put aside atleast five books right now from the ones I have that I haven’t read at all, though I bought them a long long time ago. For whatever reason, they have been left untouched. A few days back, one of my friends borrowed one of these books from me, and she really loved it. And she was also very surprised I hadn’t read such a nice book. Now I have been given the ultimatum: Book padho, ya mujhe bhul jao! (Read the book or you can forget about our friendship!) Anyways…

I went from the ‘New Arrivals’ section to the ‘Indian Fiction’ section. One after the other, I read the titles and names of authors. Once in a few names, a name would make me pull the book out of the stack and look at its cover, then look at its back and then the first few pages. I read ‘praise for the author’ and wondered exactly how many people actually meant what they said. I put the book back in its place. Sometimes I put it elsewhere. I wondered who’d be the next to pick it up. After going through a number of books, I settled for just one (very uncharacteristic of me). I put it in the shopping-bag I got at the door and turned around. I went to the billing counter. The man took the book from the shopping-bag and kept the bag on a pile of several other shopping-bags. I drummed my fingers on the counter.

‘Two-fifty, ma’am.’

I patted my pockets and realised I’d left my wallet in my bag.

‘I’ll just go get my wallet,’ I said and left the queue. And just as I turned around, I saw a lady enter the store with a small boy. He was wearing blue jeans and a white t-shirt with some abstract design printed in pink. His hair was an unusual reddish-brown colour. His feet were done in bright colored sports shoes. Within fraction of a second as mother and son entered the store, the boy’s eyes lit up. They grew big and wide and I saw a glint in his eyes. They were shining bright. The gleam was unmistakable. And even before the mother had a chance to say anything, the boy freed his hand from the mother’s grasp and ran inside the store, towards the kids section. My eyes followed him. He ran straight to the end of the store and stopped in front of the books section. I smiled and went back to the billing counter. I paid for my book, picked up my hand bag from the counter. Just as I was about to step out of the store, I turned around one more time to look at the boy. He was deeply engrossed in reading a book. My smile grew wider. I walked back inside and walked up to that boy. I got down and sat on my knees. I ruffled his hair (a habit I have. I always ruffle kid’s hair. Especially boys’). He looked up from his book, a bit confused. I smiled. He smiled back, but a little cautious.

‘You like reading?’ I said. He nodded. I reached inside my bag and pulled out an old copy of ‘Wuthering Heights’. I have a habit of carrying some kind of a book or novel with me when I go out. I opened the book and took the bookmark out; a typical sun-sign type. I held it out to him. He looked at it, then looked at his mother, who had now come and stood behind me. She nodded. The boy’s face lit-up with a big smile, and the glint was back in his eyes. He took the bookmark from my hand and looked at it.

‘Even my sun-sign is Sagittarius,’ he said and smiled.

I laughed. ‘Do you know what a sun-sign is?’ I asked. He thought for a moment, then counter-questioned me; ‘Do you know what it is?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Then why do you ask?’ he said.

‘Bhaskar! What happened to your manners?’ his mother scolded him as she walked over to him. The boy looked down at his feet.

‘No no! Please!’ I said. I ruffled his hair again. He looked up at me and smiled as I got up. I turned toward the mother.

‘I am so happy you brought him here instead of taking him to a toy-store,’ I said.

‘Oh he loves reading,’ the mother said. ‘I don’t like reading myself much, but I always encourage him to buy books. I guess it’s come to him from his grandfather.’

‘That’s really great,’ I said. I turned to look at him. ‘Bye Bhaskar!’ I said. Mother and son both waved at me as I finally walked out of the store. I then walked down to the studio and picked up my pictures which were now ready and drove back home.

For the rest of the day, my mind went back again and again to the little boy I had seen in the bookstore. I just couldn’t put his face out of my mind. The glint I saw in his eyes… It was pure and innocent. It was strong and full of hope, curiosity, happiness and a… a kind of positivenness that was so alluring... I was to meet my Professor in an hour regarding a project I was working on. I was sitting in his office. The kaka (peon) told me he’d take another fifteen minutes to come back from his meeting. Automatically my hand reached inside my bag and I pulled the copy of Wuthering Heights out. I shuffled through the pages and suddenly realised I had given the small boy my bookmark. I smiled as his face, his eyes popped up in my mind again; and instantly my face lit-up with a smile too. I opened the first page of the book and started reading it all-over again… glad he happened to me.

MIRTH

2008-03-09T01:09:00.000-08:00

I looked at the trees, the lawn, the grass and the sky. I kept staring out in the distance. Above the sound of the rain, I could hear my mom fry pakoras in the kitchen, the sizzle louder with every batch of pakoras as the oil got hotter and hotter. The first rain of the year. A proper downpour. The kind that wets every millimeter of you within seconds. Suddenly a strong wind splashed a few drops of water on my face. I blinked and drew a deep breath. I turned around and looked inside our house from the verandah. I could see dad sitting in the bean bag, pretending to read the newspaper, but actually fast asleep. I made sure mom was still in the kitchen, listening to the old Marathi songs playing on the radio. I slipped my feet into my slippers and quietly stepped out of the house.

I walked slowly and heavily on the mud path that was carved out around our garden. I stopped where it was cut to enter into the garden. I looked at my feet, at the slippers and then at the grass. I removed my slippers and stepped onto the grass. I walked slowly as I felt the grass beneath my feet. By now my clothes were clinging to me. I was drenched in the first rain of the year.

I looked up at the sky. It was a uniform grey. Spotless. Plain. But not dull in any way. I stared at the sky, unblinking. I felt the drops of rain, sharp as razor; hit my face, my eyes, my cheeks. I stood there, looking at the sky, my hands beside me.

Somewhere I could hear someone calling out to me. I ignored.

I lifted my hand and ran it over my face. Slowly I could feel this energy build up in me. My breathing grew stronger, heavier. I had this mad surge to shout at the top of my voice. No I was not mad or angry at anything or anybody. Sometimes you don’t have to be mad at or angry at something or somebody to feel like doing something so crazy. Nature drive’s you mad.

I opened my mouth and let out a loud cry. A long loud cry.

Suddenly everyone was out of their houses. They were all staring at me, wondering if I had lost my mind. Mom was standing in the verandah of our house with dad, clutching each-other’s hands. I looked at them. I looked at the people who were staring at me. I walked out of our garden onto the street and looked up at the sky again. I kneeled down and spread my arms wide apart and screamed again.

What joy!

What liberation!

I stopped screaming. My head was still tilted upwards. I drew my hands close and bent my head. I placed my hands on my laps and hung my head. I looked up at mom and dad again. And at the people who were still staring at me. And I smiled as I saw few of them were running towards me, their arms stretched out, and their mouths wide open as they joined me in my mirth and screamed.

REFLECTION - PART II

2008-03-05T05:37:00.000-08:00

‘Hey! Relax dude! Slow down.’

I immediately eased my grip on the accelerator. Suddenly my senses were alert; my muscles tense. I tried to tell myself to calm down but couldn’t. You can’t just say ‘relax’ and relax with a gun in your face.

‘Ok ok; I’ll put it back,’ she said and leaned a little towards me. She stretched her hand and reached out for her bag kept on the back seat. I shrank back and away from her.

‘Why are you acting so scared? Look, I have put it away, ok? Now I’m about as harmless as you are.’

I still didn’t look at her. She continued.

‘Potentially you’re about twice as big as I am,’ she said, looking at my six-feet-three-inch frame, ‘and twice as strong as well.’

‘I’m not carrying a gun!’ I blurted.

She started laughing again. Suddenly her voice wasn’t sweet anymore.

‘Just about anyone can have a gun ok? And I have a proper licensed gun, ok? I bought it about a month ago.’

‘What for? To kill your husband?’ I asked, shuddering at her coolness.

‘Precisely.’ She looked at me. ‘I bought it to kill Karan,’ she said to confirm.

I didn’t say anything.

‘You know, I had planned it all out. I had even decided to surrender to the police…’

I still didn’t say anything.

‘Please stop on the side of the road. I need some fresh air.’

I pulled onto the side. As soon as I turned the ignition off she asked me for the keys.

‘Why?’ I asked.

‘I don’t want you to leave me here and run away.’

‘And what guarantee you won’t run away with my car?’ I counter-questioned.

‘Ummm… Ok. Let’s just leave the keys in the car then and lets both get out together.’

I agreed and we both stepped out. She closed the door, went to the rear of the car and stood there, resting against it. The moon was right on top of us now. I saw her full-self in the moonlight, and for the first time I noticed; she was badly scratched and injured. Her entire left arm was bruised and so was a little of her waist. Her foot was bleeding and the blood had already caked at places. Her sari was soiled too. I didn’t know how much of her wounds were concealed under her sari, but the sight of blood on such a perfect and flawless skin alarmed me.

‘Jesus Christ! You’re hurt!’ I exclaimed.

‘Yes. But it’s not much.’

‘Shut up and sit down on that rock.’

I opened the rear-door and removed the first-aid box. I shut the door and came and sat down on my knees next to her. I first took a look at her arm. She adjusted her sari over her shoulder to help me get a better view. I started by cleaning up her wounds.

‘Aren’t you scared now?’ she asked. I didn’t answer. ‘Really, it’s nothing; trust me.’

‘How did you get hurt?’ I asked, ignoring her comment.

‘While jumping out of the car.’

‘What! How? Why?’

She sat quiet for a while. I waited for her to go on.

‘Good for nothing… that is what Karan called me. Lately he couldn’t help but find faults in me… My habits, my dressing style, my cooking… I guess I wasn’t good enough in bed either. That’s probably what made him lay Charu.’

She paused and took a deep breath.

‘I was a very different girl back then___ totally crazy, fashion-freak, and a smoker. I can’t remember the first time I tried it; but by the time I was in the final year of B.A. I loved nothing more than bunking lectures and sitting on the terrace of our college with my gang, listening to Linkin Park and smoking Marlboro. I wouldn’t have dared to do it back home, but then… I was a hostelite…

One day we were on our way to the terrace. We were all running up the stairs, taking them two at a time. I was holding a cigarette in one hand, clutching my bag with the other. Just as we reached the last flight of stairs, two guys brushed past me.

“Ouch!” one of them exclaimed. I had burnt him with my cigarette I guess. “Saale teri toh___” he started and caught my hand. He turned around and looked at me and immediately shut up.

“Sorry,” I muttered and tried to break free from his iron-grip.

“Subhan-allah!” he said. I looked at him. He was staring at me.

“Let go of me,” I said.

“And what if I don’t?” he asked, smiling. I looked at him for a moment, and then stabbed my cigarette onto his hand again. He instantly released me hand and squealed in pain again. I bounded up the stairs. Mid-way, I stopped and turned around to look at him.

‘Don’t make me do it again,’ I said; ‘please. I hate wasting my cigarettes.’

That was how we met. It seems like another lifetime altogether. Karan had changed so much post-marriage, I would have laughed back then, if someone had told me he was going to turn into a womanizing monster. We loved each other so much! I quit smoking and turned into a typical good Indian girl. I didn’t want to, but Karan’s parents belonged to the old times and wouldn’t have approved of my way of living. I switched from jeans and skirts to saris___ and in the process I ended up switching names to become Mrs. Isha Karan Arora.’

She paused. I had finished cleaning the wounds on her arm. She looked at the bandages and smiled at me. I smiled back awkwardly. She then lifted her sari up to her knees. Her leg was badly bruised too. I shook my head and muttered a soft ‘Oh God’. All that blood on such perfect skin looked like a curse. I opened the bottle of Dettol again and soaked yet another cotton-ball in it. I dabbed it on the wound and she clutched at my shoulder. I removed the cotton and waited for her grip to ease a bit. I applied the cotton again, she clutched again, little less strong this time. Her body eased slowly as she got used to the burning sensation.

‘I thought… Heck. I couldn’t think straight actually. I couldn’t figure out what had happened; why he had started having affairs. Then I thought maybe that’s the true him. I accepted it. Funny it didn’t affect me or my parents severely… almost as if we were prepared for it; although how come, I don’t know. The gravity of the whole thing began weighing on me a few days after I first came to know about him and Charu. I filed for a divorce. “It’s not the end of the world,” I kept telling myself. “Marriages happen and marriages break… so many… everyday…” I kept saying. But the real trouble started when Karan refused to give me divorce and started physically abusing me.’

This time I clutched my fist.

‘It went on and on for a couple of weeks. I fled to my parent’s house. He brought me back; and the situation went from bad to worse. Finally one night, I snapped. He tried to hit me, and I hit him back with a pair of tongs. I fled to my room before he had time to recover and closed the door from inside.’

For the first time since we met about an hour ago, I saw her shiver and look scared… alarmed rather.

‘That night, I decided something had to be done about the whole situation. I had only just recovered from his recent beating. Something happened that night… I don’t know what. But as the day dawned I had made up my mind to kill him.’

I looked at her. There was mad determination in her eyes.

‘I didn’t come out of my room till he had left for his office in the morning. I contacted a friend of mine and with her help I acquired this pistol the very next day. Today I decided to kill him after he got back from work. I served him dinner. He went to the bar right after dinner. I encouraged him to just an extra drink and then suggested we go for a drive. He agreed and took the keys. I took my pistol.

We reached the dhaba off the highway. We went a little further. The car swerved from left to right as the drinks took over Karan. At one point we nearly missed running head on into a truck. And that’s where I saw my opportunity. I could get rid off him without his blood on my hands. And that’s what I decided to do. I slipped my bag onto my shoulder and sat ready waiting for the next curb. I saw it coming and distracted him by kissing him hard on his lips. He pushed me away and looked taken aback. My eyes welled up. And just as he was about to drive off the road I said “Bye Karan” and jumped out of the car.’

In the silence that followed her monologue, I tried to absorb what she had told me. Things like these happened in novels, in movies… in pathetic and third-rate daily soaps; not in real life. But this was real life. She resumed talking.

‘When I got up, the car was nowhere in sight. I don’t know what had happened to it, or to Karan; but both had disappeared into thin air somehow. I got up and tried to gather my things. Most importantly I tried to locate the pistol and found it was right there, safe in my bag.

I started walking. i walked and walked… half there, half not there. Strangely, I wasn’t feeling a wee bit sad. In fact, I was feeling relieved… and happy. Actually happy. By the time I reached the highway, I was as happy as I could be. And then you drove along.’

She stopped. I looked at her. She looked back at me.

‘You can drive me to the police station if you want to. I don’t really care,’ she said. I closed my eyes for a moment. I opened them and started putting the bandage, the Dettol bottle and other stuff back into the first-aid kit. I helped her get up and get into the car. I went and sat in the driver’s seat. Soon we were driving back home.

We reached the post office at twelve-thirty. I helped her get out of the car again.

‘Thanks,’ she said, and held out a card. I took it. ‘Isha’s Creations’ it said. ‘Drop in sometime if you want to buy a dress for your girl-friend,’ she said, smiling.

‘What will you do now?’

‘Go up and sleep,’ she replied simply, like nothing had happened. I figured she didn’t want to talk about it… at least not then. I picked up the hint and didn’t press the topic. I got back in the car as she turned around and started crossing the street. I turned the ignition on and looked in the mirror.

She was gone.

I put my head out of the window. I couldn’t see her. I turned the engine off and got out of the car.

She was nowhere to be seen.

‘What the hell!’

I ran across the street and reached the apartment. She couldn’t have possibly crossed the street so quickly… with her leg sprained and with so many wounds all over her. I ran up the stairs of the building and reached her flat. The flat was locked.

Cold sweat broke on my forehead a second time in that night. I started walking down the stairs… How could this be? One second she was there, the other she was gone! I started imagining crazy things… Ghost? Spirit? Poltergeist? What?

Suddenly I remembered her card. I ran back to my car and picked the card up from the dashboard. It felt real enough. I removed my cell from my pocket, and stood just like that. Something was holding me back. I just couldn’t bring myself to dial the number on the card, fearing what I might find out

I finally mustered up all my courage, and dialed the number on the card. The hair on my body stood on their ends as I heard a pre-recorded message;

“This number does not exist…”

REFLECTION - PART I (my first attempt at writing a thriller)

2008-03-04T00:35:00.000-08:00

I stepped onto the brakes. The car came to a stop. I looked at whoever it was asking for a lift at ten-thirty in such a God-forsaken place on such a pitch-black night. It was a girl. A beautiful girl.

‘Yes?’ I said.

‘Can you please drop me off at the post office on Shami Street?’ her voice sounded like a piece of soft music.

‘At this hour? It must be closed ma’am,’ I said, glancing at my Omega.

‘Actually I live in the building opposite to it. Gulmohar Apartments.’

The name rang a bell. I was lost in my thoughts for a few moments.

‘Excuse me?’

‘What? Oh yes; ya sure. I’ll drop you off,’ I said, opening the door for her. She opened the rear door. “Attitude!” I thought to myself. Then she dumped her bag on the rear seat and shut the door. She came and sat next to me. I looked at the steering wheel sheepishly. I started the car and pulled onto the road again.

We were both quiet for a long time; during which, I tried hard not to stare at her. Clad in a black Chiffon sari with a halter neck blouse and absolutely no jewellery, spare a silver watch on her left wrist and her black beady eyes, she looked simple yet stunning. She had a fair complexion that was so soft and delicate and spotless, you’d think she bathed in milk everyday. Finally I asked her;

‘What are you doing all alone in this part of the city at this hour of the night, if I may ask so?’

Now you may think that was a stupid question to ask; but when you see a girl so beautiful and all alone at ten-thirty, about five minutes away from the highway… it doesn’t seem to be an odd question, right?

‘Funny you should ask me that,’ she said, playing with a lock of her long black curly hair.

‘Yeah; maybe… But then I’m a guy… and not much in danger. But you are a really beautiful lady___’

She suddenly burst out laughing. She then took a full look at me, her eyes lingering on my biceps, then my abs.

‘How many hours do you work out?’ she asked me.

‘Two.’

‘And you think you are strong?’

I kept quiet.

‘How strong would you be if I had a gun with me right now?’ she asked. My hair stood out on their ends.

‘Do you?’ I asked. And she laughed again.

We were quiet again for a while. Shit! Could I have run out of conversation with such a beauty so soon? Had I really put her off by my silly remark? But then the whole situation, simple as it was, was seemingly unusual.

I switched the radio in the car on. Asha Bhosale’s voice came floating out of it;

‘Aankhon Se Jo Utari Hai Dil Mein…’

‘Aaah!’ I exclaimed, then apologized immediately.

‘What for?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know… Maybe I was too loud?’

This time she simply ignored me and looked out of the window.

Again silence.

WHY WAS I ACTING SO CHIVALROUS? Come on… I mean, this wasn’t like the first time I was driving with a gorgeous female sitting next to me. I mean, it was routine for me. Oh, didn’t I tell you? I am a photographer.

‘So you are a photographer?’

I looked at her as she tried to tuck in a curl that was carelessly bouncing on her forehead, and said, ‘How did you know?’

She pointed to the rear-seat. I glanced back, and for the first time I was glad for all the mess at the back of my car; thermocol sheets, black cloth, tripod stand, and safely put in one corner among all this clutter, my precious precious camera.

‘Ya,’ I said, happy she had initiated the talk this time after my two miserable, failed attempts.

‘Cool! So you work for a magazine or something?’ she further inquired.

‘Yeah; I work for GLAM.’

Wow! We were finally talking. I could have become her chauffer for the rest of my life if only to get to see that breath-taking face in the rear-view mirror and hear that sweet voice again and again… man! I was thinking crazy things!

She pushed the back-rest further behind and leaned against it.

‘My brother was a photographer too,’ she said, her eyes closed, her body relaxed.

‘Really?’ I said.

‘But a wild-life photographer.’

‘Oh.’

I again found myself studying her in the silence that ensued. God! I tell you she was beautiful. But there was something about her beauty that was queer… something really odd. Her skin was so fair… or was it the moon playing tricks on my slightly over-worked mind? I tried hard to resist myself from reaching out for her arm.

‘Girlfriend?’ she asked suddenly, pointing at a small picture on the dashboard. I quickly picked it up and threw it on the back seat. She looked at me and raised her eyebrows.

‘Ex.’ I said, focusing on the road.

‘Name?’

‘Akanksha.’

Why was I not being able to answer her unselfconsciously? And why was I at all giving this strange, but beautiful girl a fill-up on my personal life at now almost eleven, when I didn’t even know her name?

‘I’m Isha,’ she said; ‘Whats your name?’

‘Can you read people’s minds or something?’ I blurted out.

‘Sorry?’ she asked, confused.

‘Nothing,’ I said and continued driving. A moment or two later I reached out for the glove box. My hand brushed her leg slightly, but she didn’t seem to notice it. I on the other hand, with adrenaline pumping in every inch of my body, felt it. My hand lingered a while, fidgeting with the handle. I shook my head and gathered myself. I opened the box and withdrew a pack of cigarettes. I noticed she was staring out of the window. I pulled a cigarette out of the pack and lit it. The smoke made her turn around and look at me.

‘Marlboro?’ she asked.

‘How did you know?’

‘Oh I can recognized that smell in a thousand other, have an extra one?’

‘You smoke?’

‘Used to.’

I handed the pack over to her. She removed a cigarette and held it between her lips. I lit it for her. She shut her eyes and sighed. She withdrew the cigarette and blew out a ring.

‘Wow,’ she exclaimed. ‘This feels so great… so liberating.’

‘How did you quit?’

‘Karan didn’t like it.’

I closed my eyes… squeezed them shut. My fingers tightened around the steering wheel.

‘He said he didn’t want my pink lips to turn black.’

‘No boy-friend would want that if you were the girl involved,’ I said.

She laughed. I immediately felt like an idiot.

‘He was my husband.’

I clutched inwardly. ‘What does he do?’ I asked, trying to conceal the disappointment in my voice.

‘Nothing much. He is dead.’

I did a double-take. ‘What?’ I said.

‘I killed him.’

I stamped onto the breaks. The car came to a screeching halt right in the middle of the road.

I just kept staring ahead of me for a minute or so; blinking rapidly; trying to make sense of what was happening. I turned around to look at her.

‘Keep driving.’

She was holding a pistol in my face. Cold sweat broke on my forehead. I started the car and began speeding down the road.

(TO BE CONTINUED)

MY MOST EMBARASSING MOMENT

2008-03-03T02:19:00.000-08:00

You ever had a moment when you wished the ground beneath your feet should just split open and swallow you whole and people shouldn’t even realise you have ceased to exist? Or that you could just flick your fingers and go 'POOF!' and land up in the safety and confinement of your home, where you could dance naked and not be seen for all you cared?

Sounds familiar? I bet it does...

I used to always get stuck on the 'Most embarrassing moment' blank while filling up slambooks for friends back in school... I started with my name, filled in my phone number, my address, my most memorable moment, and then I’d come upon 'Most embarrassing moment;' I’d pause, scratch my head, and then jump to the next blank... I'd continue and fill the entire slambook, and would again come back to the 'Most embarrassing moment'... I'd scratch my brain a little more, and would eventually end up returning the slambook, the blank still blank. But if i had to fill one now, I’d have loads to write about... Loads... And it wouldn’t be my 'Most embarrassing moment' but my 'Extremely mortifying and 'go-beet-root-red-in-cheeks' moment'...

One fine Monday morning (although how can a Monday morning be fine, that too after a rather long and tiring Sunday is beyond me) I was getting ready for college. I had just come out of the bath and was still in my bathrobe. Water was dripping from my hair. I was already running itsy-bitsy late for college… but I was too lazed to get ready. The first lecture was ‘English’ anyway, so didn’t matter if I went a little late. So there I was, hanging out in my room, going through the pile of much used and dog-eared books___ novels, reference books, text books, magazines___ while Nick, Howie, AJ and Brian all tried to convince me I was ‘One In A Million’. I swayed left-right-front-back as the song went on; its rhythm and melody like the boys had had just an extra shot of Tequila. Mom suddenly barged into my room and shrieked.

‘What do you think you are doing?’ she said. I froze. Holding my position, I turned to look at Mom, facing the mirror of my dressing table simultaneously. I took a look at my reflection in the mirror and burst out laughing.

‘God! Whats wrong with you? You are acting like you’re having a hang over!’

‘Maybe I am!’ I squealed; Mom looked daggers at me.

‘Chill Mom! I’m ok!’ I said, and swirled around. Needless to say, I lost my balance and fell on the bed. That sent me into more fits of laughter and Mom into those of anger.

‘God! Honestly, what have I been rearing the past nineteen years?’ Mom said.

‘Ok, what is it now? What did you come in to talk about?’

‘Nothing, what are you doing in the evening?’

‘Nothing. Why?’

‘Can you come with me? Got some work, could use some help.’

‘Sure.’

Happy that I had agreed so quickly, and without giving me a chance to change my decision or rethink, Mom danced out of my room and I went back swaying around my room. Somehow I was on a high that day. You know, it happens… sometimes you are inexplicably happy, for no reason. They say it is because of your karma… some of your past deeds, maybe of a past life, have been rewarded, and that is what makes you happy… But let’s not get into that… Bottom line is; I was on a high. It seemed like nothing could mar my mirth. But no! I have now learnt my lesson well; eight out of ten times when you get such a feeling, be sure something is going to happen. In fact, I should have picked up the signs when Mom marched right back into my room.

‘Now what?’ I asked.

‘What are you wearing today?’ Mom asked.

‘Oh no… not again!’

‘Mi tula jauch denar nahiye aaj (I am not going to let you go today) unless you wear your salwar-kameez.’

Ok, I’d like to add a few things here. I am not the types who hate wearing anything that speaks of my ethnicity and shows in a way that I am Indian. I like wearing salwar-kameezes… love it in fact. But what Mom doesn’t seem to get is I have my ‘days’ or my phases… There are days when I wear only salwar-kameezes one after the other. And then there are days when I just don’t feel like it, and I stick to my jeans and t-shirts. And although mom doesn’t mind the former, she hates the later.

‘But Mom___’

‘Te kay pujayala ghetlet ka?’ (Have we bought all those dresses to worship them?)

‘Nahi, pan___’ (No, but___)

‘No if, no but,’ mom said, reaching out for my cupboard door. She opened it and pulled one of my salwar-kameezes out. ‘You wear this and come out in the next fifteen minutes, ok?’

‘Yeah.’

Mom went out of the room, and I threw a pillow at the door. I heard Mom laugh. ‘Mend me, bend me, but you cant break me!’ she called out.

‘YEAH RIGHT! WHATEVER!’ I shouted back, nonetheless smiling to myself.

Note: if you are my friend, remember one thing. Never; NEVER EVER make me do something I don’t want to. Consequences can be disastrous.

As instructed, I came out of my room, twenty minutes later, clad in a white Lucknowi salwar-kameez, with long ear-rings, and with a Shabnam on my shoulder.

‘I’m leaving!’ I called out, and Mom came rushing out of the kitchen.

‘There you are! How pretty you look!’ Mom said. ‘Bye!’

‘Thanks… bye!’ I replied and stepped out of the house.

We had three out of five of our lectures off that day. And on top of that I had planned to bunk my last two lectures anyway, as I wanted to go for a movie, which meant I was not going to attend a single lecture that day. I spent most of that day hanging out in the parking and the canteen of our college with classmates, seniors and of course, my new world friends. Soon it was quarter-to-two; time for me to go. I said bye and took leave. The show was at two-thirty. Half-way to the parking, I thought I should probably just wash my face and go… I had been in college the entire day anyway, and had been sitting in the parking lot since the minute I came. So I made my way to the Ladies Room. And the minute I set my foot inside the room, I shrieked.

I looked down at the floor… it was all wet. Completely wet. There was water everywhere and no one was in sight.

Now I am someone who can’t stand it when people leave taps running, or unnecessarily waste water in any way, so obviously I was furious. I walked to where the washrooms were and saw that one of the taps in the basin was running… Someone had turned it on all the way and probably left it on even after the water ran out; so that now that the water-tank was full, the water was running at full speed.

‘Shish!’ I exclaimed, as I hurried to the basin, trying to hold my salwar up so that it wouldn’t get wet, and trying to balance the dupatta and the Shabnam on my shoulders and myself on my heels. I quickly reached the basin and began turning the faucet off.

Soon I realised it wasn’t turning off.

I looked at the tap like it had been jinxed. I adjusted my dupatta and Shabnam and stood a little more firmly, now facing the basin, and tried to turn the tap ff with both my hands. But it just kept going round and round and round. And then at one point, it just snapped.

‘Ooo! Shit!’ I exclaimed and sprang away from the tap, dropping my Shabnam to the floor in the process, spraining my leg, and hitting the wall behind me.

I blinked rapidly and tried to regain my equilibrium. Slowly, I moved one hand, then the other, and then my legs. I looked around. My books were lying in a puddle of water… or more precisely in three inch deep water; and so was my Shabnam. My dupatta was floating away to one corner of the room; and when I finally got to look in the mirror… I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry.

For a few moments, I just froze. I kept looking at my books, my dupatta and my reflection in the mirror again and again. Somewhere in between I figured that my phone was in my bag too. I lifted my bag off the floor, and water poured out of it. I put my hand inside and took my cell out; and for the first time, I thanked Mom inwardly for forcing her things upon me. Just the previous day she had bought me this plastic cover for my cell, and so my cell was at that moment absolutely dry and safe. I took it out and dialed mom’s number, thinking i'd ask her to bring me a change of clothes.

Have you noticed that often when one thing goofs up… it doesn’t stop there; it goes on in a series and stops only when sufficient damage has been done to leave you feeling utterly embarrassed and miserable.

So what was the next thing that had gone wrong in my series?

Mom was not answering.

Then one after the other I tried calling Dad, my brother, my neighbour and my aunt. And with every phone call, I was almost expecting the next person to not be home/be available too… and that left me with just one option. And if you are not a really really dumb person, you must have figured it out too.

To drive back home.

On my own.

In a white Lucknowi salwar-kameez that was no longer white.

I cursed my luck several times and finally dared to step out of the Ladies room. I looked around and noticed that there was nobody in sight. I quickly got out and ran on my toes towards that parking. Luckily (ironic I should use that word under these circumstances, right?) there was nobody there either. I quickly sat on my bike and drove out of college.

That day I came home at an amazing 80km/hr; and again ‘luckily’, I didn’t get one red-signal. I didn’t get stuck in one traffic-jam, which had now almost become mandatory for every time that I drove to or from college. I drove so fast, that my dress and me were half-dry by the time I reached my house. I rushed into the bathroom and stripped the dress of… it was a sorry state. I put it in a bucket of clean water and let it soak till I took a quick shower.

Mom burst out laughing when I narrated the whole thing to her in the evening after everyone got back home.

‘You are laughing! Damn! It all happened because of you!’

‘Me?’ mom said through her fits of laughter. ‘Why me?’

‘If you wouldn’t have forced me to wear the salwar-kameez, none of this would have happened!’ I said, and Mom-Dad-Bro all broke out into more and more peels of laughter.

‘And your cells!’ I said, addressing all of them; ‘go dump them into the sewer! God! I got so fed up of listening to the same line over and over again. “The customer you are trying to reach has moved out of coverage area”. What the hell!’

By now we all had tears in our eyes… theirs out of laughing, mine rooted in fury and anger. I picked up my Mango-milkshake glass and stomped off into my room… I shut the door and could still hear the laughing and my brother mimicking me now… God! I so hated it when he did that. I grabbed the remote control lying on my bed and turned the music-system on, and of all the cassettes that could have been in it, Aqua shouted out to me;

‘FREAKY-FRIDAY! THINGS AIN’T GOING MY WAY!’

And finally, for the first time in that day, after so much of fretting and tantrum-throwing… I laughed my arse off at the bloody timing! Or should I say ‘luck’ again???

CONFESSIONS OF A TEENAGE SOUL...

2008-03-03T00:11:00.000-08:00

Ok. So it was happening again. And I was prepared; or so I thought…

At the exact moment when I realised I was falling head over heels for my friend all over again, I also realised he was not interested in me, all over again… or that he would probably never be…

I still tried to play it cool… Try and ‘take it all sportingly in a stride’… Be happy for him… Ask about the girl without feeling jealous or left-out… Smile and actually mean it… act mature…

But the main problem with acting mature is that at the end of it, you are still ‘acting’ mature… and not actually being mature…

I again convinced myself… or tried to; that I am a ‘nice’ girl… good-looking and all… and that maybe I am just worth someone better… that I am not his kind but that doesn’t mean I am never going to have a boy-friend or anything… For the zillionth time in my life I tried to get over… over what? Even I don’t know really if you ask me. I mean, we weren’t going around, so I can’t call it ‘heartbreak’… so whatever it was that I was trying to get over… I still haven’t figured out… maybe trying to get over being the ‘outcaste’… trying to get over the fact of being the only person among my gal-pals who didn’t have a boy-friend, and so also didn’t have any of her friends who could spare some time for her and meet her and catch up on things… trying to get over feeling unwanted… trying to get over the feeling you get when your feelings are not reciprocated… Like always I tried to convince myself and said good things about myself to me… things that would, or were supposed to cheer me up… I tried to tell myself… I tried to argue, ‘why is it so important for me that a guy should like me, fall for me or whatever?’, and ‘why was my happiness conditional?’, and on and on I went inside my head. He was sitting in front of me and talking… I could make it out from his lip-movements, but I wasn’t really listening.

I went on and on… trying to ‘look at the brighter side of things’, if there were any… and I tried to ‘act mature’…

And then at one point… I just snapped.

You know what? No matter what you say and what you do… IT SUCKS.

It sucks to be the only single girl in your group of friends… It sucks to always fall for guys who don’t like you… It sucks to have all guys think of you as a ‘guy’… as an equal… just because you are frank and straightforward and bindaas… It sucks big-time. It really does. I am fed up of having to be the ‘poor-me’… and I don’t know what to do about it… I am fed up of eating with a voice at the back of my head that constantly reminds me the number of calories I am putting on… I am fed up of watching models with unrealistic figures on TV… I am fed up of going to college to look at girls who are ‘bitchy’ and pathetic people on the inside but who are also surrounded by people just because they act sweet on the face and are ‘oh-so-girly’… I am fed up of hanging out with friends who have nothing but their boy-friends to talk about… It’s such a shame that people should judge you by how you look and who you hang out with and what time you sleep and whether you go to pubs or not and whether you have a boy-friend or not… and whether you are fat or not… and whether you enjoy late night parties or not… I am fed up of going to romantic movies and then wistfully looking at the hero and the heroine as they kiss each other in the end… It’s so so sick. I am fed up trying to make myself ‘fit’… make myself accepted… I’m fed up of trying to be someone I am not… Ya I don’t wear make-up; I sleep at nine; I am fat; I am not a typical girl; i don’t go to pubs; I don’t wear short skirts and I don’t have a tattoo; and I have never had a boy-friend; and I have never been kissed… SO WHAT?

You try to be cool… you try to get people to accept you into their group… and you don’t succeed… and then at the end of the day, its just you sitting with your tears giving you company… even when you know the whole thing is nothing worth crying over… You know that you are better off such people… and that it’s not the end of the world… but nonetheless, it’s a fact. It is the world you are living in… it’s the world I am living in. It’s a world where I am alone in a crowd. It’s the world that is pathetic to the core, but it’s the real world… and my only consolation lies in this sentence I read somewhere…

Life is a dream… I will wake up when I die…

NOT FOR ME

2008-02-27T22:38:00.001-08:00

I. Hate. Coffee.

These words weren’t supposed to go together in a sentence, if they were linked to me. I mean how could I hate coffee???

In case you don’t relate to this or fail to understand this, let me tell you about myself.

I was three when I took my first sip of this drink that tasted like it came right out of the Angel’s goblet. Hot. Bitter. Sweet. All at once. Wow! I knew I had discovered my addiction, but it wasn’t until I was in second standard that I actually caught onto it. That was the max my Mother could keep me away from my sweet poison.

‘Nandu,’ she cautioned my father, ‘this is not correct. You are spoiling her.’

‘Relax Mona, its just coffee! Besides, we make it mild and of milk only!’ Dad said, a coffee addict himself; and Mom knew she’d lost the battle.

Over the years, my coffee, and me, went through a lot of changes… and now, my coffee was strong, black, hot, and bitter; and I was… well, I was a teenager… What else can I say… What else needs to be said?

So I was now a girl who was always seen in coffee shops, with an espresso, and a cute guy occasionally… But I was waiting for my best friend that day. We were meeting after a gap of seven days… seven whole days! For people who SMS-ed each other first thing in the morning even before brushing their teeth, then called up each other on reaching their respective colleges, then met up in the evening for a cup of coffee, and still argued with their mothers’ sometimes for permission to meet for a late-night ice-cream, seven days was a time unbearable to stay away from each other! So there I was waiting for Ankita, and she came in fifteen minutes late… as usual…

‘Heyyyyyyyyyy!’ she said and spread her arms… and we engulfed each other in a bear hug.

‘Hieeeeeeeeee!’ I replied. ‘How have you been? And how was the tour?’

Oh didn’t I tell you? She had gone to Coorg… as part of the study tour organized by their college. She is doing architecture.

‘Missed you yaar…’ I said as we took our seats. And Ankita did something very uncharacteristic of her; she reached out and pulled my cheeks.

‘I missed you too yaar! We had so much fun! You would have loved it… there were so many photographic locations!! You would have loved it yaar…’

‘I know… ok now lets order first and then I want a blow-by-blow account of what you did!’ I said.

‘Ok, how about we both have espresso? Like we did on our ‘pre-result freak out’?’ Ankita suggested.

‘Sure! That’ll be cool,’ I said.

So we ordered two espressos and started chatting. Now everybody who has ever been to CCD knows what the espresso out there is like… they say if you are sensitive enough and if the coffee is hot enough, you get a kick out of it, if you drink it in one sip, like a Tequila; its so concentrated and bitter.

Ankita started telling me memoirs of the trip, right from the minute they boarded the train. From all that she told me, I gathered the best part of the tour was the two nights they spent in the train! What with everybody staying up the whole night and playing ‘truth n’ dare’… That’s one game I still haven’t grown out of… or we, as in my Old World Friends, haven’t grown out of. I cant remember one time when we all met and didn’t end up playing atleast a few rounds of ‘truth n’ dare’… and as it turned out, it was Ankita’s idea for sure; and everybody loved it.

‘And then at one point the bottle pointed out to Prajak,’ she said.

‘Oh no, not again!’ I said. I hadn’t met even one of her friends actually, but I would easily spot them on a crowded street if I were to see them… such is the magic of Ankita's anecdotes. I already knew them all like they were my friends… who did what, who liked who, who was the idiot, who was the ‘poor me’, who was the ‘wanna be’, and who was the joker… of course, it was Prajak. So I could imagine what must have happened, and I started laughing; but nothing prepared me for what she told me.

‘No no! Listen!’ Ankita said. ‘He chose dare; so one of the guys dared him to pick out any girl at random in our class and propose to her!’

‘No way!’ I said.

‘No really! And you won’t believe, he picked out Pooja, and oh my God! He proposed to her so so sweetly! He got down on one knee and all! We were all dumb-struck! For a moment after he finished, we were all just staring at them. Even Pooja was looking like she’ll drop her jaw to the floor any minute. And then he just got up and went and sat on the seat again, and we all started clapping and cheering!’

‘Really!’ I said; I couldn’t believe it either.

‘Ya…’

And then she went on to describe everything… how they reached an hour late; checked into their hotels, had food and headed straight for their rooms as they were all dead tired; then went on their first study the next day; came back home in pouring rain… and on and on it went till almost quarter to eight. Finally it was time to leave. We paid the bill and went to the parking area across the street. Ankita was waiting for a rickshaw. I opened the dickey of my Activa and threw my wallet in it. I removed the scarf and was tying it around my face when I suddenly heard someone scream out my name. I turned around. It was Ankita. She crossed the street and ran up to me.

‘Are you nuts or what?’ I said. ‘What happened?’

‘Arre I got you something and forgot to give it to you!’ she said. She fished into her hand bag and removed two small packets.

‘What is this?’ I said as I took the packets from her; and answered my own question before she could… the aroma was not one which I wouldn’t recognize, and we both ended up screaming together gleefully;

‘Coffee!’

‘Ya,’ she said.

‘Wow!’ I said and opened one of the packets. I smelled the coffee and within a minute I was in heaven. ‘God! That smells almost divine!’ I said. I smelled again. ‘Yummy!’

‘I knew you would like it! I was hunting for a souvenir for you all over! But nothing seemed to strike a chord… and then on our last tour, we were having food and I smelled coffee. And you won’t believe, I followed the smell and traced it to this really tiny shop, like a kiosk. They were selling hand-ground coffee, and I knew I just had to buy it! So I bought two packets for you and two for me.’

‘Oh my God! That’s so sweet of you! Thanks!’ I said and engulfed her into a bear hug. She hugged me back.

‘By the way, don’t mix them up. They are not same. The one with the red rubber band is ‘Chicory mixed coffee’, and the other is plain coffee,’ she said; and immediately I opened the other packet and smelled that too.

‘Hmm… smells almost the same,’ I said.

‘That ‘almost’ makes all the difference!’ she remarked and I smiled.

‘Wowie, thanks yaar!’ I said. Just then a rickshaw slowed down next to us.

‘Aana hai madam?’ (You looking for a rickshaw?) The guy asked.

‘Haan haan,’ Ankita said as she hurriedly got into the rickshaw.

‘Call me!’ she called out as the rickshaw drove off. I gave her the thumbs up.

I got home and couldn’t wait to finish dinner. Mom was rather surprised to see me in the kitchen after we were done.

‘What are you doing?’ she asked.

‘Making coffee; it’s quite cold.’ I replied without looking at her.

‘Deva! Wachav re baba!’ (Oh God! Save me!) She said as she walked back to the bedroom and closed the door.

I poured the steaming hot ‘Chicory mixed coffee’ into my favourite bright red mug and washed the vessel. I cleared the counter, turned the light off and walked back to my room. I was getting ready to enjoy a late night of coffee and reading, snuggled in my blanket. Mom and Dad were already in bed, trying to sleep as the cold bit into them.

I found my iPod and turned it on. Ah! What luck! My favourite song played on the shuffle list. ‘Perfect!’ I thought as I fluffed my pillow. I arranged the small stool right net to my bed and placed my cell and my coffee mug onto it. Then I got into bed and pulled the cover till my shoulders. I opened the book and took the mug in my hand.

‘This is life!’ I said to myself and took my first sip of the coffee.

I spat it back into the mug.

‘Aaaargh!’ I said as I wiped my mouth to the back of my sleeve. I looked at the coffee like it was poison. I smelled it and looked at it again. I tried another sip, a tiny one this time, and spat it back again. I set the mug aside and immediately picked up my cell. I looked at the watch. Eleven-fifty. ‘I don’t care,’ I said as I opened the message window.

‘wht shit hv u givn me as souvenir? U tryna kil me or wht?’ I typed and sent it to Ankita.

‘wht?’ came the reply, after five minutes

‘wht is tht chicory stuf suposed 2 b?’ I replied again.

‘u din lik it?’

‘I HATE IT MOR THAN ANYTHING I HAVE EVER TASTED! ITS DISGUSTING!’ I replied.

‘thts weird. ppl luv it. funy u dnt… n u say u r adictd 2 coffee.’ Came the reply.

‘YA RIGHT!’ I shouted.

‘Mrunal! Shut up!’ came the reply, this time from my parent’s bedroom.

‘Ya ya!’ I said and threw the blanket off me. I went inside the kitchen and switched the light on. I poured the entire mug right into the basin and flushed it. I rinsed the mug and set it on the counter, inverted, to drain off the water. I opened the refrigerator and took the half finished Dairy Milk bar. I munched onto it irritatedly… but the chocolate soon took over me and I got engrossed in the book and slept off sometime around two-thirty.

For the first time in my life, I got up and didn’t have coffee the next day. It took me several weeks to start drinking coffee again… and for a few days, mom was in heaven. Everytime I looked at a mug of coffee or passed a coffee shop or saw some advertisement of Bru or NesCafe, my mouth screwed up in the most difficult way and I turned away from whatever it was that had reminded me of the coffee.

‘God! What happened to you yaar?’ Ankita asked me, the day after my ‘Chicory mixed coffee’ disaster, over the phone. She was laughing her guts off.

‘Nothing,’ I said; ‘but I hated whatever it was that you gave me. And one thing’s for sure, I like coffee, but chicory is not for me,’ I said, and Ankita laughed more…

LONGING

2008-02-27T04:06:00.000-08:00

I know you are not here… And that you will probably never be…

I know you are never going to read this… these words that I have got to write anyway…

I don’t know you… I don’t know where you are… but I can somehow feel it, within the heart of my heart, that as I write these words one by one, as they come to my mind, you can perceive them… somewhere… somehow… I don’t know what to say to you… does anything need to be said? They say when you really want something; the whole universe conspires to get it for you… I don’t know what I want… but if you can feel me, you may well know by now, what it is that I want…

And till then, I will wait… in this pain that doesn’t really hurt… in this wait that is necessary… I have come to like it now… come to live in this longing to meet you someday… Will you be like I have seen you to be in my thoughts, or have felt you to be like when I close my eyes? Will I recognize you if I saw you in a crowded street? Is that what ‘striking a chord’ means? I believe in serendipity… do you? Will you ever come across this? Will you try to reach out to me when you do? Maybe you will… Maybe you won’t…

And even though I really wish you would… a part of me wants to live in this longing… forever…

PERFECT PROPOSAL

2008-02-11T08:12:00.001-08:00

I woke up with a cold sweat on my forehead and my heart racing faster than PT Usha perhaps; and my first thought was: Do early morning dreams really come true?

I hoped and hoped they didn't… I didn’t want to lose Dhananjay after all… Not for a thousand other friends… Or for a thousand other guys precisely… You only come across your dream guy once after all, right?

I went through my daily chores mechanically… I had Chemistry practicals that day, so I had already bathed and packed my bag by the time it was eight. Mom had packed my tiffin for me and left it on the kitchen counter already, and she had left for her morning walk. I entered the kitchen and picked up my tiffin. Stuffing it in my bag, I left the house sharp at eight-fifteen.

Dhananjay made a grand entry at nine, for a practical scheduled to begin at eight-thirty. Ma’am was already past the stage of getting angry at him.

‘Sorry ma’am I__’

‘No! Its ok. You don’t have to explain,’ Ma’am replied, her voice rather even. Dhananjay, and the rest of the students including me, rolled our eyes. Dhananjay muttered a meek ‘thanks’ and went to keep his bag on the shelf.

‘What are you doing?’ Ma’am called out.

Dhananjay turned around and looked at ma’am. He kept staring at her.

‘Out.’ Ma’am said.

‘Ma’am but__’

‘I said its ok. You don’t have to explain. Pick up your bag and out.’

Realising he didn’t have a choice, Dhananjay picked up his bag and stormed out of the lab. Suddenly everybody in the lab became quiet. There was not a word to be heard after that till the end of the practicals. We joined Dhananjay in the canteen at eleven-thirty.

‘Kya yaar!’ (What man!) Niraj exclaimed. ‘Why can’t you be on time for once?’

‘Arre ervicha thik ahe, (It’s another thing everyday) I come late on purpose. But I had to go to the doctor today morning.’

My ears pricked.

‘Why? What happened?’ Niraj asked.

‘Same thing. This cold will really kill me one day.’

‘Is it causing a lot of trouble?’ Tanmaya asked.

‘Not ‘a lot’ really, but enough to make me make a trip to the doctor.’

‘So what did the doctor say?’

‘What will he say? “Take care, wear a sweater,” this, that.’

‘But you said your asthma was under control now?’ Tanmaya again.

‘Yes! But just check out the cold man! 5.5o! Who thought Pune could get this cold! It gets a bit hard in the winters…’ Dhananjay said.

‘Yeah…’ Niraj said.

‘I know…’ Tanmaya said.

‘Why are you so quiet today?’ Dhananjay asked me suddenly.

‘Nothing…’ I said and looked away.

‘God! I’m ravenous!’ Niraj said out of the blue. ‘Let’s eat.’

We all proceeded to bring our tiffins out of our bags. Dhananjay put a hand into his bag; it came out empty.

‘Shit!’ he exclaimed, banging his hand on the table.

‘Now what?’ Tanmaya said.

‘I forgot my tiffin.’

‘Oh no!’

‘That’s ok,’ Niraj said, ‘We all share our tiffins anyway right?’

‘Why don’t we go to the University Canteen instead?’ Dhananjay suggested. ‘I mean if it’s ok with__’

‘No!’

This came from me. I surprised myself as much as I surprised the three of them at the sudden exclamation.

‘Why not?’ Tanmaya asked.

‘Let’s just not go ok?’ I said; for only I had foreseen what lie ahead of us if we were to go to the University Canteen.

‘But why?’ Dhananjay asked. ‘In fact a little bit of sun will do me good.’

‘Ya, come on! Let’s go yaar!’ Niraj persuaded. I tried my best to protest, but couldn’t. Finally I gave in to the idea.

‘I don’t feel like driving though,’ Dhananjay said.

‘Come on! You know I can’t drive!’ Niraj said.

‘It’s ok! We’ll drive today!’ Tanmaya said.

‘Ok! I’m sitting on your bike then,’ Niraj said, leaving Dhananjay to sit behind me. Soon we were on our way to the University Canteen.

‘Whats the matter yaar?’ Dhananjay asked me, his voice lower than usual, as we were driving. We had entered the University premises.

‘Nothing,’ I replied, trying to keep my voice steady.

‘You are shivering,’ Dhananjay said.

‘It’s the cold.’

‘Since when did you start feeling cold?’ Dhananjay asked me. I kept quiet. ‘You are looking pretty today though,’ he added.

Under normal circumstances, this should have sent me to seventh-heaven. I should have been extremely flattered, ecstatic, and incomparably happy. I mean, you don’t always receive compliments from your dream guy right? But I didn’t even as much as smile at him. In fact, I was almost on the verge of tears.

‘And why did you say ‘no’ to coming to the canteen?’ he asked further.

Now how was I to answer that? ‘Because you are going to die now’? I tried to fight back my tears. Superstitions, when they are related to or when they involve people you really love and care about, can scare the daylights out of you. I didn’t want to lose Dhananjay; no! No way! On the one hand my heart was praying and praying madly that nothing should go wrong, that my nightmare shouldn’t come true. And on the other hand my brain was laughing at me for actually believing or thinking that such things happen… that such superstitions come true.

‘Hey! WATCH OUT!’ he shouted in my ear. I blinked; and the next moment I found myself headed straight towards a Maruti 800. I swerved my bike and avoided banging head-on into it.

‘Stop! Stop right now,’ Dhananjay said. I obeyed. He got off the bike. I got off it too. He took the key from me.

‘Sit.’ He ordered. I obeyed. We took off again.

We were both quiet after that; he being angry; me… a lot of things. I breathed in his scent. My lungs filled with the smell of ‘Old Spice’. His muffler was fluttering in the air as he sped through the maze of roads. Suddenly I had a strong urge to hug him, and before I knew it, I really was hugging him.

‘Hey! Hello! Kya hua hai yaar tujhe aaj?’ (Whats happened to you today?)

I kept quiet.

Dhananjay didn’t say anything after that; but he placed one of his hands on mine and drove slower. He slacked in his back, making me nuzzle against him. The rest of the journey was completed in silence, with him whistling one of the stanzas of our favourite song, Bin Tere Sanam.

About an hour later we were having a walk through the University Garden. We had just finished eating, and nobody was in a mood to go back to college and sit for the lectures.

‘Lekin bol na yaar, tujhe hua kya hai?’ (But what is the matter with you?) Niraj again asked me.

‘And don’t say nothing,’ Tanmaya said.

‘Abe mujhe puchh na!’ (Ask me!) Dhananjay said. ‘I’ll tell you what the matter is. Madam is lost in thoughts of her lover!’

I shot Dhananjay a look. His eyes were twinkling with laughter. Tanmaya and Niraj were already acting like I had announced my engagement or something. We were out of the garden now, heading back towards our vehicles.

‘What! Really?’

‘Who is it?’

I kept looking at Dhananjay. He stared back at me.

I looked away. I could hear them all tease me, but I couldn’t really figure out what they were saying. I was there with them physically, but mentally I seemed to be lost somewhere…

‘Do you believe in superstitions?’ I asked all of a sudden, and everyone went quiet.

‘What?’ Dhananjay was the first one to speak.

‘I just had this weird dream last night,’ I said, finally coming out with what had been eating my mind since morning. ‘They say early morning dreams come true. Do you think they really do?’

The silence that ensued was so dead, if I tried real hard, I could’ve probably heard their hearts beat. With perfect timing I realised there was nobody on the road; it had emptied almost suddenly. There was not a vehicle or a person to be seen. I glanced back at the garden; it had emptied too. Just like in the dream…

‘I don’t know…’ Tanmaya said. ‘Maybe they do.’

‘Yeah… I mean, I never had a dream early morning. I mean, I don’t get up that early anyway, so I wouldn’t know really…’ Niraj said.

‘Yeah… And I don’t dream so much…’ Tanmaya added. ‘So…’

I looked at Niraj and Tanmaya. Suddenly I realised they were wearing the same clothes as they had dressed up in in my dream. I looked at Dhananjay. He was wearing the same clothes too.

I closed my eyes. And just then I heard a car in the distance, approaching us from behind. I quickly pulled Dhananjay on the inside of the road and started walking on the outside.

‘Anyway! So where were we?’ Niraj said.

‘Madam’s lover!’ Tanmaya prompted, and they all started laughing. The sound of the car grew louder. It was coming up fast… real fast.

‘Right! Ae bol na Dhananjay (Come on tell us Dhananjay). Who is the mystery guy?’

I turned around. I could see the car now. I turned back and looked at Dhananjay.

‘It’s no one,’ I said.

‘Oh ya! Really?’ Dhananjay said, looking at me, his eyes twinkling as they always do when he is up to some mischief.

‘Ya.’

‘But then what was that stuff about__’

And just then, Dhananjay stopped in mid-sentence, took my hand and pulled me hard towards himself. The car drove past us.

I heard Tanmaya shout.

I heard Niraj shout.

Me and Dhananjay fell to the ground.

I quickly recovered and got up.

‘Are you nuts or__’ Dhananjay began to say, but his voice got swallowed up in his coughing.

‘Laksha kuthe hota tujha?’ (What were you so lost in?) Tanmaya said. She quickly got down to her knees and removed her water bottle from her bag. She offered it to Dhananjay. He took the bottle, but couldn’t stop himself from coughing, even enough to drink the water.

‘Oye yaar, take it easy!’ Niraj said. But Dhananjay’s coughing only got worse. I began rubbing his back.

‘I am sorry Dhananjay,’ I said. He looked at me; his eyes were blood-shot and watering from the excessive coughing. And just then I realised; he was having an attack.

‘Oh my God,’ Tanmaya said, as it struck her too. She went through his bag to find his inhaler, but it wasn’t there. Seems like he had forgotten that too. Dhananjay's coughing was now at its peak. He was gasping for air.

‘I’ll go check the dickey of his bike, it might be there in it,’ Niraj said as he sped off in the direction of our bikes. Meanwhile I and Tanmaya tried to reduce the coughing. But we didn’t know quite what to do. And just then, Dhananjay breathed in one last time, closed his eyes and fell to the ground.

Tanmaya froze.

I froze.

We kept staring at a motionless Dhananjay.

Just then Niraj cam back with the inhaler. He took one look at us, and the inhaler dropped out of his hand.

Suddenly Tanmaya burst into tears.

Niraj bent down on his knees and held her in his arms.

I just kept staring at Dhananjay… kept staring at his hair, his eyes, his lips… all things I was crazy about… all things that were now lifeless… dead.

I raised my hand and placed it on his heart. I ran it across his chest. I bent down and placed my head on his chest. I closed my eyes. I could still hear Tanmaya crying. My finger grabbed his t-shirt slowly… my fist growing stronger and stronger. I bit my lips. Slow and steady the tears started pouring out of my eyes.

Suddenly I felt a hand on my back. I looked up.

Dhananjay was staring at me.

I blinked. I turned around and looked at Tanmaya. She was standing now, and so was Niraj, right next to her.

I looked back at Dhananjay. And now, his eyes were wet.

‘You love me so much?’ he said.

I blinked, still not able to make head or tails of what was happening.

Dhananjay now sat up and leaned against the tree behind him.

‘It was a joke,’ he explained.

I looked at Tanmaya and Niraj. They nodded. I looked back at Dhananjay.

‘It was a joke,’ he repeated. ‘I talked Tanmaya and Niraj into it. When Tanmaya told me you liked me… I couldn’t believe it. Why would you want to be with a guy like me? Someone who has health problems and a medical history and all… So I decided to__’

‘Pucch hi lete ek baar. Mein bata deti,’ (You just had to ask me once. I would have told you.) I said and got up. I started walking toward our bikes. Dhananjay called out to me. I didn’t respond. I heard him get up. Tanmaya and Niraj chose not to follow him as he came after me. I started walking faster as I heard Dhananjay close up to me. He started walking faster too. Finally he ran up to me, and held me arm. He pulled me towards him.

‘I am sorry,’ he said.

I looked at him. And before I knew it, I had slapped him.

He looked back at me.

‘I am really__’

I slapped him again, this time on the other cheek.

He looked back at me. His eyes were welling up… fast. He took me by the arms and tried to pull me into an embrace. I tried to resist… but gave in finally, breaking out into tears.

‘I love you,’ he said.

I cried harder… but nodded. That’s all I could do really at that moment…

I stop here… but I smile as I realise I still haven’t told you one thing: I don’t believe in superstitions anymore, but I do believe in miracles…

YOU'RE BEAUTIFUL

2008-02-04T08:12:00.000-08:00

It was way past my bed-time, and I was not at all in a mood to sleep. The next day was Sunday anyway, so I didn’t need to sleep early or wake up early or anything. And then, when I am sulking, there is no use telling me or convincing me. When I am sulking, I have just one rule: leave me alone, and I won’t swallow you whole.

So what was I doing then?

Orkut-ing… what else?

I went and checked out several people’s profiles (all guys; needless to say) and scrapped several unknown guys - very uncharacteristic of me. And just as I was about to logoff, some guy scrapped me.

‘heyaaaaaa! no reply miss!’

G.O.D.

Are guys really that dumb? Or is it my dire luck that I always come across losers? This guy had been bothering me for god knows how many days; I had lost count by then. And I had been avoiding him - again quite uncharacteristic of me. But… there was something wrong with me… There had been something wrong with me for quite some time… I had changed… I had become very irritable, and was on a low in general… anyway. So I saw his name in my scrapbook and thought to myself; ‘That’s it! I am getting rid of this guy tonight, and for good.’

‘wht is ur prob dude? jst buzz off.’

‘i c u r rg’s fren.’ came the reply, and I immediately scanned his friend-list; sure enough, he was RG’s friend. I mellowed down a bit.

‘ya. so?’

‘so I though mayb v cud hv a chat… do u hv webcam?’

Oh God. Now I was totally convinced this guy was the ultimate loser category. I hated such guys, who think they are being really suave when they say and do things that would turn even the most boring and ‘plain Jane’ of girls’ off. Things like; ‘cn v b frens’ n ‘do u hv a cel’ or ‘do u hv a webcam’ or even ‘wen cn v meet’… God! I so loathed these types!

‘no.’ I said.

‘ok. hw abt a pic?’

‘y u wana c me so badly?’ I asked him. Actually I didn’t even know why I was talking with him in the first place… n that too when I was in such a bad mood.

‘hv herd a lot bt u frm rg. pl.’

And right there I saw my way out of this guy… I show him my pic, he doesn’t like me, and I am free!

Now, I am not the kind of person who has a low self-esteem or anything… but then, I also don’t have any fancy ideas about how I look… I think I look good… not exceptionally beautiful or anything, but good. But I am also more on the plump side. So, its like - guys like me, but not enough to pursue me I guess… Actually whatever… it doesn’t matter, I don’t care.

I gave the guy my Yahoo!-id and asked him to come online. I clicked on the photo-sharing option and chose the dumbest of my pics. It wasn’t all that dumb actually, but I wouldn’t consider it my best pic; atleast not a pic I’d share with a guy.

‘luks lik its bit big. takin tym to load. so wht do u do?’

‘u knw wht?’

‘wht’

‘jst c d pic n buz off. m nt in d mood fr a chat.’

‘y? wht hapnd?’

‘whtevr! wht is ur prob anyway? u think u r sm grt guy who cn whisk my probs away jst lik tht? u think u r bein vry nic n suave wen u ask me whts d matr wit me?’

‘u knw wht I think? i think u r drunk, or u r being vry funy rit nw.’

‘luk, whtevr ur name is – ’

‘luv. my name is luv. as in luv-kush.’

GOD SAVE ME! I almost cried out reading that one. Luv. LUV! How could anyone’s parents ever name their son ‘Luv’? Eeeeeeeeeeeew!

‘okh LUV. m hvin a bad day. so jst buz off. frankly i dnt evn knw y i m talking to u in d first place. I need to b left alon rite nw, k? so jst – ’

‘wow. u r beautiful.’

Pause.

‘wht?’

‘ur pic. it jst loaded fully. u r beautiful.’

‘ya rite. i m beautiful, n d world is flat.’

‘i mean it. m nt putin u on.’

‘no. m nt beautiful, m fat.’

‘bt dt dosnt mean u r nt beautiful.’

And just like that, my eyes welled up. I don’t know what happened in that one moment, but the next moment, I was crying. I was laughing and crying at the same time. It was like all my anger and frustration and irritation had gone in a moment.

‘u knw wht?’

‘wht?’

‘u r mad.’

‘cmon. tel me smthin new. :D’

God. I felt so touched… It was nothing maybe, and for all I know, he could be just putting me on. I can’t really express what I want to say, or how I felt. But… its like, me being fat had become a part of my identity. Even that would have been ok with me, but it gets really annoying when all people reduce you to is ‘that big fat girl’. Yes, I am very tall, and I am stout. I am not the bulging fat types. But yes, I could do with losing a few pounds. But lately, it seemed like that was the only thing people could notice in me. I act like it doesn’t bother me. And personally, it doesn’t. But sometimes you do get tired of acting strong, or acting like you couldn’t care less about what people said and did. Sometimes, it just gets to you, and all you feel like doing is curling into a corner and hugging yourself and crying. Wouldn’t you feel great if someone came along at such a time and just appreciated you the way you are? Or said something stupid and ridiculous and wonderful at the same time? Sometimes that’s all that we want really… to be accepted for what we are… to be liked or cherished just the way we are. And that is exactly what this guy had just done.

‘thnx.’ I said… That’s all I could think of saying really. It was such a stupid thing… so trivial. But it lifted me up and made me happy. We exchanged a few more words and then said goodbye and logged off.

To this day, I haven’t been able to find that guy again… I don’t know where he is or how he is. I asked my friend RG, but she completely denied of knowing any such guy. Maybe we were talking of 2 different RGs… or maybe RG had unknowingly accepted his ‘friend request’ on Orkut and didn’t really know him… or maybe… I don’t know what… I can’t really explain what happened. But that guy just came and went… just like that.

Luv, if you are reading this right now, I just want to say; thanks. Thanks for what you did. Maybe its nothing to you, but it meant a lot to me… thanks… and hope we meet again some day…

MAYA

2008-01-04T07:40:00.000-08:00

‘Come on! I wanna know who it is!’

‘I will tell you! I promise I will… But when the time comes…’

YES!

My doubts were finally confirmed… but I was still not sure. I mean… it seemed highly improbable… Neel and me? I mean… nothing absurd about it. But he would never fall in love with me… maybe, just MAYBE I would… or rather I could… but him? Fall in love with a tom-boy like me? Way nigh impossible.

But then, why would he not tell me the name of his new found love? I mean, he told me about everything! I swear he did! Then why wouldn’t he tell me about this? And what the hell was ‘when the time comes’ supposed to mean? As always, and as about everything, I set a meeting with my mentor; my friend, philosopher, and most of all, my conspirator, Ankita.

‘What? Are you kidding?’

‘No! This is exactly what he said! I swear!’ I said, as we sat on our favourite table at our favourite Café Coffee Day outlet on Law College road.

‘Well then; this could mean only one thing; you are now officially going to be your best friend’s girlfriend!’

I smiled… blushed ever-so-slightly. Up until that moment, I wasn’t aware I was capable of performing such girly feats as blushing. Really? Could this be? I couldn’t believe it… but come to think of it… it seemed almost the right thing to happen. Or rather the logical thing to happen in a sequence of event taken place over a period of about eleven months. Within the first two months of our friendship we had exchanged numbers. And over a period of time, we had started calling each other up every night, as I have mentioned before. Yes, I did like him. He had come to mean to me what no one had meant to me in a long time. Talking to him made me forget the worst of college fights; it made me get over the worst of depressions; and more than any of this, it just made me very very happy. I didn’t feel any of the things for Neel which I had felt when I had had brief crushes over several guys. But as I considered the possibility… I can’t say how I felt about going around with Neel. But it brought a smile to my lips. It brought a smile to my lips… it made me feel happy… and it made me feel… how should I put it… it made me feel secure… even though he was over 1100 kilometers away from me.

That is what love does to you.

God no! Wait! What the hell was I talking about?

‘What are you thinking about?’ Ankita asked (probably I was still smiling)

I told her what I was thinking about. She suddenly put her hands up in the air, and acted like she was playing the piano, and sang in an ultimately off-key voice:

‘’Tis the season to be jolly Fra-la-la-la-la-lala-la-la!’

I quickly held her hands and hushed her.

‘That’s not true! And even if it is, the whole world needn’t know about it!’

‘Whats not true? I didn’t even say anything! Did I say anything?’

That’s Ankita. There is no stopping her from going down hook, line and sinker once she decides to.

‘Oh my God! Look look! You are blushing!’ she squealed in delight. By now my ears were feeling real hot. I glanced at my watch. It was seven-forty five.

‘Bollocks! We must get going! It’s almost dinner time!’ I said, thankful for once that it was time-up. Otherwise me and Ankita could sit in a coffee shop and go on bantering till the end of time… and without getting bored… sometimes even without talking… that is what the thing is with best friends; it never gets uncomfortable even if you have nothing to say.

Back home, I waited for Neel’s nightly call. I waited for the call, and at the same time I wished he didn’t call me. I was getting that weird ‘butterflies-in-the-stomach’ feeling I had read about in many novels (no, not love stories). There was a whole valley of butterflies in my stomach! I kept trying to be normal. I actually took out a pen and a notebook and listed things I would talk about; in the fear that he would find my pauses too long, or would see that I was distracted. And the last thing I wanted was Neel to ask me why the hell was I acting so listless.

As the arms of the clock inched closer to ten, my anxiety grew. It climaxed and was off the peak by the time he called me.

‘Hi!’ his voice sounded welcome and unwelcome at the same time.

‘Hey… wassup?’ I said.

‘I can’t keep it. I have to tell you.’

OH MY GOD. Oh my god oh my god oh my god! No! No! Not so soon! Come on! Let’s do it like in the movies… First you talk, then I talk; small talk. Then we don’t talk. Then you clear your throat and I get the signal. But Neel had already begun talking.

‘Her name is M___’

‘Mrunal,’ I thought.

‘Maya.’

‘What?’

‘Maya!’

‘Hellow! I thought it was me!’

‘What? You are kidding. Say you are kidding, aren’t you?’

If Neel hadn’t asked me, I wouldn’t have believed I had actually said that. Within a minute… within a few seconds I was brought down to earth from my seventh, or seven hundredth heaven. Maya.

‘Hello? Mrunal you there?’

‘What? Yes... of course! I was kidding…’ I said. Neel further went on to describe Maya; how they met, what she looked like… but I still kept thinking… ‘I thought it was me’…

BHAD MEIN JAA! (GO TO HELL!)

2007-12-30T03:20:00.000-08:00

You know, there are days when you want to attend all lectures, strictly refrain from bulldozing your friends into proxy-ing for you, sit and pay attention to the teacher’s every word, scribble notes from ‘initial time: 0’ to ‘final time: t’, get up at the end of the lecture, wish the teacher ‘good afternoon’, wait till she leaves, then sit down and wait for the next teacher to come…

And then there’s every other day…

But even though today was like every other day, it felt different. Me and my new world friends (i.e. friends at my new college, where I am doing BSc) came down the stairs and entered the canteen. We had actually sat for the first botany lecture (all five of us) and had had enough of our dose of teachers, classrooms, attendance and lectures and anything remotely related to studies. We were now free to enjoy the day…

‘Su layees?’ my Gujju friend asked her twin… and immediately there were echoes of the only Gujurathi words we knew. Several ‘su layees’es later we had finally decided on the usual items… one missal-paav for the twins, and one dosa, one wada sambaar and one packet of strictly American Cream ‘n’ Onion flavored Lays in sharing for the rest of us.

‘What the hell yaar! The lecture was exceptionally boring today, no?’ the usual chit-chat began.

‘If you will sit for the lecture after so many days, it will obviously be so boring,’ Trupti, the sincerest among us patronized.

‘Ae! Baas ha!’ (Hey! That’s enough!) We all know you are the mostest sincere gal among all of us,’ I said. ‘Now no need to lecture us.’ That evoked several supportive responses from everyone, and a predictable response from Trupti: fury. She hated it when I spoke wrong English… of course only to tease her.

‘What the hell yaar! You don’t sit for the lecture, and then you call sir names!’ she said indignantly.

‘Bh___’ I began to say something, but quickly stopped myself. God! Was it really true then, what my parents and friends and people who knew me said? I couldn’t speak one sentence these days without saying those three words I was trying to get out of the habit of saying.

‘Just go yaar!’ I said finally. I tore the packet of Lays open, and munched noisily on the chips.

‘No, but really, today was utterly boring,’ one of the twins, Rupal, jabbed in. ‘God! My head is aching as if it might split any minute! I so badly need to sleep…’ she said wistfully.
‘Yeah, it was boring,’ said Tejashree. ‘I never thought Shinde-sir could get so boring. Not a single smile! I was literally dozing off. At one point all I wanted to do was get up and leave the class, right on his face.’

‘Shut up!’ Rashmi, the other twin, said suddenly.

‘Ab tujhe kya hua?’ (Now whats wrong with you?)

But Rashmi only nodded. We all looked and saw our Vice Principal walking into the canteen.

‘What the hell! Why is she coming here?’ I mused aloud; and shut up immediately as Trupti elbowed me in the stomach, but not before threatening to murder her as soon as our Vice Principal was out of sight. As we looked at our Vice Principal, our eyes following her everywhere she went, we realised she was headed for the only empty table in the canteen, right next to ours.

This is whats called ‘luck’.

As she came in and sat down, our voices dropped, but the banter kept going.

But just then I sensed; something was going to happen.

Something huge.

Something bad.

I kept putting the thought out of my head. But it kept coming. And so did Trupti’s arguments. God! I so wished I had my camera with me to click a picture of Trupti; she was arguing like her life depended on it.

‘You know what? You have a problem with everyone! You find everyone boring! What the hell! Poor sir was unwell, did you see? His nose was red like a tomato and still he was teaching!’

‘So?’ I answered in a monosyllable.

‘So? What do you mean ‘so’? Our teachers do so much for us. The least we can do is appreciate it.’ Trupti’s voice was going up by a decibel with every word.

‘Ya! So when did I say ‘no’?’

‘Then how can you call him boring?’ she was almost screeching now, to her fullest; or rather to the fullest she could while she struggled to prevent our Vice Principal from hearing it.

And just then, even before I knew it, the dreaded words were out.

‘BHAD MEIN JAA!’

Sound of steel spoon clanking onto plate.

Five pairs of eyes turned in the direction of the sound.

‘Honestly, I can’t do a thing without being clumsy these days,’ we hear the Vice Principal say to another lady sitting in front of her.

I heave a sigh of relief. She hasn’t heard me.

Resumption of all activities.

Some moments pass.

Some minutes pass.

The Vice Principal finally looks like she wants to get up.

She gets up and turns to look at us.

She looks at me, straight at me.

‘Five minutes before I see you in my cabin,’ she says, and I gulp. Damn! So she did hear me! I don’t know what words she is going to shower upon me (I choose not to think about it) but I know one thing for sure… I am damned. Five minutes, or rather four minutes and thirty-seven seconds later (I have a digital watch) I am in her cabin.

‘Welcome!’ she says, with a smile.

Ok.

Either she is mad, or I am imagining things. I swallow. Man! She is angry and she is smiling... should I be scared or relieved?

‘Please take a sit Miss Mrunal Belvalkar…’ she says. I am taken aback to know she knows my full name. In case you are wondering, I am not used to trips to the Vice Principals cabin. ‘You want water?’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Please,’ I add.

A peon appears out of nowhere and puts a glass of water in front of me. I gulp it down. I am about to wipe my mouth to the back of my sleeve, but I check myself and stop short of it. I remove a never-used napkin from my bag and wipe my mouth to it. The Vice Principal looks impressed. She gives me a minute; and I think how I am going to explain it to Dad, least to Mom. Man… what a soup I was in!

‘I guess you know by now why I have called you here, to meet me…’ the Vice Principal said.

I gulped and tried to smile.

‘I had never expected this,’ she continued. ‘Neither had I,’ I thought. What yaar! Why did she have to come and sit in the students’ area in the canteen? And on top of that, why did I have to say it in front of her? Daaaaamn!

‘Your parents will be very proud of you when they hear it,’ she continued. ‘And so am I proud of you.’

Hold it. Hold it hold it hold it. I was now convinced; our Vice Principal is officially mad.

Suddenly she got up. I too automatically got up. She came to my side from across the table and took my hand.

‘Congratulations. You have stood first in the college.’

SHIT.

‘Ma’am but___’

‘But what? Aren’t you happy?’

I try to absorb what she has just said. And then it dawns on me. Today is 27th December. Our results were going to be declared today afternoon! I realise her lips are moving… she is still saying something… but I can hardly hear her! About ten minutes I find myself walking out of her cabin and towards the canteen. My friends are still there.

‘Kya hua?’ (What happened?)

‘Abe bol na! Come on! Speak up!’

‘I am first in college.’

‘What?’

‘F*#@!’

And suddenly everyone (except the five of us) was concerned the roof of the canteen was going to blow up. Suddenly Trupti looked at her watch and said, ‘Oye! We must leave! Its Micro lecture!’ But all I did was wave my hand and shout:

‘BHAD MEIN JAA!’